THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN READABILITY LEVEL OF TEXT MATERIALS AND VOCATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS’ READING COMPREHENSION ABILITY IN EFL CLASSROOMS.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

PAGE OF APPROVAL ... i

ABSTRACT ... ii

STATEMENT OF AUTHORIZATION ... iii

PREFACE ... iv

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ... v

TABLE OF CONTENTS ... vii

LIST OF TABLES ... viii

LIST OF FIGURES ... ix

CHAPTER I ... 1

CHAPTER II ... 8

CHAPTER III ... 23

CHAPTER IV ... 36

CHAPTER V ... 54

BIBLIOGRAPHY ... 58

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 3.1 Validity Level Interpretation ... 28

Table 3.2 Reliability Level Classification ... 29

Table 3.3 Difficulty Index ... 30

Table 3.4 Discriminatory Power ... 31

Table 3.5 Guide to Correlational Test ... 32

Table 3.6 Correlation Coefficient Strength ... 33

Table 4.1 Validity Test Result ... 36

Table 4.2 Reliability Result ... 38

Table 4.3KR-20 (Cronbach’s Alpha) Reliability Coefficient ... 38

Table 4.4 Difficulty Index Result ... 39

Table 4.5 Discriminatory Power Result ... 40

Table 4.6 Test of Normality ... 41

Table 4.7 Saphiro-Wilk Table ... 41

Table 4.8 Categories of Students’ Reading Comprehension Ability ... 44

Table 4.9 Descriptive Statistics of Reading Comprehension Test ... 45

Table 4.10 Text I ... 46

Table 4.11 Text II ... 46

Table 4.12 Text III ... 46

Table 4.13 Descriptive Statistics of Readability Level of Text Materials ... 47

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1.1 Example of a Readability Formula ... 10

Figure 4.1 Scatterplots of Readability Levels ... 42

Figure 4.2 Scatterplots of Reading Comprehension Scores ... 43

Figure 4.3 Frequencies and Classification ... 44

Figure 4.4 Readability Levels of the Sample Texts ... 47

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CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter elaborates more in-depth details about the procedures applied in conducting study which have been briefly elaborated in Chapter I. The procedures include formulation of problem, research design, hypothesis, participant, data collection, and data analysis.

3.1Formulation of Problem

It is necessary to formulate the problem before the research is designed. This formulation of problem is based on the research question to ensure that the research is designed to find the answer of the question. Because the method of this study is correlational, only one research question is formulated. Thus, it needs to be noted that this study attempted to figure out the answers to the question “Is there any relationship between the readability levels of texts used as teaching materials and vocational high school students’ reading comprehension ability?”

Additionally, it is important to note that this question includes the investigation of whether the relationship is significant statistically and practically if it turns out that there is a relationship between those variables.

3.2 Research Design

The research design of the present study is based on positivism paradigm with quantitative approach. The method used is correlational as the present study only investigates the relationship between the readability levels of text materials with the students’ reading comprehension ability in non-causative way. This is in line with the definition of correlational research, which is a study that involves collecting data in order to determine whether and to what degree a relationship

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exists between two or more quantifiable variables (Gay, 1982, p. 430) as cited in Sukardi (2008, p. 166)

To maintain the feasibility of the research, the present study will take approximately a month to gather data from the samples. This range of time includes development of materials for the instruments, the instrument tryout, the test administration, and the measurement of readability. Depending on the school’s policy, the instrument will be formulated based on either the text materials from the textbook used in the school or other resources outside the textbook. The readability of those texts will be analyzed and categorized based on their respective level. After that, the data collection can be conducted by employing the instrument to the samples.

As the scores result from the test are not in form of ranked data, statistical calculation using Pearson’s Product Moment formula will be used to analyze the data resulted from the test given to all of the samples. It needs to be noted that Pearson’s Product Moment formula should only be used if the data obtained are normally distributed. Other correlation measures may be used if the data are skewed. Further details about this will be presented later in data collection and data analysis.

3.3 Hypothesis

Prior to collecting the data needed for this study, it is important to make a prediction about the relationship between the variables involved in the topic of the study. In this case, the readability levels of text materials will be the X variable, while the students’ reading comprehension scores will be the Y variable. It is expected that the instrument employed to gather the data are standardized, meaning that it is reliable and able to measure what it is supposed to measure the relationship between both variables.

In this study, a hypothesis has been formulated in the null form. The null hypothesis is that the readability level of texts used as teaching materials is not related with vocational high school students’ reading comprehension ability at all.

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Thus, in contrast, the alternate hypothesis is that the readability level of texts used as teaching materials is related to vocational high school students’ reading comprehension ability. A hypothesis testing will be administered by the use of statistics to determine if the probability that the hypothesis is true (Weisstein, 2012).

There are several steps in hypothesis testing. First, a relevant statistical test must be determined to assess the truth of the null hypothesis. Second, the p-value is calculated. Assuming that the null hypothesis was true, the probability that a statistical test at least as significant as the one observed would be obtained is explained by the p-value. After the p-value is obtained, it is compared to an acceptable significance alpha value. If p-value is lower than alpha value, then the observed effect is statistically significant, the alternative hypothesis is valid, while the null hypothesis is ruled out.

3.3 Participant 3.3.1 Population

Population is a whole subject of the research (Arikunto, 2003). As the title of the present study suggested, the participants of this study are vocational high school students. The present study took place in a vocational high school in Bandung. The population of this study is the students who major in Office Administration. There are four classes with about 120 students in total.

3.3.2 Sample

The number of students needed to be the sample is at least 30 students. Generally, 30 samples are considered minimal in correlational studies. It is supported by Gay et al. (2006) who assert that to establish a relationship, there should be at least 30 participants in a correlational study. Moreover, Waters (2014) suggests that 30 or more participants are important to increase the validity of the study.

The samples were drawn by means of purposive sampling. A class of 35 students was chosen to be the sample because they have been taught the text

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materials from the textbook. As a matter of consideration, due to the fact that some vocational high school has adapted the 2013 Curriculum to the first and second grader in which the time allocation for English subject is very limited, the sample was drawn from only one second grade class. One of the other classes was used to conduct a pilot test.

3.4 Data Collection

As correlational studies commonly need several scores to be analyzed, one or more valid and reliable instrument is needed. The instrument validity will ensure that the instrument measures what it is supposed to measure, while reliability will prove whether the instrument is reliable or not to be used as measurement in collecting the data (Arikunto, 2003). Therefore, an instrument trial or instrument tryout was conducted before the instrument is used to collect the data for the present study.

There were two kinds of instrument which were used in the present study. The first was a reading comprehension test. A class which reputed to have averagely similar English proficiency and grade level with the samples was given a pilot reading comprehension test. This pilot test served as an instrument tryout to ensure reliability and validity of the test.

The second instrument was a readability formula. The formula was used to analyze the readability of text materials the teacher implemented in the teaching and learning process. As stated in Chapter I, the readability formula which will be used is Coh-Metrix. This formula was chosen as a matter consideration since it has been tested to be suitable to measure texts in EFL contexts (Crossley et al., 2011).

3.4.9 Test Administration and Readability Analysis

The materials which were used to formulate the test were taken from three texts on a textbook. This textbook was used simultaneously with other supporting materials by the teacher. The test was constructed of ten multiple choice questions

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and ten true-and-false questions. It was formulated by mixing the types of question that ask for main idea, specific information, synonym of word and implicit message. Additionally, the questions were aimed to assess micro skills adapted from Brown (2001) with no involvement of testing the students’ knowledge about generic structures of the text.

After the test was formulated, a pilot test was administered. Several revisions on the test items were made prior to administering the test to the actual sample. The number of students who participated as sample was 30 students out of 35. The remaining five students were not present in the class at that time. Those who took the test were given 30 minutes to finish it.

As for the readability analysis, both of the texts were analyzed using Coh-Metrix. The texts were in form of argumentative text and speech with an average range of words of 300 to 500.

3.4.5 Validity Test

As explained before, a reading comprehension test was used as a mean of measurement to collect the data from the students. This test was in a form of achievement test, and was intended to obtain students’ reading comprehension scores from three different texts. Likewise, the validity and reliability of this test were evaluated in order to create a standardized test. After the instrument tryout, to evaluate both validity and reliability of the test, the software Anates and SPSS were used. The score obtained by the test was then be classified into groups and be analyzed.

In Anates and SPSS, validity was measured by processing the data obtained from the pilot test through the use of Pearson Product Moment formula. The formula is as follows.

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(NCS Pearson, 2014) r = Pearson correlation coefficient

x = Values in first set of data y = Values in second set of data n = Total number of participants

A test item is considered to be valid if the robt is higher than rcrit. On the

contrary, a test item is considered to be invalid if the robt is lower than rcrit. After

the result of the calculation has been obtained, the following table was used as a reference.

Table 3.1 Validity Level Interpretation Raw Score Validity Level

0.8 – 1.0 Very high 0.6 – 0.8 High 0.4 – 0.6 Moderate 0.2 – 0.4 Low 0.0 – 0.2 Very low

(Arikunto, 2003)

3.4.6 Reliability Test

Reliability is the degree to which a measurement technique can be depended upon to secure consistent results upon repeated administration. (Professional Testing Inc., 2006) It has to do with the consistency, or reproducibility, or a test taker's performance on the test. Simply put, if a test with high reliability is administered to a test taker on two occasions, it would be very likely to reach the same conclusions about the test taker's performance both times.

To measure the reliability of the reading comprehension test employed in this study, a split half method was used. Split half method only requires a set of instrument which is tried out once. By splitting the instrument into two groups of

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questions, this method will show how much error in a test score is due to poor test construction (Arikunto, 2003). In case of this study, it was split based on the text respectively. After that, as the contents of the instrument are dichotomous items, the following Kuder-Richardson 20 (KR-20) formula was considered the best accepted statistic to calculate the reliability coefficient.

(Arikunto, 2003)

Where,

pi = the proportion of correct responses to test item i

qi = the proportion of incorrect responses to test item i (so that pi + qi = 1)

Then, the following formula was used to calculate the variance for the denominator.

Where,

n = the total sample size.

Finally, the score obtained by applying all of the formula above was consulted to the following table.

Table 3.2 Reliability Level Classification No. Coefficient Reliability level

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2 0.20 – 0.40 Low 3 0.40 – 0.60 Moderate 4 0.60 – 0.80 High 5 0.80 – 1.00 Very high

(Sugiyono, 2003)

3.4.7 Difficulty Index

To find the difficulty level of the reading comprehension test, difficulty index is calculated. This index, according to Arikunto (2003), illustrates the value of difficulty for each test item. Averagely, it is recommended that the level of difficulty for a four-option multiple choice test should be between 60% and 80%. The following formula was to calculate the difficulty index of the test.

Difficulty Index (p) = C/T

(Wilson, 2005)

p = difficulty Index

C = the number of test takers who answer item X correctly T = the number of total test takers who answer item X

The result of the calculation was then consulted to the table below.

Table 3.3 Difficulty Index

No. Index Degree

1 0.00 – 0.30 Difficult 2 0.31 – 0.70 Moderate 3 0.71 – 1.00 Easy

(Wilson, 2005)

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To measure students’ overall ability, the significance of test items was calculated based on discriminatory power. The result of the calculation using the formula below was in a form of interpretation which was then considered in classifying the test takers.

(Wilson, 2005) Where

D = discriminatory power

N = the number of unrelated strains tested S = the number of different types

xj = the number of strains belonging to the jth type, assuming that strains will be

classified into mutually exclusive categories.

The result was then consulted to the following table.

Table 3.4 Discriminatory Power

Discriminatory Power Classification

< 0.01 Intolerable, must be left out 0.00 – 0.20 Poor, but still tolerable

0.21 – 0.40 Moderate

0.41 – 0.70 Good

0.71 – 1.00 Excellent

(Arikunto, 2003)

3.5 Data Analysis

After the data were collected, they were classified, and analyzed on the basis of quantitative approach by means of computation using Anates and SPSS.

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The descriptive statistics which include measure of central tendency and spread were applied to show the mean, median, mode, range, variance and standard deviation of the obtained data. This was done to summarize the group of data using a combination of tabulated description, graphical description and statistical commentary in the next chapter.

To find out the answer to the research question, the correlation coefficient between both variables was calculated by using Pearson Product Moment formula. The result was referred to a table of statistical significance at the minimum level of 0.5. The use of Pearson Product Moment formula was taken into account based on the table below.

Table 3.5 Guide to Correlational Test

Both variables interval or ratio?

Measures are linear? (No = monotonic) Y Pearson correlation

N Spearman correlation

Both variables are ordinal? Y Kendall correlation

Both variables can be ranked? Y Kendall correlation

N Convert to frequency data and use Chi-square test for independence

The following are Pearson Product Moment formula and a table to reveal the strength of the coefficient.

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(NCS Pearson, 2014) r = Pearson correlation coefficient

x = Values in first variable y = Values in second variable n = Total number of participants

Table 3.6 Correlation Coefficient Strength

Correlation Coefficient Strength

0.80 – 1.00 Very strong

0.60 – 0.80 Strong

0.40 – 0.60 Moderate

0.20 – 0.40 Weak

0.01 – 0.20 Very weak

Next, to determine the most appropriate correlation measure, the data were analyzed if they are normally distributed. This was done because Pearson’s correlation assumes that both of the sets of values being looked at come from distributions that are roughly in normal shape (Kranzler & Moursund, 1999).

Further, a coefficient of determination was computed to investigate the degree of the contribution of the readability level of text materials towards students’ reading comprehension ability. This coefficient determines how is the degree of the first variable to explain the second variable (Collidge, 2000).

The value of correlation coefficient (rxy) which has been obtained was used

to find the coefficient of determination. The computation uses the following formula.

(Collidge, 2000)

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Finally, after the data obtained by using the instruments were analyzed, the findings were identified and discussed. They will be presented in the next chapter along with the result of validity and reliability test, and the answers to the research question and hypotheses.

3.6 Clarification of Terms

Prior to conducting the study, several main terms need to be clarified to avoid misunderstandings. They are as follows.

Readability : An extent in which a text can be read and understood. This term refers to all the factors that affect success in reading and understanding a text. These include the complexity of words and sentences in relation to the reading ability of the reader; the interest and motivation of the reader; and the legibility of the print (Johnson, 2014).

Text : Text may be defined as a stretch of language that is semantically and pragmatically coherent in its real-world context. On the other hand text may be defined as 'any unchangeable sequence of sentences which has a strong cohesion and the unchangeable character of which is related to a value system of some sort (Pavel, 1980; Carter & McCarthy, 2006).

Reading Ability : The skill or activity of getting information from texts, reading ability will be arguably developed best in association with writing, listening, and speaking as integrated and interactive approach in language teaching emphasize the interrelationship of skills. (Brown, 2001) Comprehension : The process of acquiring or developing the meaning of

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paragraphs, texts, and other longer materials (Otto & Chester, 1976).

EFL : Abbreviation for English as a Foreign Language. This is a second language which is not widely used in the learners’ immediate social context, but rather one which might be used for other particular purposes like future travel, cross-cultural communication situations, or as a curricular requirement (Saville-Troike, 2006).

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CHAPTER V

CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION

This chapter summarizes the findings of the present study. The findings are concluded based on the research question. Suggestions for further studies and practices based on the findings in this study are also presented here.

5.1 Conclusion

Focusing on the relationship between readability level of text materials and vocational students’ reading comprehension ability, this study concludes that there is a moderate relationship between readability level of text materials and vocational students’ reading comprehension ability in EFL classrooms. Moreover, as described in the previous chapter, the degree of correlation was also investigated and explained by the coefficient of determination.

Before the data were collected, a pilot test has been administered as a form of instrument try-out. The instruments were revised based on the result of the pilot test. After that, the actual test was administered with the actual participants. The result shows that the test averagely has moderate validity and reliability. Difficulty index and discriminatory power have also been found. The result is that most test items can differentiate between higher achiever and low achiever with a combination of easy and moderate level difficulty. It was found that with the given test, the participants tended to have good reading comprehension ability.

The data about the students’ reading comprehension ability and readability level of text materials were analyzed to investigate the relationship. This correlation coefficient shows that readability level of text materials is related to vocational students’ reading comprehension ability in EFL classrooms. However, the coefficient is negative. Therefore, it can be concluded that variable increases as the other decreases, in this case, when the readability level of text materials increases, the students’ reading comprehension ability will decrease. Meanwhile, the result of coefficient of determination indicates that the measure of readability

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in choosing text materials explains 25.40% of vocational students’ reading comprehension ability.

Additionally, it is relevant to the underlying theory that readability is incapable to measure comprehensibility, the finding that the strength of correlation is not very strong may be due to that readability is not really appropriate to measure comprehensibility of a text. This is because readability only takes a certain number of aspects which contributes to comprehension.

5.2 Suggestion

From the findings of this study, a negative, moderate level of correlation between both variables was revealed. In this section, several suggestions were drawn based on the findings in relation to the reading comprehension ability and readability level. Hopefully these suggestions are useful as references for readers, particularly the future researchers and the English teachers.

In helping students to cope with their reading comprehension problems, the teacher aids should be, as stated by Ness (2010) helping in thinking abstractly, visualization, understanding vocabulary, and knowing to properly decode. The students must actually know and understand what they are reading. Knowledge about vocabulary alone would not suffice. Thus, to be able to properly comprehend what is being read, students are required to connect what is being read to their own experiences.

Unfamiliar vocabulary as the most frequent factor that affects reading comprehension is a consequence of using bottom-up model which confuse students in dealing with word recognition and structure pattern represented in a text. As the implication, teachers are suggested to use readability formula to measure the readability level to the texts they are going to teach in classroom.

On the other hand, English teacher in vocational high school should be aware that readability formula is not a tool to aid them writing their own teacher-made materials. Instead, readability should be regarded as one of the aspects worth considering in selecting and developing materials for teaching reading. It is

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possible for teachers to use this study as a reference in developing reading instruction. English teachers will have a better understanding about the use of readability in teaching reading. In turn, hopefully, the students can find the suitable reading strategy to overcome the reading problems and set the best reading method. Despite considering the existence of comprehensibility, the awareness of underlying factors which determine readability is therefore necessary.

In the measurement of readability level by Coh-Metrix, the higher the value of the readability level, the higher the chance that the text is harder to read for the students. Teachers need to make sure it will not hinder the students from learning reading skill. Instead, the text should help the students to escalate their reading skills. On the contrary, if it indicates a low level of readability, teachers need to set some adjustments on their teaching method in a way that it can benefit students to make the most of the text which is easier to read.

Aside from the findings, this study has some limitations. These limitations include the instrument, participant, and text material. First, at shown by the pilot test, the validity of test items employed in this study were various. But there was no item which belongs to very high degree. Thus, it is expected to have more valid and reliable instruments. It means that high degree of validity and reliability are more preferred in further research regarding this topic.

Another limitation is the fact that statistical result shows that the students participated as sample in this study were averagely good at reading comprehension. It may be beneficial for the researchers who are interested in this

topic to have more diverse data about the students’ reading comprehension ability,

to see if there is a different result which may occur due to more diverse data of students’ reading comprehension ability. Larger number of participants is also encouraged to pursue higher validity to obtain more accurate and reliable result in representing the whole population.

Additionally, the text materials used in this study was limited to the texts presented on only one particular standardized textbook for vocational high schools

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in Indonesia. Moreover, not all texts on the book are mandatory to be taught to the students. The teachers should and are encouraged to use and adapt the texts on the book as creative as possible by considering the students’ needs. As the readability levels of texts may vary in many different genres, more studies are called for with different groups of learners in similar situation and context (EFL vocational high schools, especially Indonesians) to investigate their perspectives on readability based on the texts which they are to learn in their respective departments. Another way is simply conducting a survey which collects different genre of texts used in different departments. By doing this, hopefully, a particular genre which is assumed to tend to have the highest readability level among other genres can be identified.

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Wildan Hariz, 2015

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THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN READABILITY LEVEL OF TEXT MATERIALS AND VOCATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS’ READING COMPREHENSION ABILITY IN EFL CLASSROOMS

Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia | repository.upi.edu | perpustakaan.upi.edu

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