“Improving students’ vocabulary by using conversation text (An action research to the second year students of MTsN Jangka).

I.     INTRODUCTION

1.1  Background of the Research

Language as a mean communication seems to have played an important role in human life. Language and human beings cannot be separated. Human life perspicuity can run well because they use language to communicate something one another. Through the language, people gain a better insight into human relations. They use the language to express their ideas and thoughts. Meanwhile language itself can survive and develop because people use it and teach to other people. Whoever, whenever and wherever they are, language always accompanies them. Even when one is silent, basically he still uses language it is a means used to form thought and feeling, will and activity.

English has important role in the world. The different growth of languages makes it the most popular among the other international languages. Nowadays, there are no part of the world affairs know nothing about English. International affairs such as education, economic, sport, science, medicine, and security, always involve English as the medium. Besides, it must be realized that most scientific books are written in English. Accordingly, in order to be able to comprehend the books for getting knowledge, one must have mastery in English and so must the Indonesian students.

For Indonesia, English is a foreign language. With this position, it does not have social function as wide as a second language. English in academic field is taught as a subject matter. By learning English the learners are hoped to be able to communicate about anything in English. River (2003:87) stated that the final aim of teaching a foreign language is to produce students who can communicate about anything and everything in the foreign language.

To achieve the communicative function, we need general knowledge and skill of English and language components. There are four language skills taught in MTsN. They are listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Reading gets more emphasis than the others. This emphasis is reasonable, as the graduates of MTsN are prepared to continue their study to senior high school and university in which most reference books are written in English. Furthermore, vocabulary knowledge is basic to and primarily the prime ingredient in comprehension.

Strategy for vocabulary development is essential element of any reading program (Robinson, 1978:8). The language components involve vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation. In fact, all language components are important, but the most important one in language teaching is vocabulary, as Coleman (1993:97) says, that vocabulary is the most important component in language teaching. By having an adequate mastery of vocabulary, students can learn language more easily. Besides, there is a direct relationship between a successful career and large vocabulary. Men and women who had achieved distinction in variety of field were proved to have vocabularies larger than the average. It does not mean that a large vocabulary can guarantee one to become a scientist. But it means that inadequate vocabulary will minimize one’s chances for success; an effective vocabulary will increase them.

Vocabulary can be defined as a list words, usually in alphabetical order and with explanations of their meanings, less complete than a dictionary (Paul P, 1978:129). Meanwhile, a word has three aspects; their form, their meaning, and their distribution. Therefore, in language teaching, a teacher must consider the three aspects. A teacher must consider the meaning of the language as the student will not automatically understand the meaning of the language without being taught though they have mastered the structure of the language. The meaning also can be grasped through the context, form, and association.

When we talk about the process of mastering vocabulary, we have to deal with the ways of enriching vocabulary. If the students could master and always remember all the vocabularies learned at school, when they have graduated their vocabulary of English would be adequate enough. After they have finished their study at MTsN, however, it turns out that they just loose too many of their English words, only a very limited number are remembered. It is one of the phenomena happening in the process of mastering vocabulary in MTsN today.

Based on the explanation above the researcher thinks that it is reasonable enough to be the reason why the researcher is interested to do a collaborative classroom action research under the title “Improving students’ vocabulary by using conversation text (An action research to the second year students of MTsN Jangka). This research is an effort to evaluate and improve the students’ vocabulary acquisition. It focused on two kind of vocabulary, namely noun and verb.

1.2  The Problem of the Research

The problems of this research are in the following:

1.      Can the second year students of MTsN Jangka improve their ability in mastering English vocabulary by using conversation text?

2.      What are the advantages of using conversation text in teaching English vocabulary to the second year students of MTsN Jangka?

1.3  The Purpose of the Research

The purposes of this research based on the problem of this research are as follows:

1.      To know if the second year students of of MTsN Jangka can improve their ability in mastering English vocabulary when the teacher uses conversation text in the teaching.

2.      To find out the advantages of using conversation text in teaching English vocabulary to the second year students of MTsN Jangka.

1.4  The Significance of the Research

This study is hoped to give meaningful knowledge both theoretically and practically concerns. Theoretically, the study would give reasonable benefit in describing the students’ vocabulary mastering ability through conversation text, especially to the second year students of MTsN Jangka. Practically, the finding of the research is expected to give a priority measures in teaching English vocabulary for teacher. Meanwhile for the students, it is hoped that conversation text can enrich their vocabulary so that they can comprehend the English text in various kinds, written or spoken.

1.5  The Scope of the Research

The writer gives the scope of this research for limiting the focus of the research. The focus of this research concerns with teaching English vocabulary, especially noun, and verb through conversation text. The text used in teaching and learning process is about daily conversation. The material given will depend on the topic of teaching.

1.6  The Definition of Key Terms

In this thesis, the writer gives some explanation about a few key terms. These key terms’ function is to make the reader understand exactly about a few words or phrases.

1.    Vocabulary

“Vocabulary” is a list of words and sometime phrase usually arranged in alphabetical order and define, etc (Webster, 1997:2046). According to Oxford Leaner’s Pocket Dictionary (2005:482), “Vocabulary” is all the words that a person knows or uses; all the words in a language; and all the words with their meanings, especial in a book for learning a foreign language. In this case, “vocabulary” means a list of words taught by the teacher through big book.

2.    Conversation Text

Conversation text is a text that contains the dialog between two people or more than two people (River, 2003:89). In this research, it means that a kind of text that is used in teaching and learning process of English vocabulary.

3.    Classroom Action Research (CAR)

“Classroom Action Research” is a form of reflective research that is conducted by teacher which its result can be used as a tool to improve the teaching and learning process (Asrori, 2008:4).

II.       THE REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

Vocabulary in a language is one of the vital aspects to be mastered by the students of English. An explanation about vocabulary and its function in language teaching is necessary. Vocabulary is defined as all the words recognized and understood by a particular person, although they are not necessary to be used by him.

According to Oxford Leaner’s Pocket Dictionary, “Vocabulary is: (1) all the words that a person knows or uses; (2) all the words in a language; (3) list of words with their meanings, especially in a book for learning a foreign language”. And according to Webster (1997:56), “Vocabulary is a list of word and sometime phrase usually arranged in alphabetical order and defined as dictionary of lexicon”.

From the definition, it can be concluded that vocabulary is a number of word or a bunch of words that should be familiar with someone and have in his/her mind. In other words, vocabulary is the word capacity of someone when he is writing or reading a text, or when he or she is expressing own ideas in practical communication. So, it would be impossible for one who doesn’t have enough vocabulary to communicate his ideas as clearly as he would like either in oral or written.

Usually vocabulary is quite important in practicing oral communication but we found some students have limited vocabulary in improving their English. They cannot enlarge any vocabulary because they rarely read some materials in English. It is obstacle faced by the students who learn English. Besides, vocabulary is important in practicing listening, speaking, reading, and writing. And vocabulary is a set of words known by a person or other entity or that are part of a specific language.

After having an understanding on the definitions of vocabulary in previous section, the writer tries to discuss about the importance vocabulary. Learning vocabulary is considered as a basic task to the learners. Those who have lack of vocabulary cannot express their ideas clearly and they can read a book which they like. Because of that, vocabulary plays as importance role in learning language.

The writer realizes that we cannot neglect teaching vocabulary to young learners in teaching English. With limited vocabulary the students are hardly to express the idea clearly as they want. Many experienced instructors know how importance the vocabulary is. Richards (2002:26) aggress that communication oriented teaching the most presses concern for the learners is the need to master an adequate foreign language vocabulary. He adds that one of the big problems is learning a foreign language when reading materials written in that language is a lot of difficult word so that the students do not understand what they read about a language relation and how they are realized.

In addition, Robinson (1978:45) also states about the importance of vocabulary, there general agreement that the possession of large number of vocabulary item is necessary to success in social, professional, and intellectual life; that vocabulary is a vehicle for thought, self-expression, and communication. Based the statement above, we have assumption that success in learning foreign language depends very much on the mastery vocabulary. Without sufficient vocabulary of the target language, the students face a lot of difficulties in developing the language skills.

III.    RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1  The Design of the Research

The design of the research is Classroom Action Research (CAR). As it explained by Asrori, (2008:45) that Classroom Action Research (CAR) is a kind of research that involves some people like the principal, teacher, lectures, or etc simultaneously. It aims to improve teaching practical quality, contribute teaching theoretical development or educational and teacher career progression.

The Classroom Action Research (CAR) is designed to implement the using of conversation text in teaching vocabulary. The research is intended to develop a strategy to solve the problem found by the teacher in teaching of vocabulary. And it is conducted by giving certain action to improve and increase the quality of teaching practices in the classrooms in order that those practices become more professional.

Asrory (2008:100) explained that in the procedure and implementation of the process, there are some stages that were done in repeated cycles. First, planning an action, the researcher designed a lesson plan and prepared the suitable topic which was given to the students in the class. The second, implementation of the action that the researcher conducted in the teaching and learning process. The third, observation that was done by the researcher to collect data during action. The fourth, reflection and data analysis that showed the results of the action done in each action. If the action of each cycle was considered not being successful, the researcher revised the plan and continued to the next cycle.

The procedures employed are adapted from Kemmis and McTaggert’s Action Research model. The visual illustration of the steps is shown in figure below.

			ANALYSIS AND FINDING ·    The students have low ability in mastering vocabulary. It was proved through the test. ·    The strategic used in the teaching and learning process are not varied and uninteresting.
		Figure 1.1 Classroom Action Research Procedures (adapted from Kemmis & Taggart, 1998)

3.2  The Setting and the Subject of the Research

This research is conducted at MTsN Jangka. There is only two classes of second year students at the school. The researcher decided to choose one class as the subject of the research to make it easier for the researcher to collect the data. The subject class consists of 30 students. The reason why the researcher chose one class only is because Classroom Action Research is conducted in one class. Classroom is the place where a group of student in the same time receives the same lesson from the teacher (Suharsimi, 2007:3 in Asrori, 2008:5).

3.3  The Technique of Data Collecting

In collecting the data, the writer will ask the subject of this research to answer some tests; pre-test and post-test. Pre-test is given before the treatment and post-test will be given after the treatment. Observation sheets and field note also will be used as the instrument in collecting data. Its functions are the following:

1.      To assess the students’ motivation and curiosity during the learning process.

2.      To check the students’ vocabulary improvement during the class.

3.      To find out the advantages of using conversation text in teaching English vocabulary.

4.      To check the students’ attitude while participating the action during the class.

3.4 The Technique of Data Analyzing

            In this research, the data will be analyzed qualitatively. It means that all the data gathered from the observation will be analyzed descriptively. Analyzing data will be conducted in each cycle.

3.5 The Schedule of the Research

The research will be completed in four months right away after this proposal approved by the authorized lecturers of Almuslim University. The writer also provides the schedule in a simple table as the following:

Simple General Table of the Research Schedule

Mei (2010)	June (2010)	July (2010)	August (2010)
Preparing to do the first cycle	Implementing to do the first cycle	Implementing to do the second cycle	Implementing to do the third cycle (if it is considered  required)