T1 112010003 Full text

THE USE OF EXTENSIVE READING IN DEVELOPING
STUDENTS’ GRAMMAR PERFORMANCE

THESIS
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree of
Sarjana Pendidikan

Margaretha Lintar Melati
112010003

ENGLISH TEACHER EDUCATION PROGRAM
FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE
SATYA WACANA CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY
SALATIGA
2014

THE USE OF EXTENSIVE READING IN DEVELOPING
STUDENTS’ GRAMMAR PERFORMANCE

THESIS

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree of
Sarjana Pendidikan

Margaretha Lintar Melati
112010003

Approved by:
Thesis Supervisor

Thesis Examiner

____________________

____________________

Anita Kurniawati, M.Hum.

Debora Tri Ragawanti, M.A.-ELT


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Copyright@ 2014. Margaretha Lintar Melati and Anita Kurniawati, M.Hum.

All rights reserved. No part of this thesis may be reproduced by any means
without the permission of at least one of the copyright owners or the English
Department, Faculty of Language and Literature, Satya Wacana University,
Salatiga.
Margaretha Lintar Melati:

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Date

: September 10, 2014
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____________________
Approved by:
Thesis Supervisor

Thesis Examiner

____________________

____________________

Anita Kurniawati, M.Hum.

Debora Tri Ragawanti,M.A.-ELT

The Use of Extensive Reading in Developing Students’
Grammar Performance
Margaretha Lintar Melati

Abstract
Most students who learn English as a foreign language have faced problems with
learning grammar. Unlike, the common teaching of grammar which requires the
students to memorize and do drilling, Extensive Reading is offered to give an
experience for the students to learn grammar subconsciously. This study aims to
investigate the extent of the students‟ grammar performance development through
Extensive Reading. This research was conducted in English Language Department
in Satya Wacana Christian University, Indonesia. The participants of this study
were 18 students from one of the four extensive reading classes in the year of
2013/ 2014. The data were collected from the students‟ oral reports and semistructured interview. The findings of this research revealed that the students might
not really show the improvement in their grammar performance especially in the
use of tenses (including to be), irregular verbs, and regular verbs. Also, Extensive
Reading seems to have no direct relationship with the students‟ grammar
performance. However, the use of oral report in Extensive Reading might give
awareness for the students to use the appropriate grammar.
Key words: extensive reading, grammar performance, development, oral report

INTRODUCTION
Grammar has been ever-lasting problems for most of English as foreign
language learners. The problems faced by the learners are that the language (in

this case English) does not have the same structures with their first language.
There is also a problem related to the teachers approach in teaching grammar. As
Swan (2002) opinion which is cited by Renandya (2013), he says that teachers
tend to teach too much grammar and many of the grammar items teachers teach
are often not immediately useful for students. It means that the students are

1

burdened with too much knowledge which is not directly applicable. The other
problem is that the fact in teaching grammar, teachers usually require the students
to memorize patterns and give drilling. These memorizing and drilling cause the
learners feel uneasy since there are so many patterns to learn and unfortunately
not every students have the ability to memorize. This situation is in line with
Al-Mekhlafi & Nagaratnam (2011) opinion which says that in learning grammar
students often feel discomfort and they see grammar as a terror.
Realizing the needs for the students to feel comfortable and free in
learning grammar, some experts might use Extensive Reading as an alternative
way for exposing grammar subconsciously. Extensive Reading according to Davis
(1995) cited in Kit U (2009) is “ an approach in which pupils are given the time,
encouragement, and materials to read pleasurably, at their own level, as many

books as they can, without the pressures of testing or marks.” In other words, this
approach requires the students to read some appropriate materials based on the
ability in their free time and free will. Extensive Reading is beneficial to improve
students‟ language development. As cited by Mason (2003) in a journal titled A
Study of Extensive Reading and the Development of Grammatical Accuracy by
Japanese University Students Learning English that students learning in both
foreign and second language settings have experienced of interest and benefits of
Extensive Reading (e.g. Bell, 1998; Mason & Krashen, 1997; Elley & Mangubhai,
1983).
Another study about the use of Extensive Reading in learning grammar
has been done by Mason (2003). In his study, he emphasizes that Extensive
2

Reading is effective not only for the development of reading skills, but also for
other areas, including grammatical accuracy. Through his study, he also finds
some evidences which show that Extensive Reading is valuable in language
education. Furthermore, his study also reveals that Extensive Reading alone is
quite powerful for the development of grammatical accuracy. In his study, he
investigated the result of students‟ TOEIC after joining the Extensive Reading
program.

This study aims at investigating the extent of Extensive Reading tp
develop students‟ grammar performance through one of the assignments in an
Extensive Reading class. Therefore, the research question of this study is: „To
what extent does the use of Oral Report in Extensive Reading affect the students‟
grammatical performance?‟In this study, the writer uses one of the assignments in
Extensive Reading which is Oral Report to analyze the development of the
students‟ grammatical performance. Oral report is one of the assignments given in
the Extensive Reading in which students are asked to record their assignment
which is in the form of summary of the story, quotation, and telling about pictures
based on the stories that they have read. The result of the study is expected to
build the teachers‟ awareness and offer an alternative to build students‟
performance toward the extent of Extensive Reading in developing students‟
grammar performance. Thus, they will consider that Extensive Reading does give
beneficial tool in improving students‟ grammar understanding.

3

The Importance of Mastering Grammar for EFL Students
Mastering grammar is an essential part in language learning and teaching.
It has been approved by some experts. Renandya (2013) in his journal states that

grammar is too important to be ignored, and it should continue to become an
important part of the teaching learning process that learners need to learn just
enough grammar so that their language becomes linguistically comprehensible
and socially acceptable. Moreover, he also mentions that without a good
knowledge of grammar, learner‟s language development will be severely
constrained. This may be due to the fact that grammar knowledge is considered as
one of the factors that help the learners develop and become more aware of the
way other people use language to communicate.
According to Richard and Renandya (2002), there are two reasons why
grammar should be learned. First, comprehensible: the learners should know how
to build and use certain structures which make it possible to communicate
common types of meaning successfully, i.e., to produce comprehensible language.
Second, acceptability: the learners should produce understandable sentences and
be in line with the speaker linguistic capacity because if people speak with
unacceptable grammar they will be considered to be socially undesirable
individuals, be labeled with such negative adjectives as sloppy, careless,
unreliable, and not be trusted.

4


The Principle of Extensive Reading
Extensive Reading is an approach to read long texts for extended period of
time. The characteristic of an Extensive Reading approach is that students read as
much as possible with a variety of materials on a wide range of available topics.
Students select what they want to read by themselves which can be done in and
outside the classroom. Besides reading, the other activities in Extensive Reading
are group discussion, group work, group project, oral report, presentation and
so on. Sheu (2004) believes that with enjoyable environment, the students‟
knowledge of language learning will increase and their eagerness to learn will
develop naturally.
Day and Bamford (1998) mentioned that the purposes of Extensive
Reading are usually related to pleasure, information, and general understanding.
The materials used in Extensive Reading approach offer different kinds of
grammatical knowledge, in other words Extensive Reading plays a role in the
process of learning grammar knowledge for English foreign language students.
Nishizawa, Yoshioka, & Fukuda (2009) stated that reading as many materials as
possible is an effective way not only for the development of reading skill, but also
for other areas, including grammatical accuracy. Renandya (2013) adds that
currently, there is ample evidence to show that learners who receive a lot of
interesting and meaningful comprehensible language input through ER tend to

have a stronger mastery of the grammar of the language and a larger vocabulary
size, and achieve a higher level of proficiency in English.

5

Other study done by Porcaro (2005), a professor of English at Toyama
University of International studies in Japan, shows the fact related to Extensive
Reading in EFL College Programs. He did his study in a reading course in the
intensive English program of a two-year foreign language/vocational college
(semmon gakkou). The participants were 18 second-year students. In his study, he
gave learners time to read self-selected material silently and independently, before
they were brought into the classroom on the book cart. The target was to read at
least one book per week or at least 500 pages per semester. The graded readers
kept a simple, neat record sheet which the teacher created to account for what they
read and they checked out each book and returned it. After that, they made
summary and response to the content of each book in about five minutes and
should be submitted to the teacher weekly. This treatment was held for about 4
semesters. As the result, he pointed out in his journal that Extensive Reading
builds awareness of grammatical structures and the ability to quickly and
accurately process sentence structure.

How Extensive Reading can help students acquire their grammar
In order for the students to acquire their grammar, they have to receive the
input. The input can be in written or oral form. According to Renandya (2013),
input is a necessary condition for language learning in which the learners need to
hear and see a lot of English in and outside the classroom.
In Extensive Reading, the students read as much as possible. In other
words, they receive much written input by reading many books. Renandya (2013),

6

stated that the students are given a big amount of highly comprehensible and
interesting materials to read on regular basis by implementing an Extensive
Reading. After they have read the books which contain various grammar
structures, automatically they will learn about new grammatical structure and be
more familiar with those kinds of grammar structures. As a result, they can
develop their skills in grammar. In addition, the more the students read the book,
the more progress they will get in developing their grammar. As Krashen (1993)
opinion which is cited by Johansson (2014), he says that Extensive Reading can
improve skills and one of them is advanced grammar.
The Role of Comprehensible Input Hypothesis
It is important for the students to receive input in order to learn something.
In Extensive reading, the students read many books as their input in order to
develop their language, including their grammar. However, there are some
characteristics for the input to be beneficial for the students. According to
Renandya (2013), research has shown that for input to be beneficial for language
development, it has to be highly comprehensible and abundantly and reliably
available in the classroom as well as outside the classroom.
In relation to the students and the input they receive, it is important for the
students to be able to gain comprehensible input hypothesis. According to
Krashen (2003), comprehensible input hypothesis happens when language is
acquired by understanding the message, it means that it can be understood through

7

hearing and reading. In other words, the result of comprehensible input is when
the learners can make sense from what they have read on the page.

THE STUDY
Context of the study
The context of the study was the English Teacher Education Program,
Satya Wacana Christian University. It is located in a small town of Salatiga,
Central Java, Indonesia. This study program was selected because it offered
Extensive Reading as one of the required courses in odd semester. The material
used in Extensive Reading class is English Learners Literature published by
Penguin Readers.
The students were required to read a lot throughout the semester. Besides
reading, in class they had to do group discussion, group work, group project, oral
report, presentation and so on. In first semester 2013-2014, the students also had
to retell the books they have read and record it through within SoundCloud. It is
an audio platform that enables sound creators to upload, record, promote, and
share their originally-created sounds (Soundcloud.com). They were then had to
upload the file into Extensive Reading group in Facebook provided by the teacher.
Participants
The participants of this study were 18 students of Extensive Reading class
group A in the first semester 2013-2014. The 18 participants were selected based
on the completeness of their oral reports. Group A was selected based on a sample
8

of convenience technique (Mckay, 2006, p.37). This was because the participants
were easily assessable for the researcher to conduct the research.

Instruments of Data Collection
The instruments used were the students‟ oral reports and semi-structured
interview. The oral reports were the assignment given by the teacher after students
read some books. There were 3 oral reports collected in one semester. The first
oral report required the students to retell the book that they had read, the second
oral report was about an interesting quotation from the book that they had read,
and the last oral report required the students to tell on the pictures they had drawn
based on the book that they read. The oral reports which were supposed to be in 3
minutes were recorded using SoundCloud program from the internet. Then, each
students‟ oral report was compared to find out whether the student still made the
same grammatical mistake or not. The writer used the students‟ oral report to
analyze the students‟ improvement in grammar. Below is the detail information
about each participants‟ oral reports.
Table11. Length of time

No

Participant

1
2
3
4
5
6
7

A
B
C
D
E
F
G

Length of time (min)
OR 1
OR 2
2.46
1.57
3.17
3.51
2.59
2.03
2.42
2.02
1.4
2
0.51
1.08
1.5
0.43

9

OR 3
2.19
2.47
1.53
1.21
1.2
1.11
1.11

8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18

H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R

Oral report 1:
Oral report 2:
Oral report 3:

3.06
3.36
3.15
1.5
2.52
1.19
2.01
2.2
2.23
1.58
1.24

3.16
0.51
1.07
0.52
1.17
1.26
2.51
2.43
1.58
0.4
0.55

2.33
1.02
2.03
1.15
1.21
1.21
1.4
1.47
1.3
1.12
1.11

retelling a story that the participants had read
retelling an interesting quotation that the participants had
read
telling the pictures that the participants had drawn
basedon the story

The second instrument used was semi-structured interview. This type of
the interview was used for the study because it allowed for greater flexibility like
changing the order of the questions to give chance for follow-up questions
(Patton, 1990). The interview session was conducted around 8 to 18 minutes each.
This type of interview was very appropriate because it could support the data from
the participants.
Procedures of Data Collection
The procedures of data collection were as follows:
1. The writer joined the Facebook group of Extensive Reading class A to be
able to listen to the oral reports the students produced.
2. The writer started to download the students‟ oral reports in November
2013.

10

3. The writer checked the completeness of each student‟s oral reports to
make sure that the participants had 3 oral reports.
4. Among 30 students the writer found that only 18 students had submitted 3
oral reports.
5. At first, the writer started with some categories of grammatical mistake by
students which are incomplete structure, Inappropriate Structure, Passive
active Structure, Inappropriate tense (Including to be), No auxiliary verb,
Inappropriate use of irregular verb, Inappropriate use of regular verb, No
s/es ending, Overuse of verb, No s/es ending, Inappropriate use of pronoun
There are some examples of each category.

Table 2. The categories of mistakes on the transcription
NO BIG THEMES
1
Structure

2

The use of verb

EXPLANATION
Incomplete Structure
Inappropriate Structure

EXAMPLES
It (*) too short
1.…so money is come to us
2. He tolds….
Passive active Structure Someone was attack the
pirate….
Inappropriate
tense 1. He works on a project …
(Including to be)
2. He makes his paint
competence to sell.
3. Dave is a great brother
4. There are many sheep and
babe behind them.
No auxiliary verb
1.
Money
(is)
not
everything.
2. She (was) just a teacher.
Inappropriate use of 1. They meet at a party
irregular verb
2. He get…
Inappropriate use of 1. She help…
regular verb
2. She kill…
No s/es ending
The title is inspector Logan
and this book consist of 6
11

Overuse of verb

3

Noun

No s/es ending

4

Pronoun

Inappropriate
pronoun

use

chapters.
They are have the law.
They are find a baby boy
without clothes.
1. He got many problem in
her life.
2. …found the two purpose
of life.
3. There are 20 cannibal
with three prisoner.
of 4. He name (…) Bread.
5. It‟s a cute.
6. Hers name is Karen.
7. Tom gave he to hug if…

6. After analyzing the oral reports and found out that there were too many
mistakes related to grammar aspects, the writer decided to limit the verbal
theme on the use of verb and reduced it into 6 themes such as,
inappropriate tense (including to be), no auxiliary verb, inappropriate use
of irregular verb, inappropriate use of regular verb, no s/esending, and
overuse of verb.
7. The writer counted the number of mistakes the students had made in each
of their oral reports.
8. The writer compared each of the categories from the students‟ oral reports
to find out whether there is improvement in the use of verb. The
improvement in this case means whether the students still make the same
mistake or not.
9. To support the findings of this study, the writer did the interview session.
The writer selected 8 participants who showed some progress in grammar
to be interviewed. First, the writer searched a friend who was taking
Extensive Reading classes in the first semester of 2013/ 2014. The writer

12

met her personally and asked her to help in finding other students. The
writer sent messages to all of the suggested participants.
10. The writer recorded the interview using cell phone and then transferred the
recording into the computer. After that, the writer transcribed one or two
recordings in a day and analyzed it.

Data Analysis
The data was analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively. The quantitative
analysis was used to find the frequency of the mistake in each category. The
findings would then be analyzed qualitatively. The three emerging themes which
are Inappropriate Tense (including to be), Inappropriate Use of Irregular Verb and
Inappropriate Use of Regular Verb would be developed because those themes
have higher mistakes than the other aspects.
After the interviews were conducted, the records of those interviews were
transcribed. The coding process was done to classify the participants‟ answers into
some groups. The interview result then would be used to support the findings of
the research.

FINDINGS
The research question of this study is: „To what extent does the use of Oral
Report in Extensive Reading affect the 18 students‟ grammatical performance?‟ In
order to answer that question, the writer analyzed the transcription of the students‟
oral report and did semi-structure interview in the Extensive Reading class in one
semester of the year 2013/2014. On this section the data which were taken from
13

the transcription of the students‟ oral reports and the interview are arranged and
discussed.
From the findings taken from the students‟ oral reports during one
semester in the Extensive Reading class, some interesting facts appear. The table
below gives a brief summary of the frequency.

Table 3. The Summary of Grammatical Mistake in using verb

PART

Inappropriate
Tense

B
I
J
L
M
P
Q
A
D
G
H
K
R
C
E
F
N
O
TOT

OR1 OR2 OR3
13 4
6
3
0
2
11 6
9
6
0
3
2
0
2
13 3
6
9
2
3
3
2
1
2
2
1
4
3
1
15 13 5
3
1
0
4
2
1
2
7
7
4
8
7
6
6
9
1
3
1
1
3
5
102 65 69

PART
A
C
D
F
H
J
L
N
P
R
B
E
G
I
K
M
O
Q

No Auxiliary
Verb

PART

OR1 OR2 OR3
0
1
1 B
0
1
1 E
0
2
0 G
0
2
1 H
0
0
2
J
0
3
0 K
1
2
0
L
1
0
1 P
1
2
1 R
0
1
1 D
1
1
0
I
0
0
0 M
1
0
0 Q
2
1
0 A
1
0
0 C
0
0
0 F
0
0
0 N
0
0
0 O
8 16 8

Inappropriate
use of Irregular
Verb
OR1 OR2 OR3
6
3
5
4
1
5
10 3
4
6
4
5
10 1
3
3
1
3
4
1
3
5
1
4
5
0
2
12 9
4
23 3
1
1
0
0
6
2
1
5
5
7
0
1
2
5
8
2
3
7
1
2
4
2
110 54 54

PART
F
H
I
L
O
P
D
E
G
J
K
Q
R
A
B
C
M
N

Inappropriate
use of Regular
Verb
OR1 OR2 OR3
3
2
3
4
1
2
9
0
4
9
1
3
2
0
1
3
0
1
4
1
1
6
4
0
6
2
1
5
0
0
5
2
0
4
1
1
7
0
0
2
7
4
2
3
2
0
3
3
0
1
0
2
5
5
78 33 31

PART
B
A
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R

No s/-es ending

PART

Over use of
Verb

OR1 OR2 OR3
OR1 OR2 OR3
1
0
1
L
2
1
4
0
1
0 A 3
0
0
0
0
0 B 0
0
0
0
0
0 D 0
0
0
0
0
0 E 4
1
0
0
0
0 F 0
0
0
0
0
0 G 3
0
0
0
0
0 H 0
0
0
0
0
0
I
0
0
0
0
0
0 K 2
0
0
0
0
0 M 1
0
0
0
0
0 N 0
0
0
0
0
0 O 1
0
0
0
0
0 P 1
1
0
0
0
0 Q 0
0
0
0
0
0 R 1
1
0
0
0
0 C 0
1
1
0
0
0
J
0
1
2
1
1
1
18 6
7

From the table, related to the usage of Inappropriate use of tense
(including to be), it can be seen that 6 the students often decrease the mistakes in
their second and third oral reports and 7 students also decrease the mistakes in
their second oral report but increase in their third oral report. However, it also can
be seen that 5 students do not show their improvement in the second and third oral
reports.

14

From the table, most of the students do not make many mistakes related to
the usage of auxiliary verb. It can be seen that 8 students decrease the mistakes in
their second and third oral reports. Moreover, 4 of 8 students do not make
mistakes in the usage of auxiliary verb. It reveals that the students understand in
the usage of auxiliary verb. Nevertheless, there are 10 students still make some
mistakes in their second and third oral reports.
From the table, it can be seen that 4 students tend to decrease the mistakes
in their second and third oral reports related to the usage of Irregular Verb. The
other 9 students also decrease their mistakes in the second oral report but then
their mistakes increase in the third oral report. The rest, 5 students still make
many mistakes in their second and third oral reports. It can be inferred that they
still do not understand in the usage of Irregular verb.
From the table, 7 students show their improvement in the usage of Regular
verb. They tend to decrease the mistakes in the second and third oral reports. The
other 6 students also tend to decrease the mistakes in the second oral report, but
then increase in the third oral report. It also happens to the other 5 students. It
seems that those students still confused in the usage of Regular verb.
From the table, most of the students tend to do very well work in the usage
of –s and –es ending. From 18 students, there is a student who still make mistakes
in the usage of –s and –es ending although it just few mistakes. It reveals that
most of the students have understood in the usage of –s and –es ending.

15

From the table, it can be seen that there are some students who still make a
sentence using more than one verb. 11 of 18 students make mistakes in the usage
of verb, even though they only do few mistakes, it seems that they still confused
in the usage of verb in a sentence. Nevertheless, 7 students do not make any
mistakes on their sentences.
It can be concluded that some of the students decrease their mistakes in the
second and third oral reports. It means that by doing Extensive Reading, they
show the improvement in their grammatical performance. On the other hand,
some students do not show their grammatical performance in the usage of Tense
(including to be), the use of Irregular Verb, and the use of Regular Verb. They
tend to have higher mistakes in those three aspects.

The Extent of Extensive Reading in Developing Students' Grammar
Performance
From the table above, it can be seen that the frequent mistakes occur in
Inappropriate tense (including to be) category. That finding shows that ER class
A students even the ones with high proficiency of grammar still had problems in
using Inappropriate tense (including to be) while they were retelling a story.
Another mistake category which also tends to occur is Inappropriate use of
irregular verb. Here, the participants seemed to have problem when they changed
infinitive word into past simple for example, the word „find‟ becomes „found‟.
The latest category is Inappropriate use of regular verb. It seemed that putting an
–edending could be barrier in the participants‟ speech.

16

These were the analysis for each type of mistakes occurred in students‟
compositions.
1. Inappropriate Tense ( Including to be )
The first type of mistakes found in the composition is Inappropriate Tense
(Including to be. Inappropriate Tense (Including to be) is a structure that used by
the students but not in proper way. The composition was about a story that they
had read before, so they have to make it in form of past tense. However, 5 out of
18 students still used other tenses such as the Simple Present Tense. There are
some examples of the mistakes were shown below,
1.
2.
3.
4.

He loves a girl
Mark is really in love with Dona
After a few days, he talks to his friends‟ father.
…the story tells us about the old Mr. Ebenezer Scoorage,...

(Participant J)
(Participant F)
(Participant B)
(Participant C)

Those sentences above used the Simple Present Tense. Those sentences
appeared in the second oral report which talked about a story that the Participants
had read. The tense used should be the Simple Past Tense because the Participants
retold the story.
From the table, some facts related to students‟ grammatical performance
appeared. Most of the students did not really show a significant improvement in
the usage of Inappropriate of Tenses (including to be).

17

Table 4. Table of Mistakes
Participant

Inappropriate Tense (including to be)
OR1

OR2

OR3

B

13

4

6

I

3

0

2

J

11

6

9

L

6

0

3

M

2

0

2

P

13

3

6

Q

9

2

3

In the first oral report, the students tended to make a great number of
mistakes, while on the second oral report, the number of the mistakes tend to
decrease. However, in the third oral report, the number of the mistakes was a little
bit increasing. One of the participants who experienced this condition was P(P).
My name is P(P). Now I want to tell you about the novel
the title is John Doe. I‟m very interesting with the novel
because the novel tell a about the man and make me a very
very wants (to) know about man. This is a story about John
Doe in the hospital. There is a doctor who ... a patient. The
patient is a man and then the doctor ask the name of the
man. The man doesn‟t know his name. He doesn‟t know
who is he, where come from, the doctor try to help the man.
He is going to find out who is he. He couldn‟t remember
his name. The doctor decided to call him John Doe and he
is agree with the doctor and he called John Doe. The doctor
has an assistant. Her name is Angela. The doctor said to her
“on Tuesday, I‟m going to New York City, you have to
take care of my patient. His name John Doe, okay?” Doctor
said nurse Angela. Everyday nurse Angela visit John Doe
bedroom to care him, give him a food drink, etc. Nurse
Angela is beautiful. John Doe falling in love with her. After
that John Doe tried to approach her. In the afternoon, John
Doe visit to nurse Angela‟s home. Nurse Angela give him
a coffee. They are talking. Unfortunately in the new ...the
doctor watch ... He shocked in the television how about the
man that is a murder and the reality John Doe is murderer

18

and then the doctor phone nurse Angela. The doctor
tellsabout John Doe, “Angela do you know where John
Doe?” said the doctor, “you must be careful John Doe is
murder!” Angela shocked “so what should I do now?”
“calm down the police will come to your house now to
catch John Doe, okay?” I recommend this story is
interesting and give me moral value that is I must be careful
with other people that I don‟t know him or her thank you

From the transcription of P(P) first oral report, it can be seen that she made
13 mistakes related to Inappropriate Tenses (including to be). While in the second
oral report she made 3 mistakes and in the third oral report she made 6 mistakes.
On the first oral report, the student used is/ are after the singular subject pronoun
in present while was/ were is supposed to be used, e.g. “The patient is a man…”
And it also happened on the second and third oral report, e.g. “...Johan Logan is
going to…” and “…two of them are Laura and John…” Although she kept on
making the mistakes related to to be, she did reduce her other mistakes. When the
writer asked her about the mistakes that she made on the first oral report, she said
in the interview,
“Saya tau pakai past tense, tapi Saya bingung penggunaan
is sama was –nya.” P(P)
“I know that it should be in form of Past Tense, but I was
still confused about the use of is and was.” P(P)
(04/07/2014, my translation)

From her answer, it appears that P(P) may not have basic knowledge
related with the use of past tense, in this case the use of is and was. P(P) also
mentioned about her nervousness of giving oral report. She said,

19

“Pertama-tama Saya nervous sekali karena kan ndak pernah
seperti itu…. Saya bingung sampai nggak maksimal, itu
pertama kali oral reportku…” P(P)
“At first, I felt very nervous because I never used it… I also
confused and did not do it maximally, that was my first oral
report…” P(P) (04/07/2014, my translation)

From the interview, it can also be inferred that the student experienced
some problems such as nervousness and confusion. When they felt nervous and
confused, it affected their product in the use of is and was. And it caused her not
to do their oral report optimally.
From the table, it can also be seen that most of the students do not really
show any improvement. They tend to make the same number of mistakes or even
more mistakes on oral report 1 to 3. The participant who experienced this
condition was P(E),
Oral Report 1
Hello everyone, my name is P(E). I have been read a book
from level one Penguin Reader book the title is Karen and
the Artist. The story is about Karen who was move from
one place to another place around the world. She and her
father like art. One day, Karen went to Rome. She was
drink at a cafe and look many beautiful painting there. The
barman said that the painter was never pay him by money,
he always pay by his paint. At that time, Karen wasneed the
artist of the paint his name is Antonio B. Antonio thought
that nobody want to buy his work, so he always gave his
work to the barman to be shown off at that café. In short
Karen bought and sold Antonio‟s picture around the world
and the picture is be shown off at the famous gallery.
Finally Karen come back to Rome and being pictured by
Antonio. Antonio didn‟t like Karen move from Rome and
then he said, “You'll go to stay here”, and Karen replays,
“Who knows?” This is the end of the story and the genre is

20

romantic. I like romantic story and I recommended the
story for all of you, that‟s all thank you
Oral Report 2
Hello everyone, I‟m P(E) and my NIM 112013063. I want
to tell you about my favorite quotation from (a book) titled
Karen and the Artist. It is level one. The quotation is
spoken by a Painter from Rome. His name is Antonio
Bruneti. He was give up to sell his paint because people
didn‟t buy his picture. They didn‟t like Antonio's picture.
One day he met a visitor to his country. She is a woman.
Hers name is Karen. Karen like Antonio‟s pictures and
Antonio gave one of his picture to Karen, but he didn‟t
accept. She wanted to bring some of Antonio'pictures to
London because she want move from one to another place
all around the world, so she work while... A week again
Karen came back to Rome. She brought some of money.
All of Antonio's pictures is sold out. Antonio is falling in
love with Karen and then Karen is being pictured by
Antonio. While drawing and said, “One day you are going
to stay here”. It is quotation that I like so much. It
impressed Antonio is hard felt to Karen to say by his faith
Karen changes his live. He makes his paint competence to
sell. She help Antonio in his work. The word is to the point
but general and implicitly. I hope all of you like this
quotation too thanks
Oral Report 3
Hello everyone, I am P(E). I want to explain about my
picture. There are a detective. Her name was Kate with her
appliances the magnify flash not with it spend and a
recorder. She wants to solve her first case, so to find a
prove where the problem have happened. She needs a
magnifying glass .... she needs to record what the witness
say, then put it in the note, then the thing she needs to do is
connecting between what the witness say to prove where
the problem take place also find the suspect why he/she do
the criminality and how the suspect his or her nation. That‟s
all about my picture. It is taken from book titled Case for
...from a level three and the last I‟m so sorry (I) am not
good in drawing thank you
From the transcription of P(E) first oral report, it can be seen that she made
4 mistakes related to Inappropriate Tenses (including to be). While, in the second

21

and the third oral report, the number of her mistakes was increasing to 8 and 7
mistakes. It might happen because she did not really know that she should retell
the story in form of Past Tense. When the writer asked her about the mistakes that
she made on the first oral report, she said in the interview,
“Di oral yang pertama belum tau kalau pakai past. Yang
kedua tau tapi masih bingung kapan pakai present kapan
pakai past.” P(E)
“In the first oral report, I still did not know if I had to use
Past Tense. I knew that I had to use Past Tense in the
second oral report, but I was still confused when I had to
use Present and when I had to use Past.” P(E) (04/07/2014,
my translation)

From the interview, it is stated that P(E) actually did not know if she had
to use past tense in the first oral report to retell the story that she had read.
However, after being informed by the teacher, she finally knew that she had to use
past tense in the second and third oral report. Although the number of the
mistakes is reducing, it does not mean that the grammar is improving because the
quantity of the words used in the second and third oral report is less than the first
one.
It can be concluded that most of the students did not show any
improvement in the usage of Tenses (including to be). The reasons the students
produced grammatical mistakes were that they were lack of knowledge about
tenses and of experience in using oral report.

22

2. Inappropriate Use of Irregular Verb
The next type of mistakes found in the composition is Inappropriate Use of
Irregular Verb. It occurred when some students made sentences in form of the
Simple Present Tense, and it should be on form of the Simple Past Tense. There
are some of the irregular verbs that occurred in the students‟ composition; tell
(told), fall (fell), go (went), so on. There are some examples of the mistakes are
shown below,
1. He come back to his island again and he find there were a lot of man and
woman in his island. (Participant D)
2. So they find a way to make his day be interesting and thinking about
anything what he can do it in his uncle‟s farm, except what in his uncle
farm. (Participant N)
3. He have much money to married her, so they go to police, but police stand
in front of him and say the true story about Carry. (Participant G)
4. He think they were death but they go home and give surprise to the people
in town. (Participant I)
The sentence above used the Simple Present Tense. That sentence
appeared in the second oral report and should be in form of past tense. The verbs
used should be in form of irregular verbs.
Table 5. Table of Mistakes
Participant

Inappropriate Use of Irregular Verb
OR1

OR2

OR3

B

6

3

5

E

4

1

5

G

10

3

4

H

6

4

5

J

10

1

3

K

3

1

3

L

4

1

3

P

5

1

4

R

5

0

2

23

Based on the table, it shows that there is a tendency that the students
produced a lot of mistakes related to the use of Irregular Verbs on the first oral
report. While on the second and third oral reports, the number of the mistakes was
decreasing. The participant who experienced that condition was P(J),
Oral Report 1
Good afternoon everyone, I‟m P(J). I read hotel Casanova
from level one. The genre is a romance. The novel is too
easy and I enjoy read, but sometimes I find difficult word.
The story tells about Deno's plan. Deno is main character.
He had plan to have a hotel when he was 30 years old, and
he was to get married when he was 26, but all of change
after he meet the first love. She is Carla and finally they are
married when he was 21, and Deno get the hotel because
his wife is very rich, and then they called hotel Casanova
but Deno is unhappy every day. He just work and work. He
was very tired. Carla is very possessive. One day, Deno
know everything about his wife. She is a killer. She kill the
first husband. Deno become not comfortable until he meet
beautiful girl and finally Deno falling in love with his
waiters. Her name is Maria. Maria work at his hotel every
day. Deno and Maria always meet. Carla know it. She is
very angry. She want to kill them, but she is fell. And
finally, Deno and Maria get married and happy ever after.
You all must to read this book. Its‟ very interest
Oral Report 2
Hallo everyone, my name is P(J). I read just like a movie
from level one. At the time, there was a man. He name
(was) Bread. He‟s just a handyman. He loves a girl. Her
name is Gina. She (was) just a teacher of a small children.
“They was some a poor Gina, I love you, I want to marry
you, but we need more money” Bread said, and Gina said,
“Money is not important. We are poor but we are happy, so
I choose the word as my quotation because the word is very
good. Money (is) not everything. If we can try to hard

24

work, we can get money. The firstly, we must happy and
enjoy with our work, so money is come to us thank you
Oral Report 3
Hi friend, I am P(J). I want to show you my picture. Oh my
God, (this) is not good picture I can‟t drawing. I draw a
picture inspiring the novel. The title is the jungle book. My
picture tells about life in the jungle; calm condition and
harmoniously. And then in the evening, father's wolf woke
up in his .. look at the picture! It‟s like wolf, right? I don‟t
think so because I can‟t drawing the wolf‟s life in the ...
with his wife and therefore.. They are have the law in the
jungle. They are animals life in the jungle. All of them life
harmoniously till they are find a baby boy without clothes.
It‟s a cute and he is very small and brave. Mother's wolf
take baby in the grave. They are afraid with bad tiger. Wolf
family keep the baby and he grew up together with animal
in the jungle. It‟s really interesting for me, a boy who can
survive in the middle of jungle with animals especially with
wolf family. I think enough thanks guys.

From the transcription, in the first oral report, P(J) made 10 mistakes in the
usage of Irregular Verb. While in the second and the third oral report, she made 1
and 3 mistakes. However, in the second report although she reduced the number
of the mistakes she still made mistakes related to the use of irregular verb even for
the same verb. For example, on the first oral report she used the word meet instead
of met. And it appeared again on the second oral report.
The decreasing of the number of the mistakes on the second and third oral
reports are due to two reasons. First, related to the number of the words produced
on the oral reports. On the first oral report, she produced 212, on the second oral
report 130 and the third 180 words. It seems that the more words she produced the
more mistakes she committed. The second reason is related to the use of irregular

25

verb itself. It seems that she did not use many of irregular verbs on the second and
third oral reports. Therefore, the inappropriateness in using irregular verb which
seems to happen to most of the students is not found.
From the findings above, it can be concluded that most of the students
might still need a better understanding about Irregular Verbs knowledge and the
reducing of the number of the mistakes not because they were aware of irregular
verbs but mostly because of the quantity of the words and the absence of using
irregular verb.
3. Inappropriate Use of Regular Verb
The next mistake found is Inappropriate Use of Regular Verb. Four
examples of the mistakes are presented below:
1. At the first time while actually it was a big fish body after they realize
that they tried to coop it to the ship. (Participant O)
2. Two strange men always look at Laura and John. (Participant P)
3. Then Cublearrive to the country so she went to the front door but the
front door didn't open. (Participant L)
4. …he wonder anything for his vacation and finally he accept his uncle
request to help him in his uncle farm. (Participant N)
Those sentences appeared in composition which talked about the students‟
drawing pictures based on the book they have read. „realize‟, „look‟, „arrive‟,
„wonder‟, and „accept‟ were verbs that should be in form of regular verb with
putting –ed ending.

26

Table 6. Table of Mistakes
Participant

Inappropriate Use of Regular Verb
OR1

OR2

OR3

F

3

2

3

H

4

1

2

I

9

0

4

L

9

1

3

O

2

0

1

P

3

0

1

From the table, it can be seen that the number of mistakes that they made
in the use of Regular verb is not as many as the mistakes that they made in the use
of Tenses (including to be) and Irregular Verb. It also shows that there is a
tendency that the students knew that they had to add –ed on the regular verb.
Therefore, the number of mistakes related to the use of regular verb that they
made did not appear a lot. It can be seen when the three oral report were compared
the writer does not find a significant number of mistakes. However, from the data,
it can be seen that some of the students had problem with the pronunciation of –d,
for example the verb dance /dæns/ should be pronounced danced /dænsd/.
Another example was on the verb express /ık‟spres/ should be pronounced
expressed /ık‟spresd/. They also had problem with the pronunciation with –ed. For
example the verb need /ni:d/ should be pronounced needed /ni:dıd/. Here are the
transcriptions of some students‟ oral reports,
Oral Report of P(F)

Oral Report 1
Hello everybody, I read a book a little girl meets boy from
level one on last week. It is a romance book.(The) level is
too easy for me and I enjoy. The story about a girl named
Dona who likes a boy named Mark. Dona sees Mark on the
27

boot to spin. She likes him and he likes her. Mark have a
brother named Dave and their very similar. Dona thinks
(that) Dave is mark so they dance together. Then Mark
(was) very jealous with them. Dona disappointed when
learnthat he is not a mark but his brother. After a few days
they meet at a party and express their feelings. Finally the
story has a happy ending. I recommend this book (is) very
interest to read, thank you.
Oral Report 2
Hello everybody my name is P(F). I want to tell you about
my favorite quotation. This is spoken by Dave. Dave is
Mark brother. He know (that) Mark is really in love with
Dona. He always .... his brother and say "hey, she is smiling
at you and you are right in the face, you are in love, hey
man, you are in love" I like this quotation because it is very
funny and make me laugh. Dave make his brother shy and
red in the face but Dave know that mark likes Dona and
Dona likes mark and he have a plan to unite them in the
party at night. Dave plans run smoothly. They meet at a
party and search into each other face and then express their
feelings. Dave is a great brother, very smart, very funny and
helpful. Thank you.

From the transcription of P(F) first oral report, it can be seen that she made
3 mistakes in the usage of Inappropriate Use of Regular Verbs. While in the
second and the third oral report, she made 2 and 3 mistakes respectively. If the
writer compared the use of irregular verb with regular verb by P(F), it turned out
that the number of mistakes was decreasing in the use of regular verb. It shows
that P(F) was more familiar with some verbs in regular verbs than those in
irregular verbs.
Oral report of P(A)

Oral Report 1
I read the book from level 2 titled the mystery island by JR.
The genre is adventure. I'll tell you the summary of the
mystery island. There were a man, one boy, and one dog
28

named Mr. Farious handcraft nape, Spiled, Habert and the
dog top that have a journey with balloon from America and
they wanted to (go) around the world. In March 1865, wind
was very strong. So the 4 man, one boy and the dog arrive
on a strange island. They found so many problem there and
they had keep survive. They were live in ... They problem
that must they face is when the pirates came. They have to
hide because they were scary and had no weapon. But
suddenly someone was attack the pirates‟ ship and they
were save. The other mysterious thing is Harbert was sick
and suddenly there were medicine in the table and after
drank the medicine Harbert was.... Something mysterious
was happening. Everything they need always ready for
them. They wonder if someone was helping them and one
day they found the harbor. It was captain Nimo. The
captain Nimo was very sick and thought it was his last time.
So he give a treasure for them and finally Mr.Fairus
bankrupt, Nape Spiled, Harbert and Top saw there was a
ship toward the mysterious island. That was a ship that will
going to America, their hometown. They were very happy
because they can back to the hometown again. I
recommended this book for you because you can feel the
atmosphere of the story when they tried to survive in the
island. It makes you feel like you are trip in the mysterious
island too. You can imagine the situation of the mysterious
island too. It makes you interest to read this book again and
again, so that is my book, the mysterious island by JF
Oral report 2
I am P(A) and I take my quotation from my level 3 book.
The title is Stargate. The genre of this book is adventure.
The quotation (that) I take comes from the main characters
of the book Daniel Jackson. He was a scientist. He works
on a project which search about a Stargate in Egypt. In this
project Daniel Jackson work with soldiers and colonel
Otniel that become his friends. Stargate is a gate that
connect Egypt to somewhere that similar to earth. It million
like years away from earth that strange prince has 3 sons
and the people afraid with ... God of son and when the
project had to start that Daniel and his friends entered to the
Stargate. The people in the strandline told Daniel and his
friend where God that could save them from the Evil Ra.
Finally Daniel and his friends can help the