Background of the Research

E. Objective of the Research

The objectives of the research were to know and describe the students‘ reading comprehension of narrative text through group work technique at SMPN 13 Tangerang Selatan.

F. Significance of the Research

Based on the objective of the research, the significance of the research are expected to give some benefits not only theoretically but also practically go to: - Teacher It is useful for English teachers at second grade class in SMPN 13 Tangerang Selatan to get clearly information about teaching English reading by using group work technique in teaching-learning process. From this, they can get available information that is useful to improve their teaching-learning process. - Student The result of this study is to give an easy technique and it is expected to be useful input for students in learning and understanding narrative text to encourage them to master and improve their reading skill. - Other Researcher The researcher hope this research can be a tool to make a comparison of other similar research particularly to compare some methods which are used to improve the students‘ reading comprehension of English texts especially to improve the comprehension of narrative text. Finally, the teaching learning process will be innovative and effective. 5

CHAPTER II THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

A. Reading Comprehension 1. The Understanding of Reading Reading is one of the basic skills in learning a language. The term reading has many interpretations. As people have different purposes in reading, different point of view about reading, different background knowledge about reading, so there are many definitions about it. For those reasons, reading can be defined in various ways. According to Francoise Grellet in his book entitled Developing Reading Skill, ―Reading is a constant process of guessing, and what one brings to the text is often more i mportant than what one finds in it.‖ 3 Based on the statement from Grellet, reading activity requires the readers to guess and predict about the text is going to be about and the background knowledge had by the reader about mutual thing contained in a text is important. Furthermore, Harmer through his book The Practice of English Language Teaching stated that, Reading is an exercise dominated by the eyes and the brains. The eyes receive message and the brain then has to work out the significance of these message. Unlike a listening text, a reading text moves at the speed of the reader expect where the reader is trying to read an advertisement that flashes past a train window. In other word, it is up to the reader to decide how fast he or she wants to or can read a text, whereas listeners often have to do their best with a text whose speed is chosen by the speaker. 4 3 Francoise Grellet, Developing Reading Skills, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981, p. 7. 4 Jeremy Harmer, The Practice of English Language Teaching, New York: Longman, 1989, p. 153. Sandra Silberstein on her book Techniques and Resources in Teaching Reading defined reading as complex processing skill, ―Reading is a complex processing skill in which the reader interacts with text in order to recreate a meaningful discourse.‖ 5 Richard Allington and Michael Strange also defined, ―Reading as decoding process with the reader processing each letter in turn, producing the appropr iate sounds, and forming words.‖ 6 Another expert, Savage and Mooney defined, ―Reading is a process of moving through printed language to meaning.‖ 7 According to Penny Ur, ―Reading means reading and understanding a foreign language learner who says, ‗I can read the words but I do not know what they mean‘ is not, therefore, reading, in this sense. He or she is merely decoding – translating written symbols into corresponding sounds.‖ 8 Based on the definitions about reading above, reading can be defined as a process that requires people to read and to understand what they read. Reading is also a complex skill that people should do an interaction with text in order to recreate or create a meaningful discourse.

2. The Kinds of Reading

There are two kinds of reading according to Jeremy Harmer. 9 a. Extensive reading The term refers to reading which students do often but not exclusively away from the classrooms. Extensive reading should involve reading for pleasure or 5 Sandra Silberstein, Technique and Resources in Teaching Reading, New York: Oxford University Press, 1994, p. 12. 6 Richard Allington and Michael Strange, Learning Through Reading in the Content Areas, Lexington: D. C. Heath Company, 1980, p. 15. 7 John F. Savage and Jean F. Mooney, Teaching Reading to Children with Special Needs, London: Allyn and Bacon, Inc., 1997, p. 1. 8 Penny Ur, A Course in Language Teaching, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991, p. 138. 9 Jeremy Harmer, How to Teach English, England: Pearson Education, 2007, p. 99.