Background of the Study

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

Language is the main way to communicate with other person in human’s life. Language has important role, such as thinking, express feeling, communicating ideas and discussing with others. Sapir 1921 : 8 says “language is purely human and non instinctive method of communicating ideas, emotional, and desires by means of system of voluntarily produced symbols”. Nowadays, many people tend to study not only their native language but also a foreign language, especially English. As we know that English holds an important part in International life as an International language. Because of that, many people are eager to speak and write English well. Large part of students in the world study about English as their second or foreign language. In Indonesia, students arealso study English as second language in the school and support it by joining English courseto improve language skills or language ability.However, still many people who have not been able to use English because English is quite difficult to be learnt and understood. One of the difficult parts to be learnt is grammar because it creates some words to become a good sentence, paragraph, etc. One of grammatical components is part of speech. Fries 1957: 65 classifies the part of speech into eight parts, they are, noun, pronoun, adjective, verb, adverb, preposition, conjunction, and interjection. According to Collin 1993:28 pronoun makes statements less repetitive while showing how the subjects and objects of a clause or a series of clauses are connected. And he divided the pronouns into eight types; personal pronouns, demonstrative pronouns, possessive pronouns, reflexive pronouns, indefinite pronouns, reciprocal pronouns, relative pronouns, and interrogative pronouns. There are so many types of pronouns that have different meaning and purpose in a sentence. Demonstrative Pronoun is one topic thatstudents studying about English grammar, especially about demonstrative sentence. By understanding the demonstrative pronoun, it can help the student in speaking and writing English well. Demonstrative pronouns are those that identify or point to a thing or things and occasionally persons.They can be both singular and plural and they refer to nouns that are either nearby or far away in time or space. There are four demonstrative pronouns: this, that, these, those. This and these used to replace specific person or thing near the speaker. But the difference is this refer to singular nouns and these identify plural nouns. For example: - This book is mine. - Do you want these candies? Then, that and those refer to replace specific person or thing far away from the speaker. But the difference is that refer to singular nouns and those identify plural nouns. For example: - I can’t reach that pen - Thosebabiesin the next the room are crying. So, a demonstrative pronoun tells us whether it is replacing something singular or plural and whether that things is close by or farther away in purpose to modify the pronoun. Meanwhile, Demonstrative adjective are those that identify or point to a thing or things and occasionally persons in purpose to modify the noun that followed by adjective . Just like demonstrative pronoun, demonstrative adjective also can be both singular and plural and they refer to nouns that are either nearby or far away in time or space. Demonstrative adjective also must contain those 4 words above to identify the demonstrative form this, that, these, those that has same meaning and function as demonstrative pronoun but followed by adjective. For example: - This red car is belong to my mother. - Thatnew sofa looks better. - Thesebroken glasses cuts her finger. - Thoseexpensivebags are mine. From the explanation above, the writer concludes both kind of the using of demonstrative are identical, but a demonstrative pronoun stands alone, while a demonstrative adjective modifies the noun. In Indonesia, studying English is as important as other subject for students. They study English beginning from primary school up to university level, moreover they take the addition lesson in course for increase their English furthermore. In this thesis, the writer describes and analyzes the ability of My Apple’s students on demonstrative sentence. My Apple is a multimedia language centre that is located in JalanSetia Budi No.370 E, Tanjung Sari, Medan. My Apple has many educated programs, they are: English for children, English for teenagers, English for adults, Mandarin class, conversation, grammar, art and craft, and movie time.In English program, there are some levels that categorize students’ knowledge about English, appropriate with the curriculum based from Singapore. The levels are: Early 1, Early 2, Pre-Beginner 1, Pre-Beginner2, Beginner 1, Beginner 2, Pre-Level 1, Pre- Level 2, Level 1-9, Step 1-6, and Conversation. Pre-Level 1, Pre-Level 2 and Level 1 are the levels that study about demonstrative pronoun and demonstrative adjective in those classes, the students are commonly in 4 th -5 th grade of primary school.Having observed some students of My Apple, the writer found that they are confused to differentiate the types of demonstrative sentence. As a primary school students, they also have difficulty to change the combination between the singular this or that either the plural these or those. They are confused which one they should use. That’s why the writer describes and analyzes the students’ ability to use demonstrative pronoun and demonstrative adjective at My Apple course.

1.2 Problem of the Study