IMPROVING STUDENTS’ VOCABULARY MASTERY USING EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING (A Classroom Action Research on the Sixth Grade of SDN Banaran 01 in the Academic Year of 2009 2010)

commit to user

IMPROVING STUDENTS’ VOCABULARY MASTERY

USING EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING

(A Classroom Action Research on the Sixth Grade of SDN

Banaran 01 in the Academic Year of 2009/2010)

THESIS By IKE ANISA

S890306018

Submitted to Fulfill One of the Requirements for Getting the Graduate Degree of Education in English

ENGLISH EDUCATION DEPARTMENT GRADUATE SCHOOL

SEBELAS MARET UNIVERSITY SURAKARTA

commit to user

APPROVAL

IMPROVING STUDENTS’ VOCABULARY MASTERY

USING EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING

(A Classroom Action Research on the Sixth Grade of SDN Banaran

01 in the Academic Year of 2009/2010)

IKE ANISA S890306018

This thesis has been approved to be examined by the Board of Thesis Examiners of the English Department, Graduate School of Sebelas Maret University, Surakarta on April 4th, 2011.

Consultant 1 Consultant II

Dr. Ngadiso, M.Pd Dr. Abdul Asib, M.Pd.

NIP. 19621231 198803 1 009 NIP. 19520307 198003 1 005

The Head of English Education of Graduate School Sebelas Maret University of Surakarta

Dr. Ngadiso, M.Pd NIP. 19621231 198803 1 009

commit to user

1

commit to user

Pronouncement

This is to certify that I myself write this thesis entitled “Improving Students’ Vocabulary Mastery Using Experiential Learning (A Classroom Action Research on the Sixth Grade of SDN Banaran 01 in the Academic Year of 2009/2010)”.

It is not a plagiarism or made by others. Anything related to others’ work is written in quotation, the source that is listed on bibliography.

If then this pronouncement proves incorrect, I am ready to accept academic punishment, including the withdrawal or cancellation of my academic degree.

Surakarta, ………….2011

commit to user

Abstract

Ike Anisa. S890306018. IMPROVING STUDENTS’ VOCABULARY MASTERY USING EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING (A Classroom Action Research on the Sixth Grade of SDN Banaran 01 in the Academic Year of 2009/2010). Thesis, Surakarta. English Education Department, Graduate School, Sebelas Maret University. 2011. The Supervisors: (I) Dr. Ngadiso, M.Pd; (II) Dr. Abdul Asib, M.Pd.

This research was conducted because of the low vocabulary mastery of the sixth grade students of SDN Banaran 01 Grogol Sukoharjo in the academic year 2009/2010. The research is aimed at finding out (1) whether the experiential learning method can improve students’ vocabulary mastery; (2) what happens in class when the teacher applies the experiential learning method.

The researcher conducted a classroom action research. The action research was conducted in two cycles. Each cycle consisted of six steps: identifying the problem, planning the action, implementing the action, observing and monitoring the action, reflecting and evaluating the result of the observation, and revising the plan. There are two types of data in the research, namely the numerical and non numerical data which were collected by observation, interview, questionnaire, and test. The numerical data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, finding out the mean scores in the tests and the significant difference of the scores using t-test of non-independent variable. The non-numerical data were analyzed using Constant-comparative technique proposed by Glasser and Corbin consisting of the following steps: (1) comparing incidents applicable to each category; (2) integrating categories and their properties; (3) delimiting the theory; (4) writing the theory.

The result of the study showed that: (1) the use of experiential learning in the class improved students’ vocabulary mastery in terms of: (a) the improvement of understanding meaning; (b) the improvement of pronunciation; (c) the improvement of spelling and (d) the improvement of using the words. (2) experiential learning can improve classroom atmosphere: (a) making the classroom situation more alive; (b) improving students’ confidence, motivation, and involvement in English class.

Related to the research findings above, the researcher wanted to propose some recommendations for the English teacher to apply experiential learning to teach vocabulary. Experiential learning can be a highly effective educational method. Experiential learning can motivate the students, make them pay attention and take part in teaching learning process. Teaching vocabulary using experiential learning can attract students’ interest in learning English and help them to grasp and remember the vocabulary meaning.

commit to user

MOTTO

commit to user

Dedication

This thesis is dedicated to:

Her parents, for their love and pray.

Her beloved husband, Arseto Noorman, ST., for his great love and patience. Her beloved daughter and son, Lintang Maharani and Abyan Surya; who always give her spirit.

Her beloved sisters: Mbak Yay, Mbak Wulan, n Mbak Kris.

The Headmaster of SDN Banaran 01 Grogol, Sukoharjo, Hadi Warsito, S.Pd, who gives the permission to the researcher to conduct the research in the school. All of her friends in SDN Banaran 01 who always give the support to finish this thesis.

commit to user

Acknowledgment

The researcher would like to address her greatest thanks to Allah SWT WHO has given everything that helps the writer to finish this thesis as one of the requirements for achieving the graduate degree of the English education. Without His blessing, help, guidance, and love, the researcher can do nothing. Then, this thesis can never be completed without helps, guidance, and supports from many people. So, the researcher would like to express her great gratitude to:

1. The Director of Graduate School Sebelas Maret University, who gives permission to write the thesis.

2. The Head of the English Education Department, Dr. Ngadiso, M.Pd for giving the researcher the permission to write the thesis.

3. Dr. Ngadiso, M.Pd. and Dr. Abdul Asib, M.Pd., her consultants, for giving her advice and guidance in accomplishing this thesis.

4. Mr. Walimin as her collaborator for his help and advice.

The researcher realizes that this is not perfect. Therefore, she hopes and accepts comment and suggestion. Finally, she truly hopes that this thesis will be useful for the readers.

Surakarta, February 2011

commit to user

TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE ……….. i

APPROVAL ………... ii

LEGITIMATION FROM THE BOARD OF EXAMINERS ……… iii

PRONOUNCEMENT ……… iv

ABSTRACT ………... v

MOTTO ……….. vi

DEDICATION ……… vii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ………. viii

TABLE OF CONTENT ………. ix

LIST OF APPENDICES ……… x

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ………. 1

A. Background of the Study ……….. 1

B.The Problem Statement ………. 7

C.The Objectives of the Study ……….………… 8

D. The Benefit of the Study ………. 8

CHAPTER II REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE ……… 9

A.Vocabulary ……… 9

1. General View of Vocabulary ………. 9

2. Definition of Vocabulary Mastery ………. 11

3. Types of Vocabulary ………. 13

4. Teaching Vocabulary ………. 15

B.Teaching English to the Young Learners ……… 19

1. Definition of the Young Learners ………. 19

2. Characters of the Young Learners ……… 20

3. Teaching English is Elementary School ……... 21

commit to user

C. Experiential Learning ……… 26

1. The Nature of Experiential Learning ………….. 26

2. The Principles in Experiential Learning ……... 29

3. Steps in Teaching of Experiential Learning …… 32

4. Strengths………... 34

5. Weaknesses……….. 35

D. Rationale ……… 36

E. Action Hypothesis ……….. 39

CHAPTER III RESEARCH METHODOLOGY ………... 40

A. The Time and Place of Research ……… 40

B. The Subject of the Study ……… 40

C. Research Design ………. 41

1. The Nature of Action Research ……….…. 41

2. The Model of Action Research ……….…. 43

3. The Procedure of Action Research ………….... 44

D. Data Sources ….……….. 46

E. The Technique of Collecting the Data ………….. 47

F. Technique of Analyzing Data ……….. 49

CHAPTER IV THE RESULT OF THE STUDY ……….…. 51

A. Introduction ……….. 51

B. Research Finding ……….. 53

C. Cycle 1 ………..… 54

1. Identifying the Problem ………..… 54

2. Planning the Action ……… 55

3. Implementing the Action ……… 56

4. Observing the Action ………..…..……. 67

5. Reflecting of Cycle 1 ………..…..……. 70

6. Revising the Plan ………..……..…... 73

D. Cycle 2 ………..…… 75

commit to user

2. Planning the Action ………... 75

3. Implementing the Action ………...…… 76

4. Observing the Action ………....……. 85

5. Reflecting of Cycle 2 ………....….… 89

E. Discussion ……….……... 92

CHAPTER V CONCLUSIONS, IMPICATIONS, AND SUGGESTIONS ………..……. 100

A. Conclusions ………..………. 100

B. Implications ………..………. 101

C. Suggestions ……….…….. 102 BIBLIOGRAPHY

commit to user

LIST OF APPENDICES

Appendix 1 Blue Print Angket Motivasi Belajar ……….. 106

Appendix 2 Angket Motivasi Belajar ……… 107

Appendix 3 Table of Questionnaire ………... 110

Appendix 4 Questionnaire of Students Perception about the Action……... 111

Appendix 5 Blue Print of Pre Test ………. 112

Appendix 6 Pre Test Material ……… 113

Appendix 7 The Result of Validity and Reliability……… 116

Appendix 8 Lesson Plan for Cycle 1 (First meeting) ………. 120

Appendix 9 Lesson Plan for Cycle 1 (Second meeting) ………. 123

Appendix 10 Lesson Plan for Cycle 1 (Third meeting) ……… 126

Appendix 11 Worksheet for Cycle 1 (First Meeting) ………. 129

Appendix 12 Worksheet for Cycle 1 (Second Meeting)………. 132

Appendix 13 Worksheet for Cycle 1 (Third Meeting) ……… 134

Appendix 14 Lesson Plan for Cycle 2 (First meeting) ……….…… 136

Appendix 15 Lesson Plan for Cycle 2 (Second meeting) …..………... 139

Appendix 16 Lesson Plan for Cycle 2 (Third meeting) …..……….. 142

Appendix 17 Worksheet for Cycle 2 (First Meeting) ……… 145

Appendix 18 Worksheet for Cycle 2 (Second Meeting) ………... 147

Appendix 19 Worksheet for Cycle 2 (Third Meeting) ……….. 148

Appendix 20 Blue Print of Post Test Cycle 1 ………..……. 149

Appendix 21 Post Test of Cycle 1………. 150

Appendix 22 Blue Print of Post Test of Cycle 2..………. 153

Appendix 23 Post Test of Cycle 2 ……… 154

Appendix 24 The Result of Pre-Test Scores……….……….. 156

Appendix 25 The Computation of the Score in Cycle 1.……….. 157

Appendix 26 The Computation of the Score in Cycle 2.……….. 158

commit to user

Appendix 28 The Computation of the Scores in Cycle 1 ……… 160

Appendix 29 The Computation of the Scores in Cycle 2………. 161

Appendix 30 Picture of Teaching and Learning Process ………. 162

Appendix 31 Interview Notes ……….. 165

commit to user

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the Study

As everybody knows, all countries in the world use English as an international language. It plays an important role in every aspect of human life such as communication, education, science, and technology. English is mostly used in the world. English is mostly used in scientific fields such as science and technology. There are so many books that are written in English, especially in educational fields, from elementary school to college. Because of the reasons, teaching English should be given from the beginning, it should be given when the students sit in the elementary school

or in kindergarten. In Indonesia, English is the first foreign language which is taught

formally from the junior high school to the university level. However, nowadays, English is taught in some elementary schools, and even in the lower level such as kindergarten and play groups. It means children are introduced to English earlier. It is hoped that they will learn English more naturally as they learn their mother tongue, besides it will be the basis for the students to learn English in the higher level. According to Halliwel (1992: p. 3), children come to primary school with this ability already highly developed.

A number of elementary schools in Indonesia have begun to introduce English into their curriculum as a local content. It is clearly stated in the curriculum of elementary education. “… pelajaran bahasa Inggris tidak diwajibkan di Sekolah Dasar melainkan sebagai muatan lokal.” (GBPP Muatan Lokal SD Bahasa Inggris (1995: p. 1).

At elementary school, English is introduced to the students through learning its vocabulary because vocabulary is the most important element that will become the basic competence in order to get other competences like listening, speaking, reading, and writing. If the students have mastered a number of vocabularies required in their level, it will be easier for them to master those elements in English learning. Hardjono defines: “Dari semua aspek dasar bahasa asing yang harus dikuasai siswa dalam proses belajar, aspek kosakata yang paling penting tanpa penguasaannya tidak mungkin orang biasa menggunakan bahasa asing.” (1998: p. 71). It means vocabulary is essential thing that has to be learned by the students in order to master English well.

Hatch and Brown (1995: p. 1) state that vocabulary is the foundation to build language which plays a fundamental role in communication. It means that vocabulary is the first priority in learning English.

As the basic component of the four language skills, vocabulary has to be mastered by the learners. Vocabulary is the main point to learn English. Without it a student will get difficulty to learn English. In elementary school, vocabulary is the first step to learn English. By knowing

the vocabulary from the beginning the children will get a lot of knowledge and will not get difficulties in mastering language skills. Thus, vocabulary should be on the first priority in the English language teaching and learning. Vocabulary mastery has always been an essential part of English as foreign language. There is no doubt that vocabulary mastery plays an important role in the four language skills. They are listening, speaking, reading, and writing. All four aspects are interrelated. But before students master all aspects, they must master vocabulary first. Vocabulary must not be neglected by anyone who learns English.

From the importance of vocabulary above, teachers should give serious attention in teaching vocabulary especially to the children, because it is a crucial thing in learning English. To teach vocabulary in elementary school is not easy. There is a difference between teaching children and teaching adults. Teachers must have extra power to teach them and the children have certain characteristics and need a certain treatment. It is also the first chance of learning a foreign language. So the teacher should find the best or the effective method to teach English vocabulary.

To teach English, especially in Elementary School, teachers will face some problems during the teaching learning process. Even though, teachers have their own priority to manage their classroom, as Richards states “teachers have primary responsibility for how they teach; they may assume very different roles within their own classroom (1994: p. 97).” So, teachers should make their classroom more comfortable and interesting, especially

teaching English in Elementary School. Here, problems always occur when teaching English is applied in Elementary School students. This can be proven from pre research in the sixth grade students of SDN Banaran 01 Grogol Sukoharjo. From the pre research, the researcher found that the students’ vocabulary mastery is low. It is because the students get difficulties in mastering vocabulary. They are: (1) the students get difficulties in grasping and memorizing the meaning of the words; (2) they found it hard to spell the words correctly; and (3) they get difficulties in pronouncing the words correctly; and (4) they get difficulties in using vocabulary in a sentence.

They are able to use the vocabulary if they know the meaning, how to pronounce, how to spell, and how to use them in a sentence. Knowing the meaning of some words does not merely know its translation in different language. Knowing means understanding how the words are put in different contexts and used differently. For example: good morning. The students not only know that good morning is selamat pagi but they can greet someone in the morning using good morning.

How to pronounce can be understood from pronouncing the words correctly. Students can distinguish the slightly different words such as, tree and three. English has more complex pronunciation than Bahasa Indonesia, and it often becomes a problem.

How to spell means that the students are able to spell the words. It will be difficult thing when the words are similar to the others. For example:

sea and see. Usually, it is tightly connected with knowing of words. When students understand the word, they will be able to indicate whether to spell sea or see.

How to use words is an ability to use or to apply the words either in spoken or written. For example: a student says, “jump to the left” when the teacher says “jump”. In another occasion, the student says: “jump to the chair ”. In this case, of course, the student has already understood how to use the word jump in different contexts.

By conducting observation and interview, the researcher found some psychological barriers from the students. They feel shy and afraid to ask the teacher if they find a difficulty. These problems may give a great influence to their learning process.

The other reason that causes of the students’ failure is the teacher’s teaching method. He/she is not creative when teaching the foreign language to children. Sometimes it makes the students get bored and they also feel that the teaching method doesn’t give more chances to them to internalize the words in their memory.

In teaching English in Elementary School the method which is used should be communicative and suited to the students’ characteristics as the children. It is aimed to create the teaching learning process which is interesting and comforting to the students so that they can reach the learning goal and English becomes a more attractive subject for them.

From the reason above, the researcher suggests experiential learning method as the solution. Experiential learning method can be used in teaching vocabulary to make the teaching learning process much interesting and fun. It will increase students’ interest in learning process in the classroom, because the circumstances become more interesting. It is suitable with the characteristics of the young learners who like playing and talking about ‘here and now’ so experiential learning can be helpful in teaching vocabulary. Brown states that experiential learning is an especially useful concept for teaching children, whose abstract intellectual processing abilities are not yet mature (2001: p. 238).

There are some experiential learning that could be proved effective to apply for the elementary students as “Role Play”, here the students are in groups, and each group must take the topic/problem paper which is prepared by the teacher, and then they do role play with their groups based on the situation from the topic/problem paper they had chosen. Another experiential learning that could be proved effective is “Roulete” (The teacher flies a paper plane and when the paper plane lands on one student, he/she must answer the question from the teacher). Then, if the student can answer the question they will get score. He/she has a chance to fly the paper to his/her friend, and he/she can give a question to his friend. But if the student can’t answer the question, she/he must be punished.

From the explanation above, it is not doubtful that the researcher chooses experiential learning because it has some strengths as follows:

a. Helping learners involve actively in the learning process.

b. Providing a challenge which encourages learners to stretch themselves (in order to answer the question).

c. Helping learners to forget they are studying: they lose themselves in the fun activity of the learning process.

d. Encouraging collaborative learning: By having active interaction among members of a group, learners are demanded to involve in real communication.

Based on the reasons above, the researcher wants to use experiential learning method as the method to improve student’s vocabulary mastery. The researcher is interested in carrying out a study on “Improving Students’ Vocabulary Mastery Using Experiential Learning (A Classroom Action Research on the Sixth Grade of SDN Banaran 01 in the Academic Year of 2009/2010).

B. The Problem Statement

Based on the background of the study above, the researcher focuses on a certain problem related to the efforts to overcome students’ difficulties or problems in vocabulary mastery. In this case, the problem can be formulated as follows:

1. Can the experiential learning improve students’ vocabulary mastery? 2. What happens in class when the teacher applies the experiential learning

C. The Objectives of the Study

This research is aimed to improve students’ vocabulary mastery. In details, this research has the objectives as follows:

1. To know whether the experiential learning method can improve students’ vocabulary mastery.

2. To know what happens in class when the teacher applies the experiential learning method.

D. The Benefits of the Study

The study result is expected to be able to give some benefits for the teachers, students, and the other researcher. For the students, with the students’ high vocabulary it is expected that they will be able to grasp the meaning of words easily and also improve their reading, speaking, and writing skills. Furthermore, the students will be motivated to learn English.

For the teachers, it is hoped that the result of the study will be one of the considerations taken by teachers of Elementary School in teaching vocabulary. For the school, it is expected that this new method of teaching vocabulary will enrich teaching techniques in this school.

For the other researcher, this research is expected to be able to give practical contributions to the other researcher on how to improve the students’ vocabulary mastery using experiential learning.

commit to user

CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

A. Vocabulary

1. General View of Vocabulary

In general, students interpret vocabulary only as a matter of words, as Burn and Broman (1975: p. 27) state that vocabulary is the stock of words used by person, class or profession to state their idea. They also state that almost every individual uses several different vocabularies, they are often designated as hearing, speaking, reading, and writing. Words are symbols of ideas, one needs facility in the use of words. In this definition they try to see the meaning of vocabulary from the general point of view

Sometimes students perceive that vocabulary is only the words and their meanings. They actually need to know the nature of vocabulary and whatever is related to vocabulary in order to make them recognize the importance of vocabulary, because vocabulary is central to language and of critical importance to typical language learner. It means that vocabulary is an important thing for learners to master vocabulary. Without a sufficient vocabulary, one cannot communicate effectively or express ideas in both oral and written forms.

According to Hornby, vocabulary is the total numbers of words in a language and vocabulary is a list of words with their meanings (1995: p. 131). It means that vocabulary is a number of words along with the meaning

in a language that is known by a person. Here, words are symbols that represent, either physical object or idea. Dealing with the vocabulary Ur states that vocabulary can be defined, roughly, as the words we teach in the foreign language. However, new item of vocabulary may be more than a single word (1996: p. 60).

Meanwhile vocabulary mastery has always been an essential part of English as a foreign language. There is no doubt that vocabulary mastery is the basic in learning English. Here, the word mastery can be defined as a test assessing performance on an objective (Gagne, Briggs, and Wager, 1992: p. 262). Furthermore, Zimmerman (in Cody and Huckin, 1997: p. 5) states that “vocabulary is central to language and critical importance to the tipycal language learning”. Vocabulary should not be neglected by those who learn a language. It even needs to be mastered if someone wants to master the four language skills. Inadequate vocabulary obstructs students’ development in learning English.

Furthermore, Thornbury (2002: p.130) states some characteristics of what is called as ‘knowing a word’, he says: knowing a words means knowing:

· The word’s form – both spoken and written · The word’s meaning ( or meanings )

· _{Any connotations the word might have}

· Whether the word is specific to a certain register or style · The word’s grammatical characteristics – e.g. part of speech

· The word’s common collocations · _{The word’s derivations}

· The word’s relative frequency’

Those aspects can be realized receptively (in listening and reading) or productively (in speaking and writing). A good vocabulary test needs to consider the multidimensional characters of them.

It can be concluded that vocabulary is a total numbers or a list of words as symbols of ideas of a foreign language text or grammar which are needed to express the idea.

2. Definition of Vocabulary Mastery

Vocabulary is an essential element of English as a foreign language. Having mastered a large number of vocabularies we will likely be able to express our ideas in the language conveniently. It is true that vocabulary plays an important role in learning and understanding the language. Hence, vocabulary is important that the teaching of it should be carried out as well as possible in English language teaching at elementary schools.

Vocabulary mastery plays an important role in learning a language. There are some definitions of mastery that are proposed by experts. Swannel (1994: p. 656) defines mastery as comprehensive knowledge. This definitions is supported by Hornby who states that mastery is complete knowledge or complete skill (1995: p. 721). According to Culson (1987: p.

1050), mastery is skill to use the knowledge. It means that mastery is ability to use one’s knowledge.

Mastery means natural or acquired facility in a specific activity: ability, adeptness, art, command, craft, expertise, expertness, knack, proficiency, skill, technique (http://www.answers.com/topic/mastery). It can be said that mastery is possession of skill, ability, and technique in conducting a certain activity.

From these definitions, it can be concluded that mastery means the skill to understand, use, and apply something learned. Meanwhile, the definition of vocabulary is a total number of words in a certain language used to express meaning. Thus, vocabulary mastery can be defined as the ability to understand and use the knowledge dealing with a list of words in certain language to express meaning.

Vocabulary mastery can be shown through four major skills, which are defined as writing, speaking, reading, and listening. Ideally, someone who has high vocabulary mastery can recognize meaning of words both in written and spoken forms. She can also pronounce it well, relate to appropriate object or concept, and know how to combine it with other words.

Here, vocabulary mastery deals with words and meaning. The teacher should select and classify the words according to the level of the students in a certain way so the students will learn them easily. The teacher

has to present the meaning of words in a way that is comprehensive to the students.

From the explanation above vocabulary mastery means an ability to use words in conducting communication, and students understand the set of words. It can also be said that the set of words likely to be used by those students when constructing new sentences.

It can be concluded that the success in learning English required vocabulary mastery. Indeed, having mastered a large vocabulary cannot guarantee learners’ competence in learning English but it is true that inadequate vocabulary minimizes the chances to succeed in learning English.

3. Types of Vocabulary

Thorndike and Lorge (in Nation, 1990: p. 19) classify types of vocabulary as follows:

Types of vocabulary

Numbers of words

Frequency Coverage of text Implications for teaching and learning High – frequency words 2,000 Occur freuently

About 87% of the running words in a text

Spend a lot of time on these words. Make sure they are learned.

Academic vocabulary Technical vocabulary Low – frequency words 800 About 1,000 to 2, 000 for each subject

About 123,000

Occur frequently in most kinds of academic texts Occur, sometimes frequently in specialized texts

Do not occur very

frequently

About 8% of the running words in academic texts

About 3% of the running words in a specialized texts

About 2% or more of the words in any texts

If learners are in upper secondary school or in tertiary education.

Based on the table above, teacher needs to decide which groups of the words that their learners need. This is an important decision because it will affect the amount of learning expected and it will affect the type of learning, receptive or productive.

4. Teaching Vocabulary

Teaching in early stage or in the primary school is very essential. Teacher should give certain attention in teaching vocabulary and decide the area of words that become the basic need for the pupil. Burns and Browman say that the teacher must give attention to develop the vocabularies of each child through carefully planned instruction and to do so, he or she must be aware of what words are and how they are formed (1975: p. 295). In further explanation Burns and Broman (1975: p. 296) also explains:

Since vocabulary development is so closely related to abstract thinking, the teacher is concerned with number, the breath, and the dept of concept with which pupils have some acquaintance. For concept development, the individual should have actual experience with the concrete object, person, idea, and event-mainly through sense impressions.

It is undeniable that most learners’ vocabulary grows through incidental learning such as through continuous exposure to comprehensible language in reading, speaking, and writing exercises (Krashen in Fauziati, 2005: p. 155). Anyhow, this does not mean that explicit vocabulary instruction is less important to foreign language learners. Even though they are keen readers with different materials, they take a lot of benefits from direct vocabulary instruction. They can effectively expand their vocabulary knowledge.

It has been so far that vocabulary is very important for second language learners, only with a sufficient vocabulary learners can effectively express their ideas both in oral and written form. Thus, they should have

good ideas how to expand their vocabulary so that they can improve their interest in learning.

Knowing some principles on the way one’s vocabulary develops in relations to memory will make us aware of the particular teaching methods suitable for vocabulary teaching and learning. By using appropriate method to learn new vocabulary, students will find it useful and interesting.

According to Ur (1998: p. 60 - 62) there are some aspects of vocabulary that both teacher and learners must give their attention to, they are as follows:

a. Form

Here, the mastery of vocabulary involves the mastery of pronunciation and spelling. The learner has to know how the word is sounded and how the word is spelled. In teaching, the teacher needs to make sure that both these aspects are accurately presented and learned.

b. Grammar

The grammar of a new word needs to be taught if this is not obviously covered by general grammatical rules. A word may have an unpredictable change of form in certain grammatical contexts. It is important to provide learners with the information at the same time the teacher teaches the base form of a word.

c. Collocation

The collocation typical of particular items is another factor that makes a particular combination sound ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in a given context. So this is another piece of information about a new item which may be worth teaching. Collocation is also often noted in dictionaries, either by providing the whole collocation under one of the head-words, or by a note in parenthesis.

d. Aspect of meaning

1) Denotation, connotation, appropriateness

Denotation is the meaning of a word that primarily refers to the real world. It is often the sort of definition in dictionary. Meanwhile, a less obvious component of the meaning of an item is its connotation, the associations, or positive or negative feelings it evokes, which may or may not be indicated in a dictionary definition.

Besides denotation and connotation, an aspect of meaning that also needs to be taught is whether a particular item is appropriate one to use in a certain context or not. It is useful for a learner to know that a certain word is very common, or relatively rare, or ‘taboo’ in polite conversation, or tends to be used in writing but not in speech, or is more suitable for formal than informal situation, or belongs to a certain dialect.

a) Meaning relationship

How the meaning of one item relates to the meaning of others can also be useful in teaching. There are various such relationship, they are: synonyms (item that mean the same or nearly the same); antonyms (items that mean the opposite); hyponyms (item that serve as specific examples of a general concept); hyponyms or co-ordinates (other items that are the same kind of thing); super-ordinates (general concepts that cover specific items); and translation (words or expression in the learners’ mother tongue that are equivalent in meaning to the item being taught).

e. Word formation

Vocabulary items, whether one-word or multi-word, can often be broken down into their components exactly how these words are put together is another piece of useful information. Teachers may teach the common prefixes and suffixes. However, they should be warned that in many common words, the affixes no longer have any obvious connection with their root meaning. Another way vocabulary items are built is by combining two words to make one item.

From that discussion above, it can be concluded that vocabulary mastery is a complete skill to understand and apply the stocks of words. It constitutes an essential thing that students have in order to be able to listen,

read, write and speak. There are some indicators of vocabulary mastery: pronunciation, spelling, meaning, and using vocabulary especially to make simple sentences, which are used by the researcher to conduct teaching vocabulary and used in testing the students’ vocabulary mastery.

B. Teaching English to the Young Learners 1. Definition of the Young Learners

The young of all species play and learn with their experience in real. It is their way of learning to live in society. When children are doing experience and play, they learn a multiplicity of concepts, skills, understanding, and attitudes simultaneously, and they draw relationship among concepts. For example, when children build with blocks, they are concerned with the shapes, sizes, and relationship, or when they are doing experience in their life by knowing what happens in surrounding they are concerned with their feelings. Doing experience by themselves, they face problem with construction, share materials with others, and communicate their ideas and feelings.

In order to maximize learning children need to be able to do experience and play. When a child learns through experience, the learning becomes internalized and remains a part of his or her being. Also when the children are seriously interested on their experience, they observe carefully and become familiar with the properties of materials he or she is using.

2. Characteristics of the Young Learners

Several characteristics attached to children are that children like playing, talking about “here and now, and understand and retain the meaning better when they have seen some objects associated with them.

a. Children like playing

One characteristic of children is that they love playing, they do like playing. Children like playing and learn things while playing. The implication to language teaching is that experiential learning by doing games or role play are effective ways for teaching language.

b. The children talk about “here and now”

Adults both observe and impose the cooperative principle when they talk to young children. They make what they say relevant, talk about the “here and now” of the child’s world. They encourage the children to take their turns and make their contributions to the conversation. They make sure that children make their contributions truthful by correcting them (Clark and Clark in Fauziati, 2002: p. 171).

The phenomena imply that the children’s world involves around the here and now. Therefore, they should not be asked to discuss abstract things or life and situation in the past or in the future. In other words, children’s interest is narrower, restricted primarily to themselves, their immediate surrounding, their families, and friends.

Teaching and learning process, therefore, should give enough opportunities for them to use English in every day contexts. Children learn by doing, they learn language by using it, listening to it, speaking it, and writing it.

c. Association and memory

Children understand and retain the meaning better when they have seen some objects associated with it. For this reason, the teacher should expose the students to real life situations. With their experience in real life they can learn English effectively.

3. Teaching English in Elementary School

Like other profession, teaching requires a long and difficult period of academic preparation, legal recognition, and social responsibility. Teaching children is different from teaching adult because they have special characteristics. The teachers are demanded to be active and creative in teaching young learners. They should explore their abilities and competences. One of the ways is by using everything in environment to help success of teaching and learning process in order to be more effective.

There are some elements that should be learned in learning a foreign language especially English, one of them is vocabulary. It is very important because people can’t express their thought and understand other’s thought if they don’t have enough vocabulary. The same perception is also stated by

Gattegno (in Richards and Rodgers, 2003: pp. 37 and 82). He pinpoints that in language learning, vocabulary is seen as a central dimension and the choice of it is very crucial. This is supported by Palmer (in Thornbury, 2002: p. 30) who says that vocabulary is one of the most important aspects of foreign language learning and the essential component of reading proficiency.

Teaching English vocabulary in primary school is very crucial. It is stated by Burn and Broman (1975: p. 295) that the teacher must give attention to develop the vocabulary of each child through carefully planned instruction and to do so, she must be aware of what words are and how they are formed.

Here, the success of language teaching not only depends on the teachers’ and the students’ competence but also on the method of teaching vocabulary. There are many methods of teaching vocabulary. Not all the methods are helpful for the students. In this case the teacher has to choose the appropriate method.

Burns and Broman (1980: p. 297 – 305) propose numerous methods to develop children’s vocabulary such as the following:

a. Firsthand experience

A varied background of firsthand experience, field trips, and excursions is profitable at all grade levels. Concrete experience permits the word to be associated with real situation: consequently, school should try to extend the experience of the children. The nature and quality of the

educative experiences that children meet both inside and outside the classroom are primary factors that determine speaking, writing, reading, and hearing vocabularies.

b. Books

Books are other significant sources of vocabulary growth, particularly books that provoke questions and discussion. Pupils need a variety of interesting, easy to read books so that new words and ideas can be learned from the context.

c. Context clues

Children who read extensively can learn many words just through use of context. Wide reading provides the opportunities for context to illuminate words meaning when it is essential to the on-flow of thought. Through a variety of reading material, the reader can begin to recognize subtleties and varied meanings of words.

d. Visual and other instructional aids and materials

Visual aids should be utilized frequently, not only to illustrate the words that have been used but to suggest other words. Individuals are helped in their word selection by special illustrative sentences, pictures and illustrations, or explanation that dramatizes the meaning of particular word.

e. Context areas

In every subject field, teachers should develop vocabulary carefully. The vocabulary problem is more acute in textbook than it is in general

reading material. The selection of textbook that avoid complicated verbiage and explain new terms clearly when they are introduced is one important way of reducing the vocabulary problem to teachable proportions.

f. Oral and written expressions

Teachers should encourage variety in oral and written expression. A conscious effort needs to be made by the teacher to encourage use of words that express thought exactly, rather than words that perform omnibus service.

g. Teacher-model

The teacher can use new words, sometimes in reading aloud, sometimes in providing explanations. Particularly in the primary years, when most pupils are occupied with developing recognition of words already in their understanding, reading and speaking vocabulary, the teacher need to read and tells many stories to the group. In reading to children it is inadvisable to simplify the vocabulary. After reading a new story, new words may be discussed and in later retelling or dramatization, the use of the new words should be encouraged. Pupils are great imitators and if the teacher employs good vocabulary, they tend to approach his levels of expression.

All of those presentation methods, either singly or in combination are useful ways of introducing new words. To make the words memorable, the teacher should use a suitable method to teach vocabulary

for the children. In this research, the researcher chooses experiential learning as a method to improve the students’ vocabulary mastery.

In applying experiential learning, the researcher used firsthand experience method to teach vocabulary. Because it can be a highly effective educational method. There are many benefits for language and learning. These include: new knowledge, increased language proficiency, new vocabulary (specialist and general), literacy learning - for the young this will include simple concepts of print, new words, and a growing grasp of sentence structure, etc. whereas for the older child this can extend knowledge of new written genres, writing for new audiences, growing reading and research skills, a stimulus to creativity, and increased interest in learning.

4. Procedure of Teaching Vocabulary

In teaching vocabulary teacher can devise additional frame of word lesson for students who need added experience. The procedure of teaching vocabulary can be divided into three stages, they are as follows :

a. Presentation

In this stage, teacher can use various methods and technique, which are recommended in the previous discussion. However, teachers have to be careful in selecting the methods that they use in teaching activity. Dealing with this, teachers must consider about the

student’s need of vocabulary, the area of vocabulary, which is appropriate with the students level and how the vocabulary can be stored in the student’s brain.

b. Practice

In the second stage, the teacher gives exercises to his students in order to practice the subject items. Completion, matching, etc. are several types of exercises that can be used by the teacher in this stage.

c. Production

In this stage the students are expected to apply the newly learned vocabulary through the speaking activities or writing activities.

C. Experiential Learning

1. The Nature of Experiential Learning

Experiential learning is learning through reflection on doing. Here, experiential learning focuses on the learning process for the individual. Keeton and Tate (in Brown, 2000: p. 239) state:

“ The learner is directly in touch with the realities being studied. It is contrasted with learning in which the learner only reads about, hears about, talks about, or writes about the realities but never comes in contract with them as part of the learning process … It involves direct encounter with the phenomenon being studied rather than merely thinking about the encounter or only considering the possibility of doing something with it.”

According to Brown (2000: p. 238) experiential learning includes activities that engage both left – and right – brain processing, that contextualize language, that integrate skills, and that point toward authentic, real world purposes. It means that experiential learning is constructivist learning, where students are active learners, constructing their own knowledge, rather than observing the demonstrative behavior of a teacher. Because experiential learning is active learning, students more readily understand what they are learning and thus retain the knowledge to a greater degree than when merely having information presented to them by another. The hands-on nature of experiential learning is highly motivating for students. Such learning may involve one or more of the following instructional strategies:

• experiments, • field observations, • field trips,

• focused imaging, • games,

• model building, • role plays, • simulations, and • surveys

From the model of experiential learning above one of the examples is field trips, here we can borrow students going to the zoo and learning through observation and interaction with the zoo environment, as opposed to reading about animals from a book. Thus, one makes discoveries and experiments with knowledge firsthand, instead of hearing or reading about others' experiences.

Another example of experiential learning is playing game and learning through it. Children usually like playing and game is effective way to discover and experiment everything in their surrounding and it also an effective way to teaching English especially vocabulary for the children.

In this research IA used games and role plays to improve the students’ vocabulary mastery, because by learning through games, the students are more actively involved in the experience, can interact with others, more creative, conducive, can improve the learners’ spirit and learning through fun helps the learner to retain the lessons for a longer period.

Role plays is also used in teaching vocabulary because most educators understand the important role experience plays in the learning process. A fun learning environment, with plenty of laughter and respect for the learner's abilities, also fosters an effective experiential learning environment. It is vital that the individual is encouraged to directly involve

themselves in the experience, in order that they gain a better understanding of the new knowledge and retain the information for a longer time.

2. The Principles in Experiential Learning

Brown (2000: p. 238) highlights for us that experiential learning is giving the students concrete experiences through which they “discover” language principles by trial and error, by processing feedback, by building hypotheses about language and by revising these assumptions in order to become fluent.

Using Experiential learning in teaching vocabulary can be fitted to the real situation in the classroom. To be said knowing vocabulary, students have to know the meaning, the spelling, the pronunciation, and the use of the words. In order to equip the students in those four aspects.

In experiential learning, immediate personal experience is seen as the focal point for learning, giving ‘life, texture, and subjective personal meaning to abstract concepts and at the same time providing a concrete, publicly shared reference point for testing the implications and validity of ideas created during the learning process ( Kolb in Nunan 1993: p. 14).

Here, in grasping experience some of us perceive new information through experiencing the concrete, tangible, felt qualities of the world, relying in our senses and immersing ourselves in concrete reality. Others tend to perceive, grasp or take hold of new information through symbolic representation or abstract conceptualization – thinking about, analyzing, or

systematically planning, rather than using sensation as a guide. Similarly, in transforming or processing experience some of us tend to carefully watch others who are involved in the experience and reflect on what happens, while others choose to jump right in and start doing things. The watchers favor reflective observation, while the doers favor active experimentation.

Here, Kolb (in Nunan, 1993: p. 16) figures the general theoretical model of experience into four stages of orientation to learning: concrete experience, abstract conceptualization, reflective observation, and active experimentation.

1) Concrete experience

with an involvement in personal experiences and an emphasis on feeling of over thinking. This is an ‘artistic’ orientation relying on intuitive decision-making.

2) Abstract conceptualization

using logic and a systematic approach to problem-solving, with an emphasis on thinking, manipulation of abstract symbols and a tendency to neat and precise conceptual system.

3) Reflective observation

focusing on understanding the meanings of ideas and situations by careful observation, being concerned with how things happen by attempting to see them from different perspective and relying on one’s own thoughts, feeling and judgment.

4) Active experimentation

with an emphasis on practical applications and getting things done, influencing people and changing situations, and taking risk in order to accomplish things.

According to the model above, experiential learning is seen as four basic stages. Thus, simple everyday experience is not sufficient for learning. It must be observed and analyzed consciously. It can be argued, that theoretical concepts will not become part of the individual’s frame of reference until they have been experienced meaningfully on a subjective emotional level. Reflection plays an important role in this process by providing a bridge between experience and theoretical conceptualization. The process of learning is seen as the recycling of experience at deeper levels of understanding and interpretation. This view entails the idea of lifelong learning.

In conclusion, experiential learning will give a significant contribution to the success of teaching learning process. They have a great power in motivating and stimulating the students. The teacher, therefore, is encouraged to use experiential learning in teaching the students, especially to young learners to teach vocabulary.

3. Steps in Teaching Vocabulary using Experiential Learning in the Classroom

In the classroom the teacher and students take on roles similar to that of the parent and child respectively. Teacher introduces the learners to the topic and covering basic material that the learner must know beforehand. The activity may be a simple game, simulation or may involve more complex grammar and more detailed scenarios. Experiential learning can be used to practice and teach various things. It is well suited to teaching classroom language and other vocabulary connected with actions. It can be used to teach imperatives and various tenses and aspects. It is also useful for role plays. http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index. php?title= Experiential Learning#Weaknesses.2FCriticisms

Experiential learning is largely about movement. By introducing the learners’ knowledge to the topic, they learn verbs and many kinds of nouns, learning increases and stress decreases. However, it is recognized that experiential learning is most useful for beginners, though it can be used at higher levels where preparation becomes an issue for the teacher. It does not give students the opportunity to express their own thoughts in a creative way. The following are some steps to integrate experiential learning in the classroom:

a. Aspect of meaning

1) Teacher explains in native language about the rule of experiential learning by introducing the topic, that is the students just listen and

need not to speak at first. They have to act out the commands from the teacher.

2) Teacher asks some students to come to the front of the room and sit with her/him in chairs that are lined up facing the other students. Other students listen and watch.

3) Teacher gives some nouns and various commands beginning with verbs while doing them together with some students.

4) Teacher allows the students to mention the words and to do the instructions.

5) Then, teacher asks one of the students to mention and perform the instructions alone.

6) Teacher approaches the other students who have been sitting observing her/him and the volunteers and gives the same commands. 7) The students follow the teacher’s action.

8) After the students master the instructions and some nouns, the teacher gives the new ones as the steps above.

9) Teacher turns to the rest of the class and gives the commands randomly to the students.

10) The last step, teacher writes the new commands on the blackboard. Each time she/he writes a command, she acts it out.

11) The students copy the sentences from the blackboard into the notebooks.

b. Aspect of spelling

1) The teacher asks the students to write the words and the instructions on the board.

2) The teacher asks students to spell the words along with her. 3) The teacher asks the students randomly to spell the words alone. c. Aspect of pronunciation

1) The teacher asks a student to play the game and practice the dialogue.

2) Then, the students play the games and practice the dialogue. 3) From the first student, teacher can check the pronunciation, and

from the second student, teacher can check whether the meaning is correct.

d. Aspect of using word

1) The teacher asks the students to make new imperative sentences spoken or written using the same words on the board.

2) The teacher asks the students to practice using their sentences.

4. Strengths

Kolb in Nunan (1993: p. 24-25 proposes that there are some strengths of experiential learning which enable students to improve their achievement. The strengths are as follows:

1. Helping learners involve actively in the learning process.

2. Providing a challenge which encourages learners to stretch themselves (in order to answer the question).

3. Helping learners to forget they are studying: they lose themselves in the fun activity of the learning process.

4. Encouraging collaborative learning: By having active interaction among members of a group, learners are demanded to involve in real communication.

5. Weaknesses

Despite having the strengths, experiential learning also has weaknesses when it is applied in teaching vocabulary. There are some weaknesses as stated by Kolb in Nunan (1993: p. 34-37).

1) The concrete experience part of the learning cycle is not appropriately explained in the theory and remains largely unexplored.

2) The idea of immediate and concrete experience is problematic and unrealistic..

3) The ELT concepts are too ill-defined and open to various interpretations.

4) ELT model is only an attempt to explain the societal benefit.

5) The experience is the starting point of knowledge acquisition and disregards the observations concerning the subjective reality of the learner

6) The ELT learning model focused on the learning process for a single learner and failed to mention how the individual fit into a social group during this process and what role this group may play. Also, there was no discussion on how a social group may gain knowledge through a common experience.

D. Rationale

The greatest difficulty faced by the students in learning English is vocabulary mastery. In fact, vocabulary is an essential part to master the four language skills, namely listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Therefore, to master a language easily, the students should have a stock of vocabulary. In elementary school vocabulary has become the first priority that has to be taught to the young learners.

Problems always occur when teaching English is applied in Elementary School students. This can be proven from a pre research which was concluded in the sixth grade students of SDN Banaran 01 Grogol Sukoharjo. From the pre research, the researcher found that the students’ vocabulary mastery is low and the students get difficulties in mastering vocabulary as follows: (1) the students got difficulties in grasping and memorizing the meaning of the words; (2) they found it hard to write down the words correctly; and (3) they got difficulties in pronouncing the words correctly; 4) they found difficulties in using vocabulary in sentences. So the teacher should have extra power to teach the students in Elementary School because children have specific characteristics.

The researcher found some psychological barriers from the students. They feel shy and afraid to ask the teacher if they find a difficulty. They are afraid of being humiliated by their friends and their teacher if they cannot answer well. They also do not have self-confidence in answering the questions. These problems may give a great influence to their learning process.

The other reason that causes the students’ failure is the teacher’s teaching method. He/she is not creative when teaching the foreign language to children. Sometimes it makes the students get bored and they also feel that the teaching method doesn’t give more chances to them to internalize the words in their memory.

The classroom situation in learning vocabulary showed that the atmosphere was not alive, with the teacher domination of teaching vocabulary. The students show low participation in using vocabulary.

Children are unique and not small version of adults. They have their own characteristics. The characteristics cover their ways of thinking, their attitude, their aptitude, etc. To give the best quality of teaching English to children, the teacher should know and understand them. In general, there are some characteristics of children in learning language, as follows: (a) children like playing; (b) children talk about “here and now”; and (c) children respond language well through concrete things rather than abstract things. Based on their characteristics, teaching them is different from teaching adults. The teacher should not only explain the topics, but also

activate their three domains (cognitive, affective, and psychomotor) through activities which are suitable to their characteristics.

In teaching vocabulary, the teacher should make the students understand and memorize new words and their meaning not only in a short period of time or at the moment when the vocabulary is given, but also in a long period of time. To make the students memorize the meaning, spell, pronounce, and use the words, the teacher should use a suitable method to teaching children. In this research, the researcher chooses the experiential learning as a method to improve the students’ vocabulary mastery.

Experiential learning is suitable with the children’s characteristics. They like fun activities and talking about “here and now” in their learning process. Experiential learning is a great way to present, practice, and revise vocabulary, because experiential learning is an active learning which is highly motivating for the students. Then, it will be advantageous if the teacher uses the experiential learning method to improve the students’ vocabulary mastery. In applying this method, the researcher used simple games and role play to improve students’ vocabulary.

The success of applying this method can be seen through indicators, they are: (1) students know the meaning of words. One of activities is playing the game. By doing so, it is easy for the students to memorize the meaning of the words. In finding the meaning of words, students need not open a dictionary because it has already been clear through the instructions they have practiced before; (2) Students are able to pronounce words

correctly. The teacher gives the commands several times in a correct pronunciation in order to give examples to the students. The teacher asks the students to pronounce the words and corrects the students’ pronunciation; (3) Students are able to spell or write words. The teacher gives some words and asks the students to spell and write the words after the teacher has given students the correct spelling of words and writes them on the white board; and (4) students are able to use words in a sentence. Teacher asks the students to make new commands or sentences based on the words given.

So, the researcher assumes that by using the experiential learning method in teaching learning process, vocabulary mastery of the elementary students can be improved.

E. Action Hypothesis

From the previous explanation, the researcher makes a hypothesis stating that using the experiential learning method is able to improve the students’ vocabulary mastery.

commit to user

CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter presents a discussion of the methods used in this study. The discussion includes research setting, subject of the study, research design, procedures of action research, data and data resources, techniques of collecting the data, and technique of analyzing the data.

A. Time and Place of Research

This research will be conducted in SDN Banaran 01 which is located in Ds. Banaran, Grogol, Sukoharjo. It is one of the state elementary school in Grogol subdistrict, Sukoharjo regency. The writer conducts the research from October – December 2009.

B. Subject of the Study

The subjects of the research are the sixth grade students of SDN Banaran 01. There are 14 students in this class consisting of 7 girls and 7 boys. Most of them are from low economic status with uneducated parents while the others come from immediate economic status whose parents are government officers or businessman. Unfortunately not all the parents have great concerns to their children’s education. It is seen when there are some students who frequently do not do their homework and even forget to bring

the English book or notebook in the English class. It indicates that their parents do not care with their children when they study at home.

In doing this research, the researcher actively participate in the teaching learning process. She acts both as a teacher and the observer. She will also do collaboration with other observers. They are: the sixth grade teacher and the other English teacher.

C. Research Design 1. The Nature of Action Research

In this research, the researcher uses a Classroom Action Research (CAR). CAR in a simple way can be understood as an action research which is conducted in a classroom. It can be defined as a study of attempts to overcome classroom problems or to improve things related to educational problems for betterment done by practitioners or teachers, or in collaboration between teachers and researchers by means of their own practical actions and their own reflection upon the effects of those actions (Ebbut, 1985 (in Hopkins, 1993: p. 45) ; Kemmis (in Hopkins, 1993: p. 44).

Mills (2000: p. 6) says that action research is any systematic inquiry conducted by teacher researchers, principals, school counselors, or other stakeholders in teaching or learning environment, to gather information about the ways that their particular school operate, how they teach, and how well their students learn.

Another expert describes action research as a form of self-reflective inquiry carried out by practitioners, aimed at solving problems, improving practice, or enhancing understanding (Carr and Kemmis in Nunan (1989: p. 12). It means that action research has to do with improvement.

Meanwhile, Ebbut (1985) as quoted by Hopkins (1993: p. 45) states that action research is the systematic study of attempt to improve educational practice by group or participants and by means of own reflection upon the effects of those action.

There are three characteristics of action research: firstly, the action research is carried out by practitioners rather than outside researchers. Secondly, the kind of the action research is collaborative, and thirdly, the action research is aimed at changing condition (Nunan, 1992: p. 17 (quoted from Kemmis and McTaggart, 1998).

It can be concluded that action research is a systematic action done by teachers, researchers,, principals, school counselors, or other stakeholders in order to get improvement. It focuses on the solution of day-to-day problems by knowing the ways the participant of a particular school operates (how both the teacher teaches and the students learn).

This classroom action research is done in collaboration. It is done by the researcher and an English teacher of SD Negeri Banaran 01 Grogol as the collaborator. This research is intended to improve the vocabulary mastery of the sixth grade students in SD Negeri Banaran 01 Grogol by using experiential learning.

2. The Model of Action Research

Action research in this classroom action research uses the model based on Hopkins views (1993: p. 48). In his model, there are four crucial basic steps which can be expanded into six steps including identifying the problem, planning the action, the implementation of the action observing or monitoring the action, reflecting the result of the observation, and revising the plan fro the following step. These steps form one cycle and can be repeated into several cycles.

Action research occurs through a dynamic and complementary process consisting of four essential steps of planning, action, observation and reflection. Each step will be explained as follow :

a. Planning

It is a process to develop a plan of critically informed action in order to improve what is already happening.

b. Action

It is an act to implement the plan. c. Observation

It is a process of observing the effects of critically informed action in the content in which it occurs.

d. Reflection

It is reflecting process on these effects as the basis for further planning; The reflection was meant to judge the success of the cycle.

D. The Procedures of Action Research

The procedures of the action research covers 6 basic activities as described in each cycle of Lewin’s model of Action Research. Those activities are as follows:

1. Identifying the problems

The teacher identifies the problems first before planning the action. The problems refer to the factors making the students difficult to master vocabulary during the lesson before. Here the researcher uses 2 techniques, namely:

a. Using test

To know whether the students master the vocabulary, the researcher makes written test of vocabularies as pre-test and post-test to know the students ability to master vocabulary.

b. Observation and interviews

The researcher observes the students behavior during the lesson and makes interviews to the sixth class teacher to know the model of class management and her student’s competence.

2. Planning the action

The researcher prepares everything related to the action as follows: a. Preparing materials, making lesson plan, and designing the steps in

doing action.

b. Preparing sheets for classroom observation c. Preparing teaching activity

d. Preparing a test.

3. Implementing the action

The researcher implements the teaching learning activity of vocabulary using experiential learning.

4. Observing / monitoring the action

The researcher observes all activities in the teaching learning process while the homeroom teacher helps to create a conducive atmosphere in a class. The researcher also makes collaborative efforts with a collaborator to explore teaching possibilities. The function of collaborator here is to evaluate the researcher’s teaching, offer suggestion on the best way to teach, and help to create students motivation to learn English.

5. Reflecting the result of the observation

The researcher makes an evaluation on all she has observed to find the weaknesses of the activities that have been carried out in using experiential learning as the technique in teaching vocabulary.

6. Revising the plan

Based on the weakness of the activities that have been carried out in using experiential learning as the method in teaching vocabulary, the researcher revises the plan for the next cycle.

D. Data Sources

In this research, the researcher uses both quantitative and qualitative data. The quantitative data are in the form of the students’ scores on vocabulary mastery. The scores are gained through the vocabulary test. In each cycle there is a pretest and post-test for vocabulary mastery. The data

sources for the quantitative data are the students of the fifth grade of SDN Banaran 01.

The qualitative data are in the form of information about the implementation of experiential learning and students’ reaction to the method that is used by the researcher as the teacher. Those data are taken from 3 sources, namely:

1. Events which happen in teaching learning process that uses experiential learning method. The events are recorded in the researcher’s and collaborator’s field notes.

2. Respondents. There are three respondents in this research, they are: the headmaster, the experienced English teacher, and also the students who join in the class.

3. Document or artifacts. The 2004 National Curriculum for English for Elementary School, syllabus, and lesson plan used by the previous teachers in teaching learning process.

E. Technique of Collecting the Data

Based on the data and data sources above, the researcher used the following techniques. For the quantitative data the researcher used vocabulary mastery test, consisting of pre-test and post-test. Every post-test is given after some teaching learning process at the end of a cycle.

The researcher also used what the so called validity and reliability as stated in Ngadiso (2006: 1). The vocabulary test can be seen in Appendix. The validity of the vocabulary test is analyzed with the following formula:

st =

n x

å

2

ro =

t t i s X X 1 1 q p

The item is valid if ro is higher than rt.

Then to know the reliability of the test, the following formula is used:

rkk = _÷÷

ø ö ç ç è æ

-å

2 1 1 s_t

pq k

k

Where rkk : estimated reliability

k : number of items on the test

p : the proportion of people who respond correctly to each item

q : 1 - p

st2 : observed score variance

The item is reliable if ro is higher than rt.

There are thirty items tested. The result of vocabulary test is that twenty items are valid and reliable. The valid and reliable items are items number 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 13, 15, 17, 18, 21, 23, 25, 27 28, 29 and 30. The items had represented for all indicators, they are five items for aspect of meaning, ten items for aspect of spelling and pronunciation, and

five items for aspect of using word. The process and the result of the validity and the reliability of the vocabulary test can be seen in Appendix 7.

Meanwhile, for the qualitative data the researcher used the following techniques:

1. Observation. This technique was done to the teaching and learning process that used experiential learning method. The researcher used participant observation technique in which the researcher was involved as the teacher and other teacher as the collaborator.

2. Interview. The researcher interviewed some students for the purpose of getting information about their vocabulary improvement after being taught by using experiential learning method. By using interview, the researcher also found the weakness of the method from the students’ perspective.

3. Questionnaire. The researcher decided to ask the students to fulfill the questionnaire. Here the students should read the questions and give responses or write in short answers.

E. Technique of Analyzing Data

There are two techniques in analyzing data, quantitative and qualitative. First is numerical data or quantitative data. The numerical data is in the form of vocabulary scores as the result of pre-test or post test. In this research will be analyzed using descriptive statistics, with comparing the mean of each test to find out the improvement of students’ vocabulary mastery. Besides, the improvement of the scores will be analyzed with

CHAPTER V

CONCLUSION, IMPLICATION, AND

SUGGESTIONS

A. Conclusion

Based on the research, teaching vocabulary using experiential learning can improve the students’ vocabulary mastery. It can be concluded that:

1. Experiential learning can improve the students’ English vocabulary mastery.

The improvement of te students’ vocabulary mastery can be identified in four aspects namely: the improvement of meaning, the improvement of spelling, the improvement of pronunciation, the improvement of using the words.

Their achievement improved, as shown by the mean score of the post-test of Cycle 1 (67.29) and post post-test of Cycle 2 (75.43) that is an increase of the students’ achievement from the pre-test (56.79).

2. Experiential learning can improve classroom atmosphere when it was implemented in teaching learning process.

During the implementation of the action, the classroom situation became more alive with various interesting activities, the students were more confidence, motivated and enjoyed the learning. The students were

commit to user

of the students’ vocabulary mastery could also be seen from their attitudes iinside and outside the class during the English teaching learning process. They became more intensive in following and paid attention to the lesson. Besides, they were more active, excited and responsive to the presented materials. Before usiing experiential learning in teaching vocabulary, the classroom situation was boring, the students seemed to be not interested in English and of course unmotivated to learn English. It caused them to have a chat with their friends and often did any other activities. Surely, they neglected the tachers’ explanation. They seemed to listen, but actually they did not. In addition they were afraid of making mistakes. They were shy to do exercise on the board. By applying Experiential Learning, the students were more enthusiatic in joining the lesson so the lesson became more effective than before. They paid more attention to the teacher’s explanation and when they had difficulties to understand the lesson, they would ask the teacher without being ashamed and afraid.

B. Implication

In teaching vocabulary to the children, it is necessary to use appropriate method which is suitable with children’s characteristics. This would bring the students into good participation in the lesson. The use of experiential learning in teaching vocabulary for children is effective in improving their vocabulary mastery. Using experiential learning combined

with fun activities in creating a good atmosphere, refreshes students’ mind which supports teaching and learning process and make students feel at ease.

It is worth to note that presenting vocabulary using experiential learning combining with group work is not only attracting the students or improving their motivation toward the lesson, but also facilitating the students in achieving the teaching objectives.

Teaching vocabulary uses experiential learning is a suitable technique to improve students’ vocabulary mastery. The effective steps in teaching vocabulary using experiential learning are as follows:

a. Leading them to pronounce the difficulty word(s) many times, give some more exercise.

b. Explain the right structure of the grammar and give them more exercise b. Supporting them to say more loudly, remind not to be afraid to make

mistakes.

c. Help them actively in teaching learning.

d. Give a high motivation, fairly approach to support their spirit. e. Create the class atmosphere as well as possible.

f. Give the instructions as clearly as possible.

C. Suggestions

Based on the research findings, the researcher would like to propose some suggestions related to this research. She hopes that the suggestions

commit to user

will be useful for the English teachers, the institutions, and other researchers.

1. To teachers

The teacher should know how to enhance their ability and to develop a good atmosphere in the class, so that the students learn easily and comfortably in their class.

It is necessary for the teachers to use interesting method, such as experiential learning in teaching vocabulary to children, so that they will be interested in joining the lesson and will pay more attention to the teacher’s explanation.

2. To the institutions

An institution of education is a formal place to get knowledge and education. It is hoped that Sebelas Maret University can arrange the program of teacher improvement dealing with the teaching and learning vocabulary and the use of Experiential Learning, the English teacher can have a better skill in teaching English especially for Elementary students. 3. To other researchers

This research studies the implementation of teaching vocabulary using experiential learning in improving the students’ vocabulary mastery. It is hope that the result of the study can be used as additional reference for further research in different context that will give contribution to teaching English for children.

commit to user

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Burns, Anne. 1999. Collaborative Action Research for English Language Teacher. United Kingdom : Cambridge Univ. Press.

Brown, H. Douglas. 2001. Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy. Longman.

Cross, David. 1991. A Practical Handbook of Language Teaching. Bath : The Bah Press.

Depdikbud Propinsi Jawa Tengah.1995. GBPP Muatan Lokal SD Mata Pelajaran Bahasa Inggris. Semarang.

Elliot, Stephen N, et al. 1999. Reflective Teaching Educational. McGraw- Hill Singapore.

Endang Fauziati. 2005. Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL). Surakarta: Muhamadiyah University Press.

Halliwell, Susan. 1992. Teaching English in the Primary Classroom. Longman.

Hatch, Evelyn; Brown, Cheryl. 1992. Vocabulary, Semantics, and Language Education. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Hopkins, David. 1993. A Teacher’s guide to Classroom Research. Buckingham Open University Press.

House, Susan. 1997. An Introduction to Teaching English to Children. London: Richmond Publishing.

Huebener, Theodore. 1965. How to Teach Foreign Language Effectively. New York; New york University Press.

Lincoln, Yvonna S; Guba, Egon G. 1984. Naturalistic Inquiry. Baverly Hills: Sage Publication.

commit to user

Mills, Geofrey, E. 2000. Action Research: A Guide for the Teacher. United States of America: Prentice Hall.

Nunan, David. 1992. Research Methods in Language Teaching. New York : Cambridge University Press.

____________. 1993. Collaborative Language Learning and Teaching. Cambridge University Press.

Richards, Jack; Rodgers, Theodore. S. 2003. Approaches and Methods in Language Teaching Second Edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Schmit, Norbert; McCarthy, Michael. 1976. Vocabulary Description, Acquisition and Pedagogy. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press.

Sprinthal, Richard C. et al. 1998. Educational Psychology: A Developmental Approach, Seventh Edition. Boston: McGraw Hill.

Thornburry, Scott. 1994. How to teach Vocabulary. Longman, Kanisius. Kesainc Blanc.

Tuckman,Bruce W. 1978. Conducting educational research. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Inc. USA.

Ur, Penny. 1996. A Course in Language Teaching Practice and Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

W. John Best. 1988. Research in Education. New Delhi: Prentice Hall of India Private Limited.