An instrument to measure spoken English communicative competence for elementary school students.

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xiv ABSTRACT

ATIK WIDYAWATI. 2014. An Instrument to Measure Spoken English Communicative Competence for Elementary School Students. _Yogyakarta: English Language Studies. Graduate Program. Sanata Dharma University.

This study was conducted to design a model of spoken English communicative competence test for elementary school students in Indonesia. The research was intended to provide a theoretical foundation for developing the test model as an instrument to measure the spoken English competence of elementary school students. The designed test model is expected as the pilot model of measurement for children in Indonesia. Therefore the information acquired from the test is able to help the learners to be more developed.

There were two research questions in this study: (1) What is the expected spoken English communicative competence of elementary schools learners in Indonesia like? (2) What is the instrument model used to measure the students’ spoken competence like? To answer the research questions, the researcher conducted the Research and Development method. To answer the first research question, the researcher conducted literature review and respondents’ validation. This becomes the foundation to formulate a theoretical model of the Indonesian elementary school students’ spoken competence. The second research question was developed by designing the test model of the communicative competence for young language learners.

From the literature review and the respondents’ validation it was found that standard competence of the spoken English communicative competence is the ability to understand and produce meaningful spoken text organizationally and pragmatically. Understanding the text means the learners are able to discriminate words and the meaning of the sentence, identify a growing range of vocabulary and structure of sentences and short dialogue, predict meaning from a range of cues in the dialogue, and understand the connection between ideas by recognizing words and sentences of the context. Meanwhile, to produce a text means the learners are able to utter sounds, words, and sentences clearly with appropriate pronunciation and intonation, speak with cohesive and well-organized sentences, use language to get what they want, to learn, to imagine things, to think about things, and use oral language appropriate to the language use situation that they are in.

From the theoretical model then the researcher designed a set of a test. The test consisted of 5 parts of listening section and 2 parts of speaking section. The listening test was an objective test in the form of multiple-choice task, matching, and answering. The speaking test consisted a set of picture which required the students to produce a spoken text.

The iconic model had also been tried out to the sixth grade of elementary school students. The test results were analyzed whether there were significant differences between the upper or lower group of the the students. From the computation it was found the score level of difference lied between 0.00 – 0.20. It means there was not significant differences between the upper group and the

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lower group. From the listening try out it was found that the level of difference was above 0.20. It means listening part 1, 2, and 4 were categorised poor. Meanwhile the listening part 3 and 5 were categorised satisfactory and good. It means there was significant difference between the upper group and the lower group. In doing the speaking part most of the students did not perform well. The students faced some difficulties in expressing their ideas orally. Many students still needed elicitation question from the tester to produce the text. It needed a professional tester, therefore, who understand more about young language learners and they must be able to treat the children appropriately.

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xvi ABSTRAK

ATIK WIDYAWATI. 2014. Alat Untuk Mengukur Kompetensi Berkomunikasi Secara Lisan Untuk Siswa Sekolah Dasar.Yogyakarta: Kajian Bahasa Inggris. Program Pasca-Sarjana. Universitas Sanata Dharma.

Penelitian ini dilakukan dengan tujuan untuk merancang sebuah model kompetensi berkomunikasi secara lisan dalam bahasa Inggris siswa-siswa sekolah dasar di Indonesia. Penelitian ini dimaksudkan untuk dapat menyediakan landasan teoritis untuk menyusun sebuah tes sebagai alat untuk mengukur kompetensi berkomunikasi secara lisan siswa-siswasekolah dasar di Indonesia. Rancangan tes ini akan menjadi contoh alat ukur yang tepat untuk siswa sekolah dasar. Sehingga informasi yang diperoleh dari alat ukur ini dapat digunakan untuk meningkatkan kemampuan lisan bahasa Inggris siswa SD.

Ada dua pertanyaan yang dirumuskan dalam penelitian ini, yaitu: (1) seperti apakah kompetensi berkomunikasi secara lisan dalam bahasa Inggris siswa-siswa sekolah dasar di Indonesia? Dan (2) seperti apakah alat ukur untuk mengetahui kompetensi berkomunikasi secara lisan dalam bahasa Inggris siswa-siswa sekolah dasar di Indonesia? Untuk menjawab pertanyaan-pertanyaan tersebut, peneliti menggunakan metode Research and Development. Rumusan masalah pertama terjawab dengan melakukan analisis kepustakaan dan validasi dari responden. Hal ini akan menjadi dasar teori penyusunan tes. Sedangkan rumusan masalah kedua dijawab dengan menyusun model tes untuk siswa sekolah dasar di Indonesia.

Berdasarkan analisis kepustakaan dan validasi para responden ditemukan bahwa kompetensi standar berkomunikasi lisan siswa – siswa SD di Indonesia adalah kemampuan untuk memahami dan memproduksi teks lisan secara runtut dan praktis. Memahami teks artinya siswa mampu membedakan kata–kata dan arti kalimat, beberapa kelompok kata dan struktur kalimat dan percakapan pendek, memprediksi arti dari petunjuk-petunjuk dalam sebuah percakapan, dan memahami kesinambungam antara beberapa ide dengan cara mengenali kata–kata dan kalimat berdasarkan konteksnya. Sedangkan memproduksi sebuah teks artinya siswa dapat mengucapkan kata dan kalimat secara jelas dengan lafal dan intonasi yg tepat, berbicara dengan kalimat yang urut dan runtut, menggunakan bahasa untuk mendapatkan sesuatu yang diinginkan, untuk belajar, untuk membayangkan benda, untuk berfikir tentang benda, dan menggunakan bahasa lisan yang tepat dalam ragam kegunaan bahasa dalam sebuah situasi tertentu.

Dari tes blueprint lalu peneliti merumuskan sebuah tes. Tes mendengarkan berbentuk objektif yang meliputi pilihan ganda, menjodohkan, dan menjawab singkat. Tes berbicara berupa bercerita dan dialog percakapan pendek.

Ikon tes ini juga telah diuji cobakan kepada siswa kelas 6 sekolah dasar. Hasil uji coba dianalisis apakah ada perbedaan yang cukup signifikan antara kelompok bawah dan kelompok atas. Setelah dianalisis ditemukan skor daya beda tes tersebut berada antara 0.00–0.20. Dari hasil uji coba ditemukan bahwa tes mendengarkan bagian 1, 2, dan 4 dikategorikan lemah. Skor tersebut menunjukkan bahwa tidak ada perbedaan yang cukup signifikan antara siswa yang berada di kelompok atas dan kelompok bawah. Sedangkan tes

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mendengarkan bagian 3 dan 5 termasuk kategori bagus. Skor daya beda berada di atas 0, 20. Hal ini menunjukkan ada perbedaan yang signifikan antara kelompok atas dan kelompok bawah. Dalam tes berbicara sebagian besar siswa kurang mampu berbicara dengan baik. Banyak siswa mengalami kesulitan dalam menyampaikan ide secara lisan. Banyak siswa yang masih perlu diberi pertanyaan pancingan dari guru agar dapat memproduksi sebuah cerita. Untuk itu, diperlukan penguji yang professional yang mengerti lebih dalam tentang dunia anak dan para penguji harus mampu memperlakukan anak – anak secara baik.

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AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

A THESIS

Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements to Obtain theMagister Humaniora(M.Hum) Degree

in English Language Studies

by Atik Widyawati

106332011

THE GRADUATE PROGRAM OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE STUDIES SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY

YOGYAKARTA 2015

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AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

Atik Widyawati 106332011

Approved by:

F.X. Mukarto, Ph.D. _______________________ Thesis Advisor Yogyakarta, June 30, 2014

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iii

A THESIS

AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

Atik Widyawati 106332011

Defended before the Thesis Committe and Declared Acceptable

THESIS COMMITTEE

Chairperson : Dr. J. Bismoko …………...

Secretary : F.X. Mukarto, Ph.D …………...

Members : 1. V. Triprihatmini, S.Pd., M.Hum., M.A. …………...

2. J.S.M. Pudji Lestari, S.Pd., M.Hum. …………...

Yogyakarta, September , 2014 The Graduate School Director Sanata Dharma University

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STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY

This is to certify that all the ideas, phrases, and sentences, unless otherwise stated, are the ideas, phrases, and sentences by the writer. The writer understands the full consequences including degree cancellation if she took somebody’s ideas, phrases or sentences without a proper reference.

Yogyakarta, June 30, 2014

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LEMBAR PERNYATAAN PERSETUJUAN PUBLIKASI

KARYA ILMIAH UNTUK KEPENTINGAN AKADEMIS

Yang bertandatangan di bawah ini, saya mahasiswa Universitas Sanata Dharma:

Nama : Atik Widyawati

Nomor Mahasiswa : 106332011

Dengan perkembangan ilmu pengetahuan, saya memberikan kepada Perpustakaan UniversitasSanata Dharma karya ilmiah saya yang berjudul:

AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

STUDENTS

beserta perangkat yang diperlukan. Dengan demikian, saya memberikan hak kepada Universitas Sanata Dharma untuk menyimpan, mengalihkan dalam media lain, mengelolanya dalam bentuk pangkalan data, mendistribusikannya secara terbatas, dan mempublikasikannya di internet atau media lain untuk kepentingan akademis tanpa perlu meminta ijin dari saya maupun memberi royalti kepada saya selama tetap mencantumkan nama saya sebagai penulis.

Demikian pernyataan ini saya buat dengan sebenarnya. Dibuat di Yogyakarta.

Padatanggal: 30 Juni 2014 Yang menyatakan,

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This thesis is dedicated to:

Jesus Christ, my beloved brothers and sisters, my husband, Widi,

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vii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

First of all I would like to thank God, Jesus Christ, for His blessing and guidance throughout the process of thesis writing.

I realize that this thesis writing would have never been realized without the support of others. Therefore, on this occasion, I would like to express my gratitude and appreciation to my sponsor F.X. Mukarto, Ph.D, and Dr. J. Bismoko, for their patience, and willingness to spare their precious criticism, advice, and correction during the research.

My deepest gratitude is also addressed to my lecturers in English Language Studies, Dr. Novita Dewi, Dr. B.B. Dwijatmoko, and Dr. Alip for their comment, suggestions, and support during my study.

I would like to reveal my greatest gratitude to my parents, (†)Bapakand (†) Ibu F.X. Madirun who had given me unconditional love and care. Mas

Nang andMbakNik who had given me inspiration and chance to pursue higher degree in this University. Without them I would not have gone this far. I thank

Mbak Wik,Mbak Tut, Mbak Rien, Mas Ook, Mbak Lies. I know they always support me in any conditions.

My thanks go to my respondents, Bu Pipin, Bu Hening, Bu Dwi, Bu

Lusi, and the sixth grader of SD Marsudirini Muntilan, from their cooperation I got the helpful data as the source from which I can conduct this research.

Many thanks are also extended to all my friends, KBI 2010, for giving me such a beautiful friendship and attenttion during my study at Sanata Dharma University. Thank you for the great times we shared.

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viii

I am greatly indebted to my friends, Mawar, Uci, Mbak Dwi, and Rusdiana who had struggled together to accomplish this thesis and face the “scary situation”.

Last but not least, my deepest love and appreciation goes to my husband,

MasWidhi, and my sons, Vinsen and Windriya, who have given me unlimited love, support, and prayer so I can pass my difficulties. Special thanks to them for giving me strength to pass through the sorrows and giving me a reason to finish this thesis. May God bless them all with His unlimited love.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

TITLE PAGE ... i

APPROVAL PAGES ... ii

THESIS DEFENCE APPROVAL PAGE ... iii

STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY ... iv

LEMBAR PERSETUJUAN PUBLIKASI KARYA ILMIAH_{... v}

THESIS DEDICATION PAGE ... vi

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT... vii

TABLE OF CONTENTS... ix

LIST OF TABLES ... xi

LIST OF FIGURES ... xii

LIST OF APPENDICES ... xiii

ABSTRACT ... xiv

ABSTRAK_{... xvi}

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION ... 1

A. Background of the Study... 1

B. Problem Identification... 6

C. Research Focus ... 6

D. Statement of Research Question ... 7

E. Goal of Research ... 8

F. Product Specifications... 8

G. Benefit of Research ... 9

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW... 11

A. Theoretical Reviews ... 11

1. Communicaive Competence Theories ... 14

a. Hymes ... 14

b. Canale and Swain ... 15

c. Savignon ... 17

d. Bachman and Palmer ... 20

e. Celce – Murcia ... 22

2. The Young Learners ... 25

a. Children’s Growth ... 26

b. Children’s Literacy ... 27

c. Children’s Need ... 28

d. Children Language Development... 28

3. Language Testing ... 31

a. The Phase of the Test Development ... 33

b. The Test Characteristics ... 34

c. Reliability, Validity, Practicality, and Authenticity ... 36

4. Testing Spoken Language Competence ... 38

B. Theoretical Framework ... 40

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A. Research Method... 43

B. Research Setting and Respondents... 46

C. Research Instruments ... 47

D. Data Gathering and Analysis Techniques ... 50

CHAPTER IV: RESEARCH FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ... 52

A. Result of Experts’ Validation on the Preliminary Product... 52

1. The Result of the Experts’ Validation on the Theoretical Model ... 53

2. The Result of the Experts’ Validation on the Test Items ... 58

B. Product Revision ... 61

C. Results of Determining the Test Appropriateness, Practicality, and Usefulness ... 72

D. The Results of the Test Trial ... 79

E. Discussion ... 87

1. Theoretical Model ... 87

2. The Test Prototype ... 88

a. Listening Test... 88

b. Speaking Test ... 90

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMENDATIONS ... 93

A. Conclusions ... 93

B. Recommendation ... 95

BIBLIOGRAPHY ... 97

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 2.1: Spoken Activities (Penny McKay 2006, 198) ... 39

Table 3.1: Test Blueprint ……….48

Table 3.2: The Blueprint of Test Assessment ... 49

Table 4.1: Some Characteristics of Oral Language Ability ... 54

Table 4.2: The Spoken English Competence for Children in Indonesia ... 57

Table 4.3: The Results of Experts’ Validation... 58

Table 4.4: The Results of Experts’ Validation on Questionnaire Part B ... 72

Table 4.5: The Summary of the Tests Item Analysis... 79

Table 4.6: The Category of the Test Items ... 80

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 2.1: Hyme’s Model of Communicative Competence ... 15 Figure 2.2: Canale and Swain’s Model of Communicative Competence ... 16 Figure 2.3: Savignon’s Model of Communicative Competence ... 20 Figure 2.4: Bachman and Palmer’s Model of Communicative Competence .... 22 Figure 2.5: Celce-Murcia et al’s. Communicative Competence Model ... 25 Figure 2.6: Model of Test Development ... 33 Figure 3.1: R & D Cycles and Test Development Stages ... 44

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LIST OF APPENDICES

Appendix 1: The Blue Print ... 100

Appendix 2: The Listening Script ... 101

Appendix 3: The Questionnaire ... 109

Appendix 4: The Final Product of the Test Prototype ... 122

Appendix 5: The Raw Data... 135

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xiv

ABSTRACT

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xvi

ABSTRAK

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xvii

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CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

This chapter will explain the reasons of conducting a research on spoken English communicative competence test for elementary school students in Indonesia. This chapter consists of six subheadings in which the researcher elaborates the background of the study, problem identification, research focus, statement of research question, goal of research, product specifications, and benefit of research. Further discussion will be presented in the following section.

A. BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

English as a means of communication becomes very important today. It is mostly used by people around the world. They use English to maintain their relationship to international business, education, tourism, etc. Therefore, there is a strong demands to have good skills in English. Knowing the strong demands of the society, people are aware of its importance. People from expanding country try to learn it. There are some reasons why people want to speak English. The first reason is that it will help them to communicate each other especially to communicate with people from other countries. This importance brings an understanding that in order to survive every person must be able to speak English. Given the fact, some of the Asia countries have used English as a second language. There is, therefore, English community in some areas of the country. English has been used as a means of communication with the people in that

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community besides their mother tongue. The second one is the growth of economics. The issue of free trade also influences the reasons why people must be able to speak English. By acknowleging the reasons above, it is very crucial that every person must be able to speak English in order to compete with the others. One of the solutions is by teaching English since the early age. The aim is to equip the children with good English competence particularly in speaking English. Intentionally in the future they can work professionally and can compete with people from around the world. Moreover, when children learn English in the early age they will be able to speak English fluently.

Indonesia as part of the developing country has put English as the local load in the elementary curriculum. Knowing its importance, many elementary schools teachers teach English to their students. Hopefully the students can communicate in English since early age. Yet there is unclear description of how far they have been studying English and what they can do with it. Even their interests in learning English decrease when they continue their study in Junior High school (Kasihani, 2004: 10). Moreover, there is not clear and standard measurement of the elementary school students’ competence. If there is standard measurement, it is expected the process of teaching and learning English will be more effective. Yet, it is not easy to find an instrument to measure the students’ competence especially for young language learners.

Measurement is a part of the language program. It is utilized to measure the students’ ability of expected competence. A good measurement must be supported by appropriate instruments. The appropriate instruments will be useful

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to monitor the students’ progress. This progress will give accurate information about their language competence.

English has been taught in the elementary school in Indonesia around 1990’s. It is taught since the fourth grade in elementary school. Recently, English has been taught from the first year. Even, in some schools, it has been taught in the play group. English becomes the local load in the elementary school curriculum. The intention is that the students can communicate in English since early age. So, the practice of teaching English to young learners must be done to develop their competence.

From Kasihani’s research (2004: 3), it was also reported that the practice of teaching English to young learners has been done for years, but it is still questioned why the students are not able to communicate in English effectively. The reality showed the teaching methods and techniques were not appropriate for elementary school students. In addition, there were some teachers who did not have appropriate backgrounds in English education. Moreover some schools sometimes do not prepare appropriate instruments to assess the children’s language competence even some teachers do not know how to assess them.

Assessment activity is often done by giving a test to the children. Unfortunetely, most of the tests focus more on the grammar and vocabulary items. In this kind of test the students often do the multiple choice and matching test. The test only recalls the children’s memory about words and rules. The designed test does not support the children to develop their creativity in using the language they have learned. The test also rarely focuses on the language skills, the ability to

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listen and speak. Even the test given is not in the same line with the teaching practices that have been done. In the classroom teachers often ask the children to speak, sing, retell, and also have a dialogue but they test designed is really far from the activities given in the classroom. Therefore, it needs a set of test which covers the children’s needs and lead to the betterment of the children’s competence.

As part of the language programs, assessment is used to collect information about the practice of language program itself. Assessment takes an important role in the teaching and learning process. Assessment will be useful to monitor the students’ progress. The students may be assessed on their skills or knowledge. As has been stated before, in Indonesia the assessment is conducted mostly by giving a test. The test is applied to measure the students’ knowledge of the materials given and also their skills. It means every student has opportunity to show their knowledge and skills in learning the language. A test can also be used to evaluate the material itself, whether the material given is appropriate enough for the students, especially for young language learners. Therefore, a teacher can make a good decision related to the material which is given in the school.

A test is also one of the sources of information for the parents. It is very important for parents to have enough and objective information about their children. It will help them to make appropriate decision to support their children in learning a language. From the test parents will know whether learning another language gives positive impacts on their children or not. If it does not give

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positive impact, parents can find appropriate ways to motivate and support their children, so that every child can grow and bloom well.

Although the practice of teaching English for elementary school students has been implemented years ago, there is still not enough serious attention from the government to give more concern on this area. The government may provide the curriculum, however the follow up is still limited. The materials may also be various, but the appropriate assessment is also still limited. It is, therefore, important to provide the instrument that covers the young learners’ need.

Concerning to the matters above, it is necessary to prepare and design appropriate tests for young learners. It is crucial to be done because most of the tests emphasize more on the written text. It is still needed the appropriate tests that measure not only the written competence but also the spoken competence. The tests must emphasize and develop the children’s communicative competence It means the tests must encourage the children in developing their writing and speaking skills. In addition, the tests must also motivate the children to be more creative and competent in using the language. Since there is still difficulty to find this kind of test, in this study the writer is interested in designing a set of test to measure the children’s competence. The instrument designed is based on the theories related to the communicative competence. The main purpose is to encourage the students to be able to develop their communicative competence. Thus, the children will become more competent and more self-actualized to prepare them to participate and take a part in this global era.

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B. PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION

There are two main concerns of this research. The first concern is related to the communicative competence of the elementary students. The second is the test design to measure the students’ communicative competence.

Since English has been taught in the elementary school, it is expected that students have ability to communicate in English. So far there is not clear description of what kinds of communicative competence should be possessed by the students. This study tries to identify the communicative competence in children. The children’s competence will be derived from the theories of communicative competence and then they will be adjusted to the children’s characteristics. In short, the identification of children’s communicative competence is the first concern of this study.

The second concern of this study is the test design which is used to assess the children communicative competence. Communicative competence becomes the main goal of the language program so the test design should represent the students’ ability to communicate in speaking or listening. This test design hopefully will make the teaching practice to be more effective and the children will be more competent.

C. RESEARCH FOCUS

This research focuses on the two main concerns, they are the communicative competence of the elementary school students and the design of a

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test to measure spoken competence of the elementary school students in Indonesia.

Communicative competence in this study focuses on the spoken skills, they are listening and speaking. Since language is not used separately therefore this research to focus on the integration of the two skills above. To be more specific, this study will describe the spoken competence of elementary school students. The description of the elementary school students’ spoken competence will become the theoretical model of this study. The theoretical model then will be developed to be a set of spoken English tests.

The next focus is the product of this study. This study is oriented to the product. In this study the product is a set of test to measure the spoken competence of the elementary school students. The test is developed from the theoretical model and the product will become the spoken test of the elementary school students.

D. STATEMENT OF RESEARCH QUESTION

There are two points that are crucial to be answered based on the phenomenon above. They are the communicative competence of the students and the designing of a test itself. These concerns lead to the following research questions:

1. What is the expected spoken competence of elementary school students like? 2. What is the instrument model used to measure the students’ spoken

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E. GOAL OF RESEARCH

The goals of the research are to suggest the spoken competence of the elementary school students and to design the test which is used to measure the students’ spoken competence.

The first goal is related to the theories of the spoken competence of the elementary school students. Since this research is not based on the national curriculum, the description of the students’ competence is derived from the theories which are accepted by people around the world in general. Then the theories mentioned above will be developed to be the blueprint of the test.

The second goal is the test design. The design of the test will be derived from the test blueprint. The designed test model will be adapted to the situation in Indonesia in order to get the correct test model to measure the children’s spoken competence.

F. PRODUCT SPECIFICATIONS

This section explains the product specification. It focuses on the structure and functions. The structure of the product consists of the theoretical model and the prototype of the test. The theoretical model is the blueprint of the test. Its function is as the basis of developing the test model. The theoretical model consists of the standard competence and indicators to measure the children’s spoken competence. While the test prototype is a set of test that is developed from the theoretical model. The test prototype is a set of test which is used to measure directly the children’s spoken English competence. Hopefully this test will be one

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of the instruments to measure the spoken competence of elementary school students in Indonesia.

Technically, the test takers can perform the test in their proper time. The result of the test provides information about the children’s competence. The information would be beneficial to the parents or teachers to develop the children’s spoken English competence.

G. BENEFITS OF RESEARCH

There are several benefits of this study. First, from this study it is expected that there is a clear and appropriate description of the children’s communicative competence. This description will help the teacher to decide the main goal of the language program.

Second, this study is a product oriented. It means at the end of this study there is a set of measurement which can be utilized to measure the children’s communicative competence. This measurement is in the form of a set of test. This test becomes an independent and objective measurement to measure the children’s competence. This test will provide an authentic result. Therefore, the test results give an objective evaluation. The results inform the students’ strengths and weaknesses. This information can be used as a reference to improve the children’s competence. This designed measurement is not based on the local curriculum but it is derived from the theories which are believed and accepted to be true empirically. Therefore, this product will not be influenced by the changing of the curriculum.

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Third, this study will be beneficial for evaluating the practice of the teaching English to young learners. The evaluation will give us a description which parts need to be improved and what parts are not necessary exist. So, each element of the teaching practice will develop and it will raise an understanding that every child in Indonesia must bloom well. They have to possess excellent skills or competence for their future in which one of them is the ability to communicate effectively in English in this global era.

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CHAPTER II LITERATURE REVIEW

In this section there are several theories presented concerning this study. The theories are used to answer the first research questions and to develop the same understanding related to the study. The theories discussed here are communicative competence, young language learners, and language testing.

A. THEORETICAL REVIEWS

The theoretical review starts with the theories as the basic of this study. They are also used to answer the previous research questions and it ends with the theoretical framework of this study. The following section will discuss more about them.

Language is viewed as an organized system which is used by people with certain goal or function. Halliday, in his book An Introduction to Functional

Grammar, proposed language referred to four views. First, language is “as text

and system”. Second, “as sound, as writing, as wording”. Third, “as structure – configurations of parts”, and fourth “as resources – choices among alternative” (Halliday: 19). Language as system and language as a set of text cannot be separated (Halliday: 26). They have close relationship; the system is essential potential of a language. Texts are various and their varieties are categorized by their context in used (Halliday: 27). Halliday also points out that a text which is associated with a given type of context must contain a description of the grammar.

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It means the text must be “coherent, comprehensive and richly dimensioned” (Halliday: 5). This is to say that grammar is viewed as the working system to make and understand the meaning (Halliday: 5). It means that every part and the interaction among language pattern play significant part in building the meaning. In a simple way we can say people can understand what others say by understanding the meaning of the sentences. “ .... The analysis points up how the interaction among patterns at different strata plays a significant part in the construction of meaning” (Halliday: 41). It is seen that grammar is functioned as the working system which form the text and can be understood in certain situation or context. Therefore, the text will be coherent and comprehensible.

Starting from the definition proposes by Halliday it is inferred beyond the structure of the language there is an important meaning to be understood by the hearer. It means people used the language to send their message to others. Then there is modern understanding about language view. Since meaning of the text also depends on the context so the view of language use is also changed. There is a view of what are going to say is more important than how to say it. When people exchange information or message each other it means they communicate. It is obvious that people use the language as a media of communication. The structure of the language is also important to make the communication more effective. Thus the meaning of the sentence becomes the priority in the communication. In this case, language has its function that is functioned as a media of communication with certain purposes.

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Starting from Halliday’s point of view then there are some language theories related to the function of language. There are some changes on the language view. Previously language program is done to make the learners become native speakers like. They have to master the grammar rules in order to be able to communicate in English. The view has changed. There is deeper expectation about the language program. Now the most important objective is how people can use the language to communicate with others. The ability to communicate in a target language can be interpreted as a communicative competence.

The term “competence” was introduced by Chomsky along with performance. There is a difference between competence and performance. Competence refers to the language system. In this context competence relates to one’s knowledge about grammar rules while performance refers to the use of the language. In some context performance is about one’s speech perception and production in the real situation. In Chomsky’s theory, competence is considered stronger than performance. According to Chomsky, competence focuses on the linguistic competence, “...Noam Chomsky who focuses on linguistic competence and claimed that any consideration of social factors was outside the domain of linguistics” (Celce-Murcia: 42).

The term competence according to Chomsky emphasises on the linguistics competence. In other words competence is one’s ability to communicate each other effectively which emphasis on the grammatical correctness.

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Chomsky did not directly mention the term of communicative competence. But he had introduced the term competence as the starting point of some theorists to define the communicative competence. There are some definitions about communicative competence that have been proposed. Those definitions and their aspects will be presented in the section below.

1. Communicative Competence Theories

To define the communicative competence that answers the research question, it is appropriate to review some theories of communicative competence proposed by some experts. There are, among others, five experts who have defined the term communicative competence and its aspects.

a. Hymes (1972)

Hymes defined the term of communicative competence in 1972. Communicative competence refers to two competencies, linguistics competence and sociolinguistic competence. Linguistic competence focuses on knowledge of the grammatical components and the use. This competence also includes the selection of the grammar related to its appropriateness in the context. Sociolinguistics refers to the knowledge of the rule of the language use. In other words sociolinguistics competence is the ability to understand the social situation in which communication takes place. This ability includes the participants to share the ideas or information.

Furthermore Hymes gives his review on the relation of the linguistic role in the communicative system. They are correctness, feasibility, appropriatness

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system. Feasibility refers to the acceptance of the grammar use which is

implemented in the communication. Appropriatness relates to the use of the

grammar in the contextual features. Occurance refers to the ability to use other

knowledge (unconsious knowledge) in communication (Hymes, 1972: 284-286). In conclusion, Hymes’s view about communicative competence covers two competence, they are linguistics competence and sociolinguitics competence. From his definition it is summarized, the communicative competence is the ability to use the language based on the linguistic role to communicate in a certain social situation and context. It means the learners can communicate to each other by using appropriate language in a certain context.

Figure 2.1 Dell Hymes’ model of communicative competence

b. Canale and Swain (1980)

The term competence refers to personal ability. Canale and Swain point out that there are three aspects of communicative competence; they are grammatical competence,sociolinguistic competence, andstrategic competence. system. Feasibility refers to the acceptance of the grammar use which is

implemented in the communication. Appropriatness relates to the use of the

grammar in the contextual features. Occurance refers to the ability to use other

Figure 2.1 Dell Hymes’ model of communicative competence

b. Canale and Swain (1980)

Communicative competence Linguistics competence Sociolinguistics competence

system. Feasibility refers to the acceptance of the grammar use which is

implemented in the communication. Appropriatness relates to the use of the

grammar in the contextual features. Occurance refers to the ability to use other

Figure 2.1 Dell Hymes’ model of communicative competence

b. Canale and Swain (1980)

Sociolinguistics competence

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Grammatical competence

Grammatical competence refers to the one’s knowledge about lexical

items and morphology use, syntax, sentence-grammar semantic, phonology. The grammatical competence is very important to help the learners produce and express accurate literal utterances. Therefore, the utterances can be understood easily.

Sociolinguistic competence consists of two components, sociocultural

rules of use and the rules of discourse. Sociocultural rules relate to the selection of utterances to be produced and understood appropriately. The main focus of this component is how far the utterances will be appropriate in the communication in a certain context or situation. While the discourse rules refer to the cohesion and coherence. Cohesion refers to the knowledge of grammatical links, coherence refers to the appropriate combinations of communicative function.

Strategic competence refers to verbal and nonverbal communication

strategies. These strategies will help the speakers to negotiate with others in a breakdown communication. These strategies will occur when the learners communicate in the real situation.

Figure 2.2 Canale and Swain’s model of communicative competence Communicative competence Grammatical competence Sociolinguistics competence Strategic Competence

Grammatical competence refers to the one’s knowledge about lexical

Sociolinguistic competence consists of two components, sociocultural

Strategic competence refers to verbal and nonverbal communication

strategies. These strategies will help the speakers to negotiate with others in a breakdown communication. These strategies will occur when the learners communicate in the real situation.

Figure 2.2 Canale and Swain’s model of communicative competence Strategic

Competence

Grammatical competence refers to the one’s knowledge about lexical

Sociolinguistic competence consists of two components, sociocultural

Strategic competence refers to verbal and nonverbal communication

strategies. These strategies will help the speakers to negotiate with others in a breakdown communication. These strategies will occur when the learners communicate in the real situation.

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c. Savignon (1972, 1983)

People need a language when they interact to each other. The purpose is to understand and to be understood by other people. Understanding what other people say will make the interaction effective because each person can understand and give responses to others. It means people often use language to communicate. That is why Savignon’s theory about communicative language teaching is based on a view of language as communication. This means language is used as a means of communication with other people orally or in writing.“...language is seen as a

social tool that speakers use to make meaning; speakers communicate about

something to someone for some purpose, either orally or in writing” (Savignon,

1983: 6)

The concept of communicative competence in language teaching has broader meaning than the linguistic theory. In communicative competence people and languages they use are viewed in the social context or setting (Savignon, 1983: 16). While linguistic theory sees people as the ideal speakers and listeners. In these conditions the grammatical correctness becomes the main concern. Therefore, sometimes the meaning or message itself is delayed. People incline to focus on the grammar structures rather than to the meaning itself.

There are three main focuses of communicative competence proposed by Savignon. The first one is the use of the language. She explains in using a language the message in it is more important than the grammar, “... a view of language learning is going from the surface grammatical structures to meaning” (Savignon, 1983: 30). That is to say that it is more important that the learners

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understand what they say and what is said by other people in the target language. The second one is the view of language acquisition, “language acquisition is seen as proceeding from meaning to surface structure”. It means that the focus in using language as a means of communication is that learners understand “the meaning or getting one’s message across” (Savignon, 1983: 35). The third one is specification of context. In this view the language should be taught in the correct way. It means the communicative purpose or function should be the main concern. Therefore the language used becomes meaningful for the learners because they use the language based on the contexts.

There are some components of communicative competence. Savignon proposes four components of communicative competence. They are grammatical competence, discourse competence, sociocultural competence, and strategic component. The components above are interrelated each other. Every component takes an important role in the development of the language learners.

Grammatical competence refers to the grammatical forms of the sentence. Savignon argues “the ability to identify the lexical, morphological, syntactical and phonological features of language, “ and “to make use of those features to interpret and form words and sentences” (Savignon, 1983: 9). It means how second or foreign language learners are able to use grammatical features to form words or sentences and to interpret the words or sentences. Furthermore she states grammatical competence is not related to the theory of grammar or the ability to state the grammatical rules.

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Discourse competence relates to “the interconnection of a series of utterances or written words or phrases to form a text, a meaningful whole” (Savignon, 1983: 9). The texts are various. They can be a poem, an email message, a sportscast, a telephone conversation, or a novel.

Sociocultural competence refers to ability to understand the social context in which language is used. Social context consists of the role of the participants, the information they share, and the function of the interaction. By possessing sociocultural competence the learners are able to communicate in many different situational contexts. Communicative competence also includes “a willingness to engage in the active negotiation of meaning” (Savignon, 1983: 10).

Strategic competence refers to the ability to cope strategies that someone uses in unfamiliar contexts, “with constraints arising from inadequate knowledge of rules or such impediment to the applications as fatigue or distraction “(Savignon, 1983: 10).

From the explanation above it can be concluded that communicative competence means the ability to understand, identify and use language or language features as a whole meaning to communicate one another in different situational contexts.

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grammatical competence,

Figure 2.3 Savignon’s model of communicative competence

d. Bachman and Palmer (1996)

Bachman used communicative language ability to refer to the communicative competence. He defined communicative language ability ‘as a

concept comprised of knowledge or competence and capacity for appropriate use

of knowledge in a contextual communicative language use” (cited in Bagaric:

2007).

Bachman and Palmer propose four areas of language knowledge that should be included (as cited in McKay, 2006: 183). They are grammatical knowledge, textual knowledge, functional knowledge, and sociolinguistic knowledge. The grammatical knowledge and textual knowledge are called as the organisational knowledge while the functional knowledge and sociolinguistics are called as pragmatic knowledge.

Grammatical knowledgeincludes areas of knowledge such as knowledge

of vocabulary, syntax, phonology and graphology. McKay points these areas of knowledge needs to grow and deepen (Bachman and Palmer in McKay, 2006: 183). In this area, the children need to sharpen their abilities in both producing and understanding sounds, words, and sentences. It means that the children learn how to “utter sounds, words and sentences clearly with appropriate

grammatical competence, discourse competence sociocultural competence strategic component.

Figure 2.3 Savignon’s model of communicative competence

d. Bachman and Palmer (1996)

Bachman used communicative language ability to refer to the communicative competence. He defined communicative language ability ‘as a

concept comprised of knowledge or competence and capacity for appropriate use

of knowledge in a contextual communicative language use” (cited in Bagaric:

2007).

Grammatical knowledgeincludes areas of knowledge such as knowledge

strategic component.

Figure 2.3 Savignon’s model of communicative competence

d. Bachman and Palmer (1996)

Bachman used communicative language ability to refer to the communicative competence. He defined communicative language ability ‘as a

concept comprised of knowledge or competence and capacity for appropriate use

of knowledge in a contextual communicative language use” (cited in Bagaric:

2007).

Grammatical knowledgeincludes areas of knowledge such as knowledge

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pronunciation and intonation” (183). Besides, the children also need to

understand others’pronunciation and intonation clearly.

Textual knowledge refers to the ability to speak in ways which are

cohesive and well-organized. Textual knowledge can be applied to comprehend or produce texts. It is necessary for the children to use and understand the connecting words that combine sentences and paragraph together. In this area the children also “need to learn how to refer back to other parts of the sentence” (183). In

listening they need to sharpen their ability to use textual knowledge to understand what is being said (Bachman and Palmer in McKay, 2006: 183).

Functional knowledge refers to the ability to use language for many

different functions. They learn how to use language to get what they want, to learn, to imagine things, to think about things (Bachman and Palmer in McKay, 2006: 183). On the other side it is also essential for the children to understand the purposes behind the language even when the speakers do not state the purpose directly.

Sociolinguistic knowledge refers to the children’s ability “to use oral

language appropriate to the language use situation that they are in” (Bachman

and Palmer in McKay, 2006: 184). They need to use and understand expression and culture references. Also children learn to communicate and act in ways which help them to reach out people from different culture (Bachman and Palmer in McKay, 2006: 184).

From the discussion above there are four areas of children’s spoken competence. Those abilityies are useful for the children in order to develop their

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spoken ability. These abilities also facilitate the children to use the language appropriately. Bachman and Palmer’s model of communicative competence is intended directly for children. This model is acceptable for children whose first language is not English.

Figure 2.4 Bachman and Palmer’s model of communicative competence

e. Celce-Murcia (2008)

Celce-Murcia elaborates communicative competence into six aspects. They aresociocultural competence,discourse competence,linguistic competence,

formulaic competence,interactional competenceandstrategic competence.

“Sociocultural competence refers to the speaker’s pragmatic knowledge”

(Celce-Murcia, 2008: 46). It means the speaker’s ability to communicate effectively inside the social and cultural context. This kind of competence consists of three variables (Celce-Murcia, 2008: 46). The first is social context factors. This factors include the “participants’ age, gender, status, social distance, and their relation to each other”. The second is stylistic appropriateness. These

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factors include “politeness strategies, a sense of genres and registers”. The third is cultural background factors. These factors include “background knowledge of the target language group, major dialects or regional differences, and cross cultural awareness” (Celce-Murcia, 2008: 46).

Discourse competencesare defined as the ability to select, sequence, and

arrange the words, structures, and utterances to achieve a unified spoken message (Celce-Murcia, 2008: 46). The combination of them can express the speakers’ messages and create coherent texts. The sub- areas of the discourse competence proposed by Celce-Murcia (2008) are: (1) cohesion, some rule related to the “use of reference, substitution, conjunction, and lexical chain” (pg. 47), (2) deixis refers to the “situational grounding achieved through use of personal pronouns, spatial terms, temporal terms, and textual reference” (pg. 47), (3) coherence, refers to the expression of goal or intent through “proper content schemata, organizing of old and new information, maintaining temporal continuity and other organizational schemata through conventionally recognized means” (pg. 47), (4) generic structure refers to the “formal schemata which permit the user to identify an oral discourse segment as a conversation, nrrative, interview, service encounter, report, lecture, sermon, etc”.

Linguistics competence consists of four types of knowledge, they are

phonological, lexical, morphological, and syntacttic. Phonological knowledge refers to “both segmental knowledge (like vowels, consonants, syllable type) and suprasegmentals (such as stress, intonation, and rythm) (pg. 47)”. Lexical refers to the “knowledge of both content words (noun, verbs, adjectives) and function

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words (pronouns, determiners, prepositions, verbal auxiliaries, etc) (pg. 47)”. Syntactic refers to “constituent/phrase structure, word order (both canonical and marked), basic sentence types, modification, coordination, subordination, and embedding”.

Formulaic competencerefers “to those fixed and prefabricated chunks of

language that speakers use heavily in everyday interaction” (pg. 49). This competence has four aspects, they are routines such as fixed phrases, collocations such as verb-object, idioms, and lexical frames.

Interactional competence consists of three sub-component, they are

actional competence, conversational competence, and non-verbal/paralinguistics competence. Actional competence is defined as “knowledge of how to perform common speech acts and speech acts sets in the target language involving interactions” (pg. 48). The interactions in communication are like information exchanges, interpersonal exchanges, expression of opinions, and feelings, problems, and future scenarios. Conversational competence is the knowledge of the turn-taking system in conversation. Non-verbal/paralinguistic competence refers to the body language, haptic behaviour, and non-linguistic utterances.

Strategic competence refers to cognitive, metacognitive, and

memory-related. Cognitive strategies are defined as the ability to “use logic and analysis to help oneself learn a new language through outlining, summarizing, notetaking, organizing and reviewing materials” (pg. 50). Metacognitive refers to strategies of one’s planning, monitoring, and compensating about their learning.

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Memory-sociocultural competence,

discourse competence,

related refers to the “strategies that help learners recall or retrieve words through the use of acronyms, images, sounds, or other clues” (pg. 50).

Figure 2.5 Celce Murcia’s model of communicative competence

2. The Young Learners

Young learners are children who are at the ages of five and eleven (McKay: 5) while young language learners are children who study a foreign language or a second language. They learn the language because it is taught in the school. They learn it because of the school policy, so they sometimes do not have specific reason and need in learning certain language. In Indonesia young learners mostly study English as a foreign language. English is a foreign language in Indonesia because this language is only spoken in the classroom. Children do not speak English outside the classroom.

Children around the world share the same characteristics. The issue of multiple intelligence theory by Gardner also needs to be considered related to the development of the characteristics of the children. Multiple intelligence theory shows that every child possesses different kind of intelligence. There are eight

Communicative competence discourse competence, linguistic competence Formulaic competence, interactional competence

related refers to the “strategies that help learners recall or retrieve words through the use of acronyms, images, sounds, or other clues” (pg. 50).

Figure 2.5 Celce Murcia’s model of communicative competence

2. The Young Learners

interactional competence

strategic competence

related refers to the “strategies that help learners recall or retrieve words through the use of acronyms, images, sounds, or other clues” (pg. 50).

Figure 2.5 Celce Murcia’s model of communicative competence

2. The Young Learners

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types of intelligences, they are linguistic, musical, logical mathematical, spatial,

bodily kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalistic. Each child has

his/her specific characteristics. This condition leads the children vary in their competence.

Children grow cognitively, socially, emotionally, and physically. In assessing young learners it is very important to know their cognitive development in order to make it suitable with their abilities. McKay, in his book Assessing

Young Language Learners (2006), points “assessment task should not extend

beyond the child’s experience of the world”. It means children will not be able to give response if they do not have experience or they have not been told before about the real objects. Besides, children should not be asked to analyze pictures or ideas or to describe language rule (McKay: 8). There are some characteristics of young learners to be concerned when they are assessed. Those characteristics fall into three general categories. They aregrowth, literacy andvulnerability(McKay:

8). In which these three characteristics give big influences in the assessment. Further discussion is presented in the following section.

a. Children’s Growth

The physical growth of the children is characterized by continuing and rapid development of gross and fine-motor skills (McKay: 10). Physically children are active, sometimes children are restless and like activities which are short. That is why they only have limited span of time. Children are only able to

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focus in more or less10 to 15 minutes because children are easily distracted and diverted by other children (McKay: 6). They like physical activities.

Emotionally young learners have wide range of emotional needs (Ellis et.al: 27). Children are excitable and enthusiastic. On the other hands children easily get bored and they tend to learn slowly and forget things easily (Ellis et.al. 27). The children are interested in something based on what they like and dislike. Therefore task used in assessment should deal with familiar content, simple genres like children’s stories and folktales. The purpose of using genres is to achieve particular communicative goal (McKay: 10). They continue to develop the ability to work and play with others.

b. Children’s Literacy

The development of foreign language depends on the children’s literacy development on the first language. The background of the first language literacy development will be brought to develop the improvement of foreign language literacy. At the age 9 to 12 years old children can expand thinking more readily through writing and reading. In this phase oral ability grows when they interact with other people in conversation in different situations, with different goal and on different topics (McKay: 13). The topics can be home, family, school and other topics which are familiar to the children. In this phase children can also talk in longer stretches of interactions related to different types of talk beyond narratives and descriptions, such as instructions, arguments, and opinions (McKay: 13).

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c. Children’s Need

Children are at the age where they need to be supported emotionally. Sometimes they feel so confident at the same time they may be nervous or unconfident. Therefore they need to be praised and encouraged to develop their self-esteem. Children can succeed if they have good experience in learning. Therefore it is crucial to make them feel successful and good about themselves. This condition can help the children to keep their interest and creativity. Therefore, giving a test to the children should provide them a sense of success and progression.

d. The Children Language Development

Severals language theorists are interested to study about children language acquisition. Some of them are Chomsky, Crystal, Aitchison, and Piaget. From their studies, they have made theories about children’s acquisiton on language. This section tries to review their theories about the development of the children’s language. Chomsky believes that children are born with an inherited ability to learn any human language. He states that a child possess “language acquisition devices”. It is known as LAD. In his view, children acquire the language by using their “LAD” system to form a sentence to communicate with others. It means they do not only imitate from the adults.

David Crystal, in Prosodict Development (1979: 37 - 45), defines the

theory about how children learn a language. There are five stages how language is developed. Stage one is where children say something with certain purposes, to

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get something they want, to get someone’s attention and to draw attention to something. Stage two is the stage when children start to ask questions, the first question is “where”. They also begin to learn the opposite word for example up/down, big/small. Stage three is the stage where children start to have more complex questions and their questions are signalled with the intonation. Stage four is the phase when children use increasingly complex sentence structures and begin to explain things, ask for explanation, and make a wide range of requests. In this stage children can use the complex sentences to express wider range of meanings. They also begin to use the abstract verbs and can comprehend the meaning. Furthermore Crystal points out that in this phase children are able to use auxiliary verbs and may duplicate modal verbs for example “please, can I, may I”. Stage Five is the stage where children regularly use language to do all the things that they need. They use the language for asking and giving information, asking and answering questions, requesting directly and indirectly, suggesting, offering, stating and expressing.

Referring to the Piageat’s theory, the language development of children is influenced by the cognitive development of the children. There are four main stages of the cognitive development of the children. The first stage is sensorimotor. This stage begins when children are at the age 0 to 2 years old. In this stage children interact and learn by their sensory inputs. They are hearing, feeling, and seeing. The language development starts from the ability to hear sounds from the environment and then they begin to produce sound by mumbling.

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The most important here the children learn to control their own bodies and objects outside them.

The second stage is preoperational. This stage begins when children are the age 2 to 7 years old. In this stage children develop the ability to manipulate images and symbols, especially language. Children begins to learn something by playing. They begin to see the use of symbolism in pretend play. In this stage children are egocentric. They view something from their own perspectives.

The third stage is concrete operational. The children’s age of this stage are 7 to 11. Children begin to perform logical operation of the concrete objects. Children sort the things based on their categories. In this stage children are also able to concentrate on the here and now. Children begin to understand condition from others’ point of view. Children use the language to point specific and concrete fact. It means children may produce sentences or form a story deals only with facts rather than abstract ideas.

The fourth stage is formal operational stage which begins from age 12. In this stage children start to think logically and abstractly. They are able to speculate future situation. In this stage they tend to apply their new abstract reasoning abilities to all area of life (Sieger and Richard: 913). Children can manipulate the abstract object into the concrete objects. In this stage children can use the language to express the abstract concepts or theories.

The elementary school children is in the age 7 to 11 years old. In this age children grow phisically and emotionally. Based on Robert Havighurst’s theory the elementary school children are in middle childhood stages. In the stages the

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children are (1) Learning physical skills necessary for ordinary game, (2)

Building wholesome attitudes toward oneself as a growing organism, (3)

Learning to get along with age-mates, (4) Learning an appropriate masculine or

feminine social role, (5) Developing fundamental skills in reading, writing, and

calculating, (6) Developing concepts necessary for everyday living. (7)

Developing conscience, morality, and a scale of values, (8) Achieving personal

independence, (9) Developing attitudes toward social groups and institutions.

From the stages, it is found children’s physical development are still growing. In other side their emotional development are also growing. This condition also influences their needs. In this stage they like to have physical activities and like to play games.

3. Language Testing

Applying foreign language program in school covers three main things. They are the objective, process, and assessment. Assessment is used to gather information about the students’ progress. There are three different definitions of assessment. First, assessment is methods used to gather information about children's knowledge, ability, understanding, attitudes, and motivation (Ioannou: 4). Second, to assess means an attempt to analyze the learning that a child has achieved over a period of time as a result of the classroom teaching/learning situation ( Brewster: 24). Third, assessment is the collection of data on language use by students in classroom language learning (Rea-Dickens and Rixon, 2009: 89). From the definition above it can be concluded that assessment is methods

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used to collect information about students’ progress in learning. In this context assessment relates to the students’ progress in language learning.

There are several reasons to assess young learners according Cajkler and Addelman in Brewster. First, formative, it is used to increase motivation by

making assessment a part of the continuous learning process. Second, summative.

It gives students feedback on their progress or achievement at a particular point in time, often done formally through tests of various kinds. Third, diagnostic. It is

used to monitor individual student's needs and help identify students who need special support. Fourth, evaluative. It identifies students' levels of achievement

and select or order students according to merit, to check the effectiveness of teachers, teaching materials or teaching methods. It can be concluded that assessment young learners are used to monitor and provide information about the students’ progress and in the other hand it enhances children’s motivation.

There are also several kinds of assessment. One of them is giving a test. Test is characterized as one method to gather information (Genesee, 2007:141). There are some aspects which differentiate test from other method of information collections. Genesee (2007, 142) proposes there are three aspects of test, content, method, and measurement. The content of the test refers to what test is about. It can be intelligence or foreign language proficiency. The content of the test is “only a sample of the subject matter, skills, or knowledge being assessed” (2007, 142). Test methods refer to the “task that test takers are asked to perform” (2007, 142). Test methods influence the test takers’ scores. Measurement refers to the description of “attributes or qualities of things and individuals by assigning

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numbers to them” (2007, 145). Those numbers then will be interpreted to the qualities or characteristics of the test takers.

a. The phase of the test development.

This section will present the process in designing the test. Bachman and Palmer in Penny McKay (2006: 302) point three phases in test development processes they are a design phase, an operationalization phase, and an

administration phase.

Figure 2.6 Model of test development (adapted from Bachman and Palmer in Penny McKay 2006, pg.320)

In design phase, the test developer collects information and theories related to the test that will be designed. In this phase the developer begins to describe the purpose. The purpose of the test must be clear as the basic step to

develop the next steps. This step also allows the developer todefine the construct.

The clear construction will helps the developer to develop the task types.

design phase

operationalization phase

administration phase

Considerati on of the qualities of usefulness

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In the operationalization phase there are two main steps to be prepared. The first one is describing the test task specification and the second one is describing the blueprint of the test. In the first step, the developer prepares the specification of the test task. The test task must be described as clear as possible to make the task more specific based on the purpose of the test. In the second step, the developer describe the blueprint of the test. The blueprint consists of “information about the structure or overall organization of the test as well as the

test task specifications for each task type to be included in the test” (McKay,

2006: 321).

In the administration phase there are two main steps to be conducted, a try out and an operational test use phase. A try out is a phase when the test model is tried out. The purpose of this phase is collecting information related to the model itself. Therefore the test developer gets an objective and accurate data whether the test model neccesary to be revised or not. In the second step, an operational test use, the test model “is administered as a test” (McKay, 2006: 321). This step involves the preparation of test environment, collection of the test materials, the test is given to the intended test takers (McKay, 2006:321).

b. The Test Characteristics

In the past era test was used to measure the students’ knowledge only or performance only. The final result is the most important part to consider because the children’s quality is determined by the test score whether they are failed or not. In the contrary, postmodern era has put test as an instrument to see the

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An instrument to measure spoken English communicative competence for elementary school students.

AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

A THESIS

AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

This thesis is dedicated to:

Jesus Christ, my beloved brothers and sisters, my husband, Widi,

design phase

operationalization phase

administration phase

Parts

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MATERIAL DESIGN TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE : TEXTBOOK ANALYSIS ON Material Design To Improve Students’ Communicative Competence : Textbook Analysis On I Can Do It, English For Senior High School Students Grade Xi.

THESIS English Task To Develop The Students’ Communicative Competence: A Study Of Edukatif Work Book For Junior High School Students.

THESIS ENGLISH TASK TO DEVELOP English Task To Develop The Students’ Communicative Competence: A Study Of Edukatif Work Book For Junior High School Students.

The theoretical testing model to measure communicative written English competence of elementary school students of Indonesia.

Designing an english listening program for elementary school students.

English Teaching For Elementary School Students.

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An instrument to measure spoken English communicative competence for elementary school students.

AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

A THESIS

AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

AN INSTRUMENT TO MEASURE SPOKEN ENGLISH

COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE FOR

ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

This thesis is dedicated to:

Jesus Christ, my beloved brothers and sisters, my husband, Widi,

design phase

operationalization phase

administration phase

Parts

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