Esteria, Asie (2017) Implementing PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summarize, and Test) strategy to improve eighth graders`reading comprehension / Asie Esteria. Masters thesis, Universitas Negeri Malang.
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ABSTRAK Improving Eighth Graders Reading Comprehension in Recount Text through PQRST Strategy Asie Esteria1 Nur Mukminatien2 Utari Praba Astuti3. Graduate Program in ELT Universitas Negeri Malang Jalan Semarang No. 5 Malang E-mail achiearitonang gmail.com Abstract A collaborative action research was conducted to improve the eighth graders reading comprehension in recount text through PQRST (Preview Question Read Summarize and Test)strategy in SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada. It involves two English teachers in SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada as the collaborators. The instruments used were reading comprehension test observation checklist field notes and collaborators interview guideline. The result of the treatment during two cycles showed that the implementing of PQRST strategy could improve the students reading comprehension and made them participate actively in teaching learning activity. Key Words Reading comprehension recount text PQRST strategy Abstrak Sebuah kolaborasi penelitian tindakan kelas di laksanakan untuk meningkatkan pemahaman membaca teks recount siswa kelas delapan SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada melalui strategy PQRST (Preview/peninjauan Question/pertanyaan Read/membaca Summarize/menyimpulkan dan Test/tes). Penelitian ini melibatkan dua guru Bahasa Inggris di SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada sebagai kolaborator. Instrumen penelitian yang digunakan adalah tes pemahaman membaca lembar observasi catatan lapangan dan panduan wawancara dengan kolaborator. Hasil dari perlakuan dengan menggunakan strategi ini dalam dua siklus memperlihatkan bahwa pelaksanaan strategi PQRST dapat meningkatkan pemahaman membaca siswa dan membuat mereka berpatisipasi secara aktif dalam kegiatan belajar mengajar. Kata kunci Pemahaman membaca teks recount strategi PQRST. Reading means reading for comprehension. Everybody does reading because they want to know or understand something from the material they are read. Reading comprehension is the result of understanding the meaning of written or printed text based on the reader s experiences knowledge vocabulary and structure of the language as found in Snow (2002) Tankersly (2003 2) Mcnamara (2006 6) and Willis (2008). In other words reading comprehension shows the readers ability in understanding and finding the meaning of the text from implicit or explicit information. Reading is important for students because almost all of the materials in schools are in printed form. Students can acquire more knowledge when they want to learn new information in their discipline only by reading. Through the ability of reading students can develop their knowledge and essential skills for independent learning. In order to be successful in teaching reading the teacher needs to consider some factors which are possible to affect the reading comprehension process. The factors are classified into internal and external factors (Susanti 2013). The internal factors are related to students ability in reading such as identifying main idea specific information textual reference and word meaning. The external factor is related to some components that are crucial to support the reading learning process such as students motivation classroom management and classroom interaction. Reading is important but unfortunately not everybody could comprehend the reading material easily especially for students who have English as the second language. Reading English material could be a big problem. Based on researcher s experience as an English teacher in SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada the students there had problem in learning English especially in reading comprehension. The researcher found their reading comprehension test score were low and they were not interested in reading. From preliminary study it was found out that the factors affected eighth graders of SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada in reading comprehension were classified into internal and external factors. The internal factor related to the problems faced by students of VIIIB in SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada in reading comprehension were the problem in finding out word meanings and specific information. The data from preliminary study also showed the external factor that was identified in the classroom atmosphere where the students were not interested and did not want to participate in the teaching learning activities especially reading comprehension. One effective way to solve the problems faced by the eighth grade students of SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada is by using PQRST (Preview Question Read Summarize Test) strategy. This strategy was adapted from SQ3R (Survey Question Read Recite and Review) and according to Thomas and Robinson (1977)as cited in Kuslolyta (2015) it was first developed by an expert on the psychology of learning at Ohio state Francis P. Robinson. The strategy could be implemented in the classroom following the steps proposed Preview. In preview stage students are stimulated to use their previous knowledge to predict the topic that will be discussed by looking at pictures or title of the text and observe the whole text. It could also establish the students understanding about the topic or the theme of the text which is going to be read. Question. After having understanding about the text that the students are going to read the students are asked to make questions based on their prior knowledge of the text. By creating questions students are prepared to have inquiry activities related to the text and it helps students to be more focus in reading. They will read the text to find the answer of their own questions. Read. In this stage students will read the text more carefully to find the answer of their own questions. If the students cannot find the answers they can change their questions and find the answers from the text. Summarize. For summarizing activity students can make their own conclusion by noting the main points of information they can get from understanding the text. The note can be in the form of list of important points or mind mapping Test. In test stage the students are asked to answer teacher s quetions in a form of a test to find out the students comprehension and to make sure that the students really understand the text. The test also important for the students they may know their ability in reading comprehension after answering teacher s questions. According to Sulistyo (2011 94) this strategy is useful as an instructional reading strategy by paying more attention to key information in reading activities. The PQRST reading strategy is a step-by-step plan that has been proven to improve students reading comprehension for students who follow the steps involved. This strategy helps the students focus on studying and prioritizing the information in a way that relates directly to how they will be asked to use the information in any kinds of exercise and/or test. In addition Vazques Green and Medina (2006) state that there are some purposes of PQRST (1)stimulate the students to improve their previous knowledge (2) motivate the students to actively reflect upon the material before being read in class (3) prepare the students to participate in reading with an inquiring attitude towards the material (4) motivate the students to deepen their understanding (5) encourage the students to ask themselves to do the test to evaluate their comprehension degree of the material (6) promote the development of students autonomy in learning and (7) improve students final performance result. So by applying and practicing this strategy continously it will help the students to improve their reading comprehension ability. Moreover Haeriyanto (2012) reported that PQRST strategy can improve reading comprehension skills of the eleventh graders of MA Nurul Jadid. During the class the students are more active in sharing ideas asking and answering questions. In other words this strategy can increase the students involvement during the teaching learning process. Based on the concept PQRST strategy is proposed as the treatment to improve the students reading comprehension since it has a well-organized stage. It could make the students involve and participate in the teaching learning activities by following every steps in this strategy.The strategy can help the students to activate their background knowledge before reading focus on information that they want to get from the text and evaluate their comprehension. By implementing this strategy it is expected that students can find specific information and understand the word meaning based on their background knowledge and context of the text. It would also make the teaching learning activities run effectively where the students could participate actively. PQRST strategy could be applied in SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada to help the students in comprehending a text and solve the students problem in reading comprehension by developing the strategy so the students in class VIII-B of SMPN 1 Pangkalan Lada could follow it well. The students were hoped to participate actively in teaching learning process by following developed stages in PQRST strategy. Based on the consideration the researcher wanted to conduct a classroom action research to find out how PQRST strategy could improve eighth graders reading ability. It included the process and the product in implementing this strategy where the students reading comprehension score is the productand students participation in teaching learning activities. METHOD The design of this research was a collaborative classroom action research since it aimed to enrich teachers knowledge improve teaching skills assist the students to solve their problems in learning English especially in the classroom. In addition therewerepractical problems faced by both the students and the teachers in English instruction that needed to be solved especially in reading comprehension of recount text. According to Latief (2015 145) classroom action research for English learning aims at developing a certain instructional strategy to solve practical instructional problems in the English classes. The idea underlying this approach was to implement PQRST strategy to solve teaching and learning problem in the classroom. Hopefully the result of the implementation was students improvement in reading comprehension of recount text. This research was conducted by two English teachers and the researcher collaboratively. The English teachers of SMPN 1 PangkalanLada acted as collaborators where the first collaborator helped the researcher to observe the students activity by using observation checklist and the second collaborator wrote notes during the implementation of the strategy in the classroom in the form of field notes. Meanwhile the researcher acted as the teacher in applying PQRST strategy. The research was conducted in SMPN 1 PangkalanLada where the researcher has been teaching English in this school for more than 10 years. To be more focus on the strategy implemented the researcher chose class VIII-B as the subject of this research. This class consisted of 25 students in which there were 17 males and 8 females. The researcher chose this class because from the preliminary study it was found that the students have problem in reading comprehension showed in their preliminary study score. This class had the lowest score compare to the other classes. This classroom action research followed the model proposed by Kemmis andMcTaggart (1988) in Burn (2010 9) in which there are four stages (1) planning an action (2) implementing the action (3) observing the action and (4) reflecting on the result of the observation. Planning the Action Planning was the most important part of this design since concern to the preparation in applying the new strategy to solve the students problem. It was supported by Latief (2015 150) who said that planning is a step to prepare the classroom instructional strategy to be developed in the study to solve the instructional problem. In this step the researcher conducted the activities of designing the teaching strategy and setting the criteria of success. Teaching Strategy In this study the researcher developed the instructional strategy into five meetings where in every meeting it was divided into three main activities namely Pre-activity Whilst-activity and Post-activity. At the beginning of the lesson (Pre-activity) the students were given pictures as media related to the topic and asked to mention things that they see in the picture. Students were stimulated to communicate their ideas related to the picture. Students were also asked to think critically and make questions about things they wanted to know more from the picture. Some example of questions were given to help them in making their questions. Student were free to make their questions it could be in English or Bahasa Indonesia and the researcher helped them by translating it into English and writing the correct order of the questions in English. Researcher also gave explanation how to make good questions in English.These questions could be a model for students to make questions in Question stage of PQRST strategy. In Whist-activity PQRST worksheet were distributed and PQRST strategy was implemented through five stages. In Preview stage the students tried to find out the topic of the text by skimming over the text features which may include the title pictures paragraphs or the points in the reading text. The purpose of this activity is two folds activating students prior knowledge by linking their previous experience with the one they find in the text and at the same time establishing students understanding about the theme or the topic of the text and the scope within which the topic is explored by the writer. Through this activity the students were asked to make prediction about the text they are going to read. It helped them to be more well prepared to read the material in Read stage. In Question stage students made their own three questions based on the questions which has been taught in the pre-activity or they could make their own questions in Bahasa Indonesia and the researcher helped to translate it into English. This activity as inquiry activities related to the topic or theme they have held in the previous activity. For Read stage they read the text carefully to find the answers of their own questions and the reading activity led them to find other important information from the text. Through this stage the students were also asked to classify the underlined words from the text into some part of speech and find out the meaning. Classifying the words helped the students to understand the usage of the words and find out the meaning in the dictionary or guess the meaning from the context. By doing these activities students enriched their vocabulary and helped them to select relevant information related to the questions they made. Questions of which answers were not found in the text should be revised in order to have acceptable and relevant questions. In Summarize stage the students went over the main points of the information found in the text by answering their own questions. Then they could fill in the mind mapping it helped them to understand the generic structure of recount text because it was given in the form of generic structure of recount text. It developed students ability in reading comprehension where they could relate the clauses pattern and structure of the language to see the connections between events ideas and information from the text. In the first meeting the researcher explained and helped the students in completing the mind mapping in order to make the students more understand the use of mind mapping as a summary of the text. Test as the last stage of PQRST strategy was done by answering the student s own questions in the second step (Question) and the researcher should check the students answer to know whether they have the right understanding or not. The researcher gave another questions to check students understanding of the whole text in the form of reading comprehension test. The test was given to ensure that students understanding of the text is not accidental that is the students really understand the text thoroughly. For Post-activity researcher should give time to discuss the answer of researcher s questions and to reflect their reading activities. The students could also express their view and difficulties on following the reading strategy in this activity. The Criteria of Success In this study the researcher set two aspects of criteria of success for the implementation of PQRST strategy. The first aspect mainly focused on the product of the students reading comprehension improvement which was showed from students reading comprehension score. The researcher categorized students reading comprehension score in the preliminary study into two levels. The first level was for them who had passed the minimum passing grade if 100% or 4 students who had passed the minimum passing grade could improve their reading comprehension score at least 10 points higher than what they got in the preliminary test it could be considered that this study was successful because 10 points of improvement meant this strategy had helped the students to comprehend a text.The second level was for 21 students whocould not reach more than 66 as the minimum passing grade if 80% of them could improve their reading comprehension score at least 20 points higher than what they got in the preliminary test it could be considered that this study was successful . The second aspect of the criteria of success was focused on the process of the implementation of PQRST strategy where showed by the students participation toward the teaching learning activities in the implementation of this strategy. If the average of students participation in the four meetings of implementation of PQRST strategy reached 80 % which indicated that the students were actively participated in the teaching learning activities this action research could meet the criteria of success. Implementing the Action In this stage the researcher acted as a teacher and implemented the teaching scenario of PQRST strategy to improve student s reading comprehension. The collaborative teachers would be the collaborators who observe the process of teaching learning activities. The first observer filled in the observation checklist and the second collaborator wrote on field notes to gather the data of the students participation and attitude during the lesson in the classroom. In the end of every meeting the researcher interviewed the collaborators informally to get feedback and correction in order to make the implementation of the strategy runs effectively to solve the problem faced by the students. There were five meetings and the time allowed for each meeting is 80 minutes. In every meeting the researcher provided different recount text with the same thematic material Holiday Experience . The first up to the fourth meetings will be the implementation of PQRST strategy while the fifth meeting will be used for reading comprehension test. Observing the Action In this stage the researcher focused on collecting the data in which deals with the criteria of success in the implementation of the strategy. It was conducted to collect the data about the success of PQRST strategy and how much the strategy can overcome the problem in the classroom. Moreover the researcher was assisted by two collaborators in observing the implementation of PQRST strategy in teaching recount text as well as the students activities and participation during teaching learning process. The researcher used four instruments in collecting the data they are (1) observation checklist (2) field notes (3) collaborator interview guideline and (4) reading comprehension test. The observation checklist was used by the first collaborator and field notes was written by the second collaborator. The aim of using observation checklist was to obtain information concerning to students participation during the teaching learning activities. It contained the list of statements of what the students do during the implementation of the strategy. Moreover the field notes would be useful to record some aspects of teaching and learning activities that might not be covered in the observation checklist. The second collaborator wrote in the field notes in form of description so it was the collaborator s evaluation towards the lesson plan the students participation the classroom atmosphere and feedbackfor the implementation of the strategy to solve the students problem in reading comprehension. As an additional collaborator interview guidelines were used to find out other things that happened in the class related to the implementation of the strategy and how to make the implementation of the strategy run better to improve students reading comprehension ability.The researcher interviewed the collaborators in the end of every meeting informally. Perhaps during this interview what was missing in observation checklist and field notes could be disscussed by the researcher and collaborators and together found out the solution to make the implementation of the strategy could run effectively to improve students reading comprehension ability. These three instruments oberservation checklist field notes and interview with the collaborators informally were given to record the process of the implementation of PQRST strategy and see the students participation in the teaching learning activities. The next instrument was reading comprehension test it was used in the end of the implementation of the strategy to gain students reading comprehension score as the product of reading comprehension improvement. It was used to measure the effectiveness of the strategy in improving students reading comprehension. The test was in the form of essay (WH-Question). The test was developed by the researcher based on the objective of the test to measure students ability in comprehending information within recount text. Regarding to the instrument mentioned above the data collection in this research was based on quantitative and qualitative method. The quantitative data was gained from the reading comprehension test in which the result of the test was in form of numerical data. This data was used to analyze how far the improvement of students reading comprehension from preliminary study compared to the reading comprehension test after the implementation of PQRST strategy at the end of cycle. Meanwhile qualitative data was taken from the observation checklist field notes and interview the collaborators informally. The students participation in the teaching learning activities in the implementation of PQRST strategy were recorded and analysed from observation checklist field notes and interview with the collazorator informally. All the data collected was related to the criteria of success. Reflecting the Action Reflecting was the final stage of each cycle which deals with the process of analyzing data collected during the observation. It was used to give information about the success or failure of the cycle conducted in the research. The data was compared with the criteria of success to know whether the data meet the criteria of success or not. If the indicators of the criteria of success had been achieved it could be concluded that the process of teaching learning is successfully done. Meanwhile if the result showed the opposites the researcher had to conduct the second cycle by making revision or adjustment on the planning. RESULT Students Reading Comprehension Achievement in Cycle 1 Based on the test result of the students reading comprehension in the fifth meeting (January 20th 2017) there was improvement of the students average score from the preliminary study to the score in reading comprehension test in Cycle 1. The average score in the preliminary study was 48.8 while the average score in the reading comprehension test in Cycle 1 was 63.6. It meant that there was 14.8 points of improvement. The improvement in detail showed there was 1 student got 40 points of improvement from what he got in preliminary study. The improvement made him passed the minimum passing grade where he got 50 in preliminary study and got 90 in reading comprehension test. There were 5 students got 30 points higher than what they got in preliminary study. It made 4 of them could pass the minimum passing grade and one student still could not pass the minimum passing grade. 20 points of improvement were gained by 8 students as the result 2 of them could pass the minimum passing grade. For 10 points of improvement 6 students had reached it and it made 5 of them could reach the minimum passing grade. There were 2 students who got no improvement and still could not pass the minimum passing grade. The rest 3 students got 10 points lower than what they got in preliminary study and made them could not reach the minimum passing grade. In conclusion there were 12 out of 25 students who reached the minimum passing grade meanwhile in the preliminary study only 4 students succeded. The data of the improvement that occured in Cycle 1 is presented in Table 1. Table 1 The Students Improvement in Reading Comprehension Test No Aspect in Criteria of Success Improvement Percentage 14 students who reached the minimum passing grade 3 students got 10 points higher 75% 1 student got 10 points lower 25% 2 21 students who failed to reached the minimum passing grade 13 students got 8805 20 points higher 62% 8 students got 20 points higher 38% However the students reading comprehension score in Cycle 1 could not reach the criteria of success because from 4 students who reached the minimum passing grade in preliminary study there was still one students who could not improve his score 10 points higher than what he got in preliminary study. As the criteria of success required 100% or 4 students who had passed the minimum passing grade could improve their reading comprehension score at least 10 points higher than what they got in the preliminary test. For those students who could not reach the minimum passing grade in preliminary study only 13 students ( 62%) could get 20 points higher than what they got in preliminary study. It could not meet the criteria of success that required 80% of them could improve their reading comprehension score at least 20 points higher than what they got in the preliminary study. The Students Participation during the Teaching Learning Activities In Cycle 1 In the teaching learning activity which covered 3 stages of activities namely pre-activity whilst-activity and post-activity. There were some activities employed for each stages. In this case the researcher and the first collaborator observed the number of students who involved at each stage. The result of observation checklist on students participation in Cycle 1 was presented in Figure 3.1. Figure 1 The Result of Students Participation in Teaching Learning Activities From figure 1 it could be seen that the students participation in every meeting was varied. The students participation increased from the first meeting up to the fouth meeting but from the average of students participation which achieved 67% it coud be concluded that the students participation could not meet the criteria of success that required 80% of the students actively participate in teaching learning activities. It meant the students need to be motivated and encouraged to be more active in the next cycle. Reflection in Cycle 1 In general the implementation of PQRST strategy ran well and made the students participate actively in teaching learning activities. However as what have been discussed above the implementation of PQRST strategy did not meet the criteria of success. The criteria of success required 100% students who could reach the minimum passing grade in preliminary study could improve their score 10 points higher than what they got in preliminary study. Based on students improvement in reading comprehension test only 75% students (3 of 4 students) who reached the minimum passing grade in preliminary study could improve their score 10 points higher than what they got in preliminary study. For the students who could not reach the minimum passing grade the criteria of success required 80 % of them could improve their score 20 points higher than what they got in the preliminary study. The reading comprehension test revealed that there were only 62% students ( 13 of 21 students) who could improve their score 20 points higher and more than what they got in preliminary study. Moreover the average of students participation from the first up to the fourth meeting only achieved 67% it could not reach 80% as the second criteria of success for this classroom action research. Therefore the researcher and her collaborators decided to conduct the next cycle by analyzing the causes of the failure revising the plan and implementing revised plan in the second cycle. There were some problems found in the teaching learning process where PQRST strategy was implemented in Cycle 1. The first problem came from the difficulties in making questions. Students were not familiar with this activities it took times for them to make questions even when they were asked to make it in Bahasa Indonesia. They were not confident to make questions in English because they did not understand how to make questions in English although the researcher had explained and given example of English questions. They prefer to make questions in Bahasa Indonesia and asked for researcher s assistance to translate it into English. The second problem was the activity in Read stage the time was not enough to read classify words and find out the word meanings. They got confused in doing it because they had to read to find the answer of their own questions classify words find out the word and their meanings in the dictionary in limited time. They asked the researcher a lot of questions in finding out the words meaning. They found it difficult to find appropriate meaning in the dictionary since they could not differentiate the words into some part of speech that usually used in recount text. They did not know how to use a dictionary effectively. They just tried to find the meaning of the word from the dictionary without considering whether it was in past verb noun or adjective. As the result they often found not appropriate meaning and ask for confirmation from the researcher. The third problem was making summary in the form of mind mapping. It was difficult for the students because they had to find the specific information such as the person place and time of the actions that required a lot of time and after that they should fill it in the mind mapping. As the result they only had limited time to do the test. The last problem was the students were not confident to do all the stages in PQRST worksheet by themselves they often asked for assisstance from the researcher and it made them got problems when they were asked to do reading comprehension test without any assistance from the researcher. Revision of Cycle 1 The purpose of this revision was to make the implementation of the PQRST strategy better than the previous one. It was also to achieve the criteria of success that were not achieved yet it was quite crucial for the researcher to revise and improve the plan. In Cycle 2 the researcher and the collaborators agreed to give another thematic material for the students instead of Holiday Experience because it would enrich students reading material in recount text and it would avoid boredom. The researcher and the collaborators chose School Activity as the thematic material for the second cycle because it related to students real activity that most of them experienced it. The collaborators suggested to give three meetings in Cycle 2 because the students had done five meetings in Cycle 1 and another three meetings in Cycle 2 were enough for the students. The main revision was in whilst-activity where in Preview stage students were required to guess the word meanings based on the pictures and the context of the text. The researcher would give more meaningful pictures to help the students in finding out the word meanings. They were asked to guess the meaning of the words by looking at the pictures and the context of the text. They were not asked to classify the words because it was not necessary to classify the words as long as they could guess the meaning of the words from the pictures and context of the text. In Question stage the researcher asked students to make questions mostly in English they were only allowed to make one Bahasa Indonesia questions out of their three questions. Hopefully by asking them to make questions in English they would try to use their knowledge and ability in making questions in English and did not only depend on the researcher s assistance to translate their Bahasa Indonesia questions. Before doing it in pre-activity the researcher had given list of questions example and explained it more clearly for the students by giving a lot of examples and exercise in making questions. The researcher also asked them to write down the model of good English questions order in their notebook every time they were asked to make questions so they can use it in the next meeting as the example in making another questions. In Read stage the students would have 15 minutes in reading activity only to focus on finding the answer of their own questions . Since they have already got the meaning of difficult words they could read the text effectively to find the answer of their own questions. The time allowed for reading activity were longer than what they had in Cycle 1 where they had 20 minutes for reading the text carefully to find specific information classifying words and finding out the word meanings. In Summarize stage since the purpose in making summary was recalling the important information they got from reading activity the researcher decided to ask the students in Summarize stage to cite or note the main points that they got from reading the text. It would take short time and more meaningful for them. For Test stage the students had 15 minutes to answer researcher s questions it was longer than what they had in Cycle 1. The researcher would give less assistant to the students and encourage them to be more confident in doing all stages in this strategy. The students Achievement in Reading Comprehension in Cycle 2 The reading comprehension test was given in the third meeting it was on February 10 2017. The text given entitled Kartini s Day and the test consisted of 10 numbers of subjective test. The result of students achievement test in Cycle 2 had shown that there was improvement of the students average score from the preliminary study to the score in reading comprehension test in Cycle 2. The average score in the preliminary study was 48.8 while the average score in the reading comprehension test in Cycle 2 was 80.8. It meant that there was 32 points of improvement. The improvement in detail showed there was 1 student got 60 points of improvement from what he got in preliminary study. The improvement made him passed the minimum passing grade where he got 40 in preliminary study and got 100 in reading comprehension test. There were 2 students got 50 points higher than what they got in preliminary study. It made both of them could pass the minimum passing grade. There were 7 students who got 40 points of improvement and it made 6 students could pass the minimum passing grade and one student still could not pass the minimum passing grade. 30 points of improvement were gained by 8 students as the result 5 of them could pass the minimum passing grade and 3 students were still could not pass the minimum passing grade. For 20 points of improvement 5 students had reached it and all of them could reach the minimum passing grade. There were 2 students who only got 10 points of improvement where one of them could pass the minimum passing grade and one student still could not pass the minimum passing grade. In conclusion the students reading comprehension on recount text by using PQRST strategy in Cycle 2 showed good result. The number of students who reached the minimum passing grade was incresed. There were 20 students out of 25 students who could reach the minimum passing grade. The result of students improvement in their reading comprehension is presented in table 2. Table 2 The Students Improvement in Reading Comprehension Test in Cycle 2 No Aspect in Criteria of Success Improvement Percentage 14 students who reached the minimum passing grade 4 students got 8805 10 points higher100% 221 students who failed to reached the minimum passing grade 20 students got 8805 20 points higher95% 1 students got 20 points higher 5% The result of students improvement in reading comprehenson test had met the criteria of success where all of the students who had reached the minimum passing grade in preliminary study had improved 10 points higher and 95% (20 students) of students who could not reach the minimum passing grade in preliminary study could improve their score 20 points higher and more. It meant that this study had met the criteria of success. The Student s Participation During the Teaching Learning Activities The data related to the students participation was obtained from the observation checklist and field notes during teaching and learning activities and interview with the collaborators informally in the end of every meeting in Cycle 2. The first collaborator recorded and scored by seeing the number of students who participated in the activities stated in observation checklist. The second collaborator recorded in fiel dnotes the description of students participation and the classroom atmosphere. Through interview with the collaborators informally in the end of every meeting the researcher got feeback about how to make the strategy more effectively to solve students problem in the teaching learning activities. The data analysis of students participation during the teaching learning activities in Cycle 2 which had been gained by the researcher and the first collaborator through the observation checklist was presented in figure 3.2. Figure 2 The Result of Students Participation in Teaching Learning Activities From figure 2 it could be seen that the average of students participation in Cycle 2 achieved 82%. In the first meeting the students participation was 80% and in the second meeting it improved into 84%. It can be concluded that the average of the students participation were improved from Cycle 1 which only gained 67% into 82% in Cycle 2. The average of students participation in Cycle 2 achieved 82% it could be concluded that the students participation had met the criteria of success that required the average of students participation reach 80% in teaching learning activities. It meant the researcher did not need to conduct the next cycle and could stop the study. After analysing the result of the implementation of PQRST strategy in teaching learning activities and the evaluation of students achievement in reading comprehension test of Cycle 2 it could be concluded that PQRST strategy has been successfull to improve the students reading comprehension ability. Based on the result of reading comprehension test in Cycle 2 there were significant improvement gained by the students all of the students or 4 students who had reached the minimum passing grade could improve 10 points higher or more. For students who could not reached minimum passing grade there were 95% students or 20 students had improved their score 20 points higher or more. It was only one students who still could not reach 20 points of improvent. The average of students participation had increased from Cycle 1 to Cycle 2 where the average of students participation in Cycle 1 reached 67% and it increased into 82% in Cycle 2. It can be seen that the students had became more motivated and interested in teaching learning activities which reflected in their participation in every stage of PQRST strategy. Based on the result in Cycle 2 it can be concluded that the implementation of PQRST strategy has been successful to improve the students reading comprehension. It has met the criteria of success. First of all the result of the students reading comprehension test showed improvement compared the result in preliminary study and Cycle 1. The students average score in preliminary study was 48.80 increased to 63.60 in Cycle 1 and it increased into 80.80 in Cycle 2. It meant that the implementation of PQRST strategy had increased the students ability in reading comprehension. Second the students participation were increased during the implementation of PQRST strategy in teaching learning activities. The students who were not familiar in making questions were developing their ability in making questions and they were more confidence to cite their questions in Cycle 2. The students were more active in folllowing the strategy and it can be seen from the average score of students participation which increased from Cycle 1 (67%) to Cycle 2 (82%). The findings have shown students reading comprehension improvement and students active participation in the teaching learning activitiesi n the implementation of PQRST strategy. It meant that this study have met the criteria of success and did not need to follow up to the next cycle. DISCUSSION Students Reading Comprehension Achievement The research s result shows that PQRST strategy has improved students reading comprehension ability. In the preliminary study there were only 4 students out of 25 students who could reach the minimum passing grade that was 66. The other 21 students got under 66 and they were considered as low achiever. After implementing PQRST strategy in teaching learning activities the students reading comprehension ability was improved. The average of students reading comprehension ability was improved from 48.8 in preliminary study into 63.6 in Cycle 1. However it did not reach the criteria of success that required all students (100%) who reached the minimum passing grade got 10 points higher. There were only 3 students (75%) could reach it. For those who could not reach the minimum passing grade in preliminary study 80% of them were expected to reach 20 points higher. In fact there were only 13 students or 62% could reach it. Due to the result of Cycle 1 Cycle 2 was conducted based on the revision on Cycle 1. It gave better result which was shown in average of students reading comprehension score from Cycle 1 (63.6) to Cycle 2 (80.8). All of the students or 4 students who reached the minimum passing grade in the preliminary study could improve their reading comprehension score 10 points or higher. For students who could not reach the minimum passing grade in preliminary study 95% of them or 20 students out of 21 students could improve their score 20 points higher or more. The result of students achievement in Cycle 2 have met the criteria of success which is indicated that PQRST strategy is one of appropriate strategy to help students to improve their reading comprehension ability. It is supported by Miqawati (2013 78) that stated PQRST strategy was effective in making the quality of students reading comprehension significantly better than those who were taught by using Translation and Reading Aloud strategy. Moreover the findings of this research is in line with Susanti (2013 76) who revealed that the use of PQRST strategy could improve students reading comprehension skill in the English teaching and learning. The students reading comprehension improved because they follow and do every activity in every stage of this strategy. By following every activity in every stage in this strategy it gives guidance for them to get a comprehension of the text being read. The Students Partcipation in the Teaching Learning Activities In the first meeting of Cycle 1 for Pre-activity the students got difficulties in doing activities in sharing their ideas and questions about the picture because they were not familiar with these activities but in the next meetings they could develop their ability in communicating their ideas and citing their questions. It is in line with what Grabe (2009 211) stated about activating prior knowledge that could be used as a key to build better understanding about the topic. In whilst-activity the students asked to follow each step in PQRST worsheet for the first and second meeting in Cycle 1 they worked in group and in the third meeting they worked in pair. By working in group and pair high achiever students could help low achiever students to do every step in PQRST worksheet. As stated by Brown (2015 272)that groups work gives advantages for students in the form of increasing individual time to practice the language helping students to be more secure and capable to participating and promoting students responsibility and autonomy. In other words groups work provides opportunities for students initiation for face to face give and take and for practice in negotiation of meaning. On Cycle 1 students were had problems in making questions finding out the word meaning and making summary in the form of mind mapping. Moreover on Cycle 2 the researcher paid more attention in explaining how to make questions in past tense giving note and example of questions in English . The activity on finding out the word meaning was done by guessing the word based on meaningful pictures given in Preview stage. As Negara (2008 140) suggested to find the word meaning in preview stage because students needed to be provided with adequate vocabulary related to the text before reading so that they could comprehend the text. While in Summarize stage the activity was more simple only noting the main meaningful points they got from the text. As like Grabe (2009 209) said that summarizing leads to significantly better comprehension of reading passage. Having these revision activities in whilst-activity made it ran well. While in post-activity there was no significant differences between post-activity in Cycle 1 and Cycle 2. It was a session to discuss the answer to the researcher s questions and students were allowed to express their view or problems related to PQRST strategy. Generally there was significant improvement on students participation in every meeting during the implementation of PQRST strategy in teaching learning activities. The percentage of students activeness increased significantly in every meeting from Cycle 1 to Cycle 2. The average percentage was 67 % in Cycle 1 and 82% in Cycle 2. It is in line with Sulistyo (2001 94) that stated PQRST strategy is useful as an instructional reading strategy that could make students participate in every step of this strategy. Supported by Negara (2008 150) that mentioned the students participation were become more active in the teaching learning process than before the strategy was implemented. CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION Conclusion After PQRST strategy was modified and implemented through two cycles it can be concluded that this strategy can improve the students reading comprehension of VIIIB students of SPMN 1 Pangkalan Lada. Moreover the students are participated more actively during the teaching learning activities in implementing the PQRST strategy. The appropriate model of using PQRST strategy in teaching reading covers a number of procedures namely (1) Preview where the students looked at the title and pictures related to the text to identify what they will be reading about and guessing the difficult word meanings by looking at the meaningful pictures and context of the text. (2) Question the students were asked to make three questions about anything they want to know more from the text. They could make the questions in English but if they found it difficult to make three questions in English they could make one of their three questions in Bahasa Indonesia. It is better to push the students to make questions mostly English so they can develop their ability in making questions in English. (3) Read the students read the text carefully to find the answer of their own questions. (4) Summarize the students noted at least three main meaningful points they got from the text. (5) Test the students answered their own questions and researcher s questions to know their understanding of the text that they have read. Moreover after implementing the strategy the researcher draws conclusion that when students are taught by using a step by step activity in reading comprehension like what they have done by implementing PQRST strategy they can comprehend the content of the text easier. This strategy can make the students comprehend the reading material better than when they are only taught about the type of the text and after that asked them to answer the questions individually. This strategy guides the students to understand a reading material start from making prediction of the text and then making questions to make them focus on information that they want to know from the text. After that reading the text to find the information they want to know making confirmation of what they have already got from the text by noting the main points of the text and finally answering their own questions and the researcher s questions. There are stages to be followed before come into good comprehending these stages build students reading comprehension. Second the activities in PQRST strategy have stimulated the students to develop their ability in reading comprehension. This strategy helps the students to link their prior knowledge with the new knowledge they get from the text. The strategy enriches their vocabulary knowledge related to the text by guessing the word meanings after looking at the pictures and context of the text . They are also guided to think critically about what they want to know from the text when they are asked to make questions. By having their own questions the students have purpose in reading and it stimulates them to be more interested in reading because they have their own questions that need to be answered. This strategy also trained the students on how to get the content of the text by making summary so they get more comprehension about the text. By making summary they are trained to make confirmation of their understanding of the text content. Third when the students are able to follow every activity in every stage of the strategy their confidence is increased and they can participate more actively in the teaching learning activity. By implementing the strategy the students can make a prediction of a text they can make questions they become more effective in reading they can mention the main points of the text and in the end they can answer researcher s questions confidently. The last conclusion is when students know how to read well by using PQRST srategy they can apply the strategy when they do other reading activity. Instead of discussing the answers only it is better for the students to apply the strategy in their future. By applying the strategy for other reading material they can improve their reading comprehension ability. Suggestion On the basis of the research findings and discussion PQRST strategy is applicable for English teachers who have similar situation in teaching reading comprehension and for future reseachers who are interested to conduct a study in the use of this strategy. Considering the use of PQRST strategy could improve the students reading comprehension and increase the students participation during the teaching learning activities PQRST strategy can be implemented as one alternative in teaching learning activities of reading comprehension. There are some suggestions in implementing PQRST strategy. In pre-activity the activity should be focused to activate students background knowledge by showing pictures related to the topic. Through the pictures the students are asked to communicate their ideas related to what they see from the picture and to think critically about what they want to know from the picture by making questions. These activities are essential to build their understanding about the material that they want to learn. It will also help them to make questions in Question step of PQRST strategy. In whilst-activity it is better to place finding out the word meanings activity in Preview stage than in Read stage because it will be more usefull to help students create their understanding of the text from the beginning of PQRST activity. The students can use their prior knowledge and relate it to their new vocabulary. By linking the students prior knowledge with their new vocabulary the students can draw their understanding related to what is the text about. So they can make questions about things they want to know from the text in Question stage and be more focus to find the answer of their own questions in Read stage. It is also more effective to ask students to note the meaningful main points that they have already understood in Summarize stage because it will be more comprehending for the students. In addition for teachers since PQRST strategy is not familiar for students it is better to ask students work in groups and then make them more confident to work in pair in the next meeting. If the students have already knew how to use this strategy in reading activities they could be asked to work individually. For more suggestion the strategy can also be used to teach other genres such as narrative decriptive and recount. The last suggestion is for future researchers. Particularly those who have similar problems in teaching reading and want to apply PQRST strategy in their research the finding is expected to be a reference. It is suggested that future researchers conduct a similar study in order to create a better shape and more comprehensive and effective use of PQRST strategy. REFERENCES Brown H.D. (2015). Teaching by Principles. New York Pearson Education. Burn A. (2010). Doing Action Research in English Language Teaching. New York Routledge. Grabe W. (2010). Reading in Second Language Moving from Theory to Practice. New York Cambridge University Press. Haeryanto A.I. (2012). Improving the Reading Comprehension Skills of the Eleventh Graders of MA Nurul Jadid Paiton Probolinggo through PQRST Strategy. Unpublished Thesis. Malang Universitas Negeri Malang. Kuslolyta D. O. (2015). Using the PQRST Strategy to Improve the Reading Comprehension Ability of the Tenth Graders at SMA Negeri 1 Rogojampi. Unpublished Thesis. Malang Universitas Negeri Malang. Latief M. A. (2015). Research Methods on Language Learning an Introduction. Malang State University of Malang Press. Mcnamara D. S. (2006). Reading Comprehension Strategies Theories Interventions and Technologies. New Jersey Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc. Miqawati A. H. Sulistyo G. H. (2014). The PQRST Strategy Reading Comprehension and Learning Styles. Indonesian Journal of Applied Linguistics 4 (1) 123-139. Negara N. S. W. (2008). Using PQRST Strategy to Improve the First Quarter Students Reading Comprehension at DCC (Language Academy) Lampung. Unpublished Thesis. Malang. Universitas Negeri Malang. Snow C. (2002). Reading for Understanding Toward an R D Program in Reading Comprehension. Santa Monica RAND. Sulityo G. H. (2011). Reading for Meaning Theories Teaching Strategies and Assessment. Malang Pustaka Kaiswaran. Susanti A. N. R. (2013). Improving Students Reading Comprehension Through PQRST Technique at Grade XI of SMA Piri 1 Yogyakarta in the Academic Year of 2012/2013. Unpublished Thesis. Yogyakarta Yogyakarta State University. Tankersly K. (2003). The Threads of Reading Strategies for Literacy Development. Virginia ASCD. Vazquez C. B. Green R Medina J. M. M. ( 2006). The Application of the PQRST Method to the Teaching in English of Difficult or Complex Technological Subjects. Jornadas De Innovacion Docente Universidad Europea De Madrid. Retrived from http //universidadeuropea.es/myfiles/pageposts/jiu/jiu2005/archivos/PDAA/PDAA24.pdf. (Accessed on 18 January 2016). Willis J. 2008. Teaching the Brain to Read Strategies for Improving Fluency Vocabulary and Comprehension. Virginia ASCD.
| Item Type: | Thesis (Masters) |
|---|---|
| Subjects: | L Education > L Education (General) |
| Divisions: | Fakultas Sastra (FS) > Departemen Sastra Inggris (ING) > S2 Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris |
| Depositing User: | Users 2 not found. |
| Date Deposited: | 14 Jul 2017 04:29 |
| Last Modified: | 09 Sep 2017 03:00 |
| URI: | http://repository.um.ac.id/id/eprint/58889 |
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