59 lesson and following classroom activity because they felt appreciated after getting
reinforcement. In conclusion, all of the participants in FGD have implemented
reinforcement skill when were assigned as the teachers in Microteaching course. There are many different ways in delivering reinforcement to the students.
Reinforcement resulted in positive effect to the learning process based on the participants’ experiences.
B. Microteaching Students’ Suggestions on the Use of Reinforcement Skill in Microteaching Class
This part is to investigate the second research problem. The research problem is to find out Microteaching students’ suggestions on the use of
reinforcement skill in Microteaching class. There are several suggestions from the participants for the implementation of this skill. The suggestions are divided into
two categories, for the teacher candidate in Microteaching class and the implementation reinforcement skill in Microteaching class.
From the open-ended question, there were as many as 16 participants had similar suggestion that the teachers should vary the form of reinforcement, as
stated in chapter II about types of reinforcement. There were six participants suggested that non-verbal reinforcement should be improved such as eye contact,
facial expressions and gestures to encourage the students in classroom activity. It means the teachers should be accustomed to use non-verbal so the way of
60 delivering reinforcement will not be monotonous. To vary the verbal
reinforcement, the teachers should expand the vocabularies. There were five participants in FGD who suggested that the teachers are
better to deliver reinforcement as natural as possible. Being honest and natural is also needed because it can affect the students’ performance. Being natural as they
meant is unaffected, relaxed, instinctively spontaneous and honest. They added that using facial expressions and tone of voice showing enthusiasm can make the
reinforcement more meaningful for the target. Four participants provided answers in the open-ended question that the teachers had better reinforce their students in
right time by knowing their characteristic and adjusting the language to the students’ level. In FGD result, the researcher found that there was a participant
stated that when the teacher gives reinforcement but the students’ behavior does not change as the teacher expected, there might be problems to be solved such as
by deepening the students’ characteristic and class condition. More practices are needed for the teacher candidates to master the basic
teaching skills including reinforcement. In FGD, there was a participant said that practicing giving reinforcement is not only done inside the class but also outside
the class if necessary, for example, the students’ daily life. A participant in open- ended suggests that Microteaching’s lecturers should provide more practices in a
small and big group of students. Another student wrote that leaving comments verbally could appreciate their response to the teacher’s question. The teacher
should have the comment or feedback as meaningful as possible.
61 According to Cooper 1982, overusing a word or phrase may lead the
reinforcement into absence of its power as reward. If the reinforcement is given too often, it will have no effect to the students and they may not be enthusiastic
and interested in the lesson activity. Brown 1975 also states that using verbal praises too frequently results in the loss of its rewarding properties. So, the
teacher should avoid monotonous way including forms, words or phrases in giving reinforcement to the students.
There were four participants who suggested appreciating students’ work and answers is necessary even though they made mistakes by paying attention to
their behavior. Understanding the student’s characteristic is necessary in order to help the student during learning process. Also, it can be used to decide the right
reinforcement for the characteristic. Then, it can encourage and make the student more confident in classroom activity. There was a suggestion found in open-ended
question, The teacher also should appreciatereinforce the students when they have
no idea about the material. The teacher has to guide them with a brief explanation and illustration and then reinforce the students that they can
do it. see Appendix C of Raw Data from Open-ended Questionnaire Questions
It is clear that the teacher has the responsibility to the student’s understanding of the material and gives reward to the students who express or share the intended
meaning. The next paragraph will discuss the suggestion for the implementation of reinforcement skill in Microteaching class.
In the FGD, the student C said that the implementation of reinforcement skill could be improved by learning from recorded video of each student who
62 practiced in Microteaching lab. In the FGD, the researcher found that student O
and P said that the observation when teaching practice could allow Microteaching students to have comment and feedback may both from the observers and lecturer
supervisor. The suggestions from other Microteaching students might leave doubt or be less obvious, the teacher candidates had better choose the lecturer as
the model in how to implement the basic teaching skills. In student L’s explanation about teaching lower semester, it may be necessary to record the
teaching practice in lower semester because the students are different from the students in Microteaching lab. The teacher faces real classroom activity and has
no feedback from the lecturer of lower semester class.
63
CHAPTER V CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
This is the last chapter of the research. This chapter contains two parts, namely conclusions and recommendations. The conclusion part will describe the
summing-up of the research and its result to answer the problem formulations. The recommendations part will present the suggestions for the Microteaching
students, lecturers and future researchers.
A. Conclusions
The researcher
conducted this
research to
investigate Microteaching students’ perception on the use of reinforcement skill in
Microteaching class. This research has two problem formulations. The first is “What is Microteaching students’ perception on the use of reinforcement skill in
Microteaching class?”. The second is “What are Microteaching students’ suggestions on the use of reinforcement skill in Microteaching class?”.
The first problem research contains two parts, Microteaching students’ perception as the student and as the teacher. The participants of the research were
Microteaching students of year 2009 that were taking the course in even semester of 2012. The researcher used questionnaire and focused group discussion FGD
as the instruments to collect the data. The questionnaire consists of 20 close-ended questions 10 items for students’ perception as the students and 10 items for
students’ perception as the teacher using Likert scale of agreement and
