USING FLASH CARDS TO INTRODUCE AND TO TEACH CONCRETE NOUNS ON FIRST GRADERS OF MI RAUDLATUSSHUBBAN TAWANGREJO WINONG PATI, ACADEMIC YEAR 2008/2009.
(A CLASSROOM ACTION RESEARCH APPROACH)
Fulfill of the Requirement
For the Degree of Bachelor of Islamic Education
In English Language Education
1. Anis Sundusiyah, S.S. M.Pd. M.A.
2. Drs. Abdul Wahib, M.Ag.
FACULTY OF TARBIYAH
STATE INSTITUTE OF ISLAMIC STUDIES WALISONGO
USING FLASH CARDS TO INTRODUCE AND TO TEACH CONCRETE NOUNS ON FIRST GRADERS OF MI RAUDLATUSSHUBBAN TAWANGREJO WINONG PATI, ACADEMIC YEAR 2008/2009.
(A CLASSROOM ACTION RESEARCH APPROACH)
A. Background of The Study
Allah create human in the world with various nation, ethnic, and custom. Even so language, between one country and another country have different language. It is one of big sign of Allah that will be appear some new sciences about language, so human will study more deeply in certain country, especially English. About the variety of language, Allah said in suroh Ar-Rum ayat 22:
Meaning: And among His signs are the creation of the heavens and the earth, and the variations in your languages and your colors. Verily in that are signs for those who know (Ar-Rum:22)
The globalization era we required to use language that can be understood by everyone in around world. At these points, English becomes an international language. Therefore, to be able to survive in the globalization era, we have to master English. By mastering English, we can learn everything and communicate with everyone. In Indonesia, English becomes the foreign language that has an important role to the development of the country. It can be seen from the use of English in many fields such as information, tourism, business, and also in education. In education for example, there are many scientific books written in English.
Teaching English at elementary school will emphasize on the vocabulary teaching. In this case, there are many difficulties to teach English in elementary school because the students usually are confused and difficult to memorize the vocabulary. There is unsatisfactory result of teaching vocabulary in Indonesia, especially in elementary school. Vocabulary is still a problem for the students and it is still difficult to keep the new vocabulary in mind without teachers’ explanation.
Vocabulary is one of the language components which have to be mastered by the students in learning a new language, it should be mastered as well as the language skill (reading, writing, listening, and speaking).
The researcher looked that the students of first grade at MI Raudlatussubban still have difficulties in memorizing new vocabularies. It could be seen in daily teaching and learning process. The students seemed to forget the vocabulary which had been taught by their teacher. Probably this happen because of the weakness of students’ memory, or the teacher still using conventional technique, or it may be because of the lack of the instructional media of learning. It can make the situation in the class bored and students can not absorb new vocabulary with maximal.
The teacher should be more creative and keep the students away from feeling bored in the daily teaching and learning process. In order to keep the students away from feeling bored in teaching learning English vocabulary, teacher should use the appropriate instructional media which still has relation to their world. According to one of website in internet, flash cards are helpful in the process of learning vocabulary of a new language, to teach many other aspects of the chosen language.
However, the English teacher must help the students to surmount their difficulties by giving motivation and must creative in teaching, especially in teaching vocabulary. Using variety of media will increase the probability that students will learn more, retain better what they learn and improve their performance of the skills, they are expected to develop.
Because of the reason above, the researcher want try to make research about using flash cards to introduce and to teach concrete nouns on first graders of MI Raudlatusshubban Tawangrejo Winong Pati, academic year 2008/2009. ( A classroom action research approach ).
B. Definition Of Key Term
To give clear clarification and to loss miss understanding or interpretation between the researcher and the reader, the researcher clarifies the terms are used in this study as follow:
1. Flash card: a card with a word or words and sometimes a picture on it. Flash cards are held up for pupils as a visual aid to learning. A card with a word, sentences, or pictures on it used as an aid or cue in language lesson.
2. Introduce: to bring something into use or operation for the first time.
3. Teaching: is an activity that tries to help someone to acquire change, develop skill, attitude, idea, appreciation language.
4. Concrete is existing in a form that can be touched, felt, seen, etc. Real and solid. Noun is a word used to name or identify any of a class of things, people, places, or action research ideas, or a particular one of these. So concrete noun is a noun which refer to a physical thing, real, that can be touched, felt, seen, and so on. For example: book, house, etc.
5. Action research:
- Research that has the primary goal of finally ways of solving problem, bringing about social change or practical action, in comparison with research that seek to discover scientific principles or develop general laws and theories.
- (In teacher education), teacher initiated classroom research that seek to increase the teacher’s understanding of classroom teaching and learning and to bring about improvements in classroom practices. Action research typically involves small-scale investigative projects in the teacher’s own classroom, and consists of the following cycle of activities:
a. The teacher (or a group of teachers) selects an aspect of classroom behavior to examine in more detail (e.g. the teacher ‘s use of questions).
b. Selects a suitable research technique (e.g. recording classroom lessons).
c. Collects data and analyzes them.
d. Develops an action plan to help bring about a change in classroom behaviour (e.g. to reduce the frequency of questions that teacher answer him self or her self).
e. Observes the effects of the action plan on behaviour.
C. Research Questions
1. How is the implementation of teaching concrete nouns with the aid of flash cards ?
2. How effective is the use of flash cards to aid the teaching of concrete nouns?
D. Objective/aim of research
1. To describe the implementation of teaching concrete nouns with the aid of flash cards.
2. To find out the effectiveness of the use flash cards to aid the teaching concrete nouns.
E. Literature Review
1. Flash cards
Flash cards are cards with words and or pictures which can be handled easily by the teacher, the flashcards which each card contains a picture is intended in the research is square cardboard sheet seven by ten centimeters in size. The teacher can make or he can take in from a magazine, newspaper or book. At the bottom of each card, there is on English vocabulary item with its pronoun caution and its translation into Indonesian. Flash card is any of a set of cards with words, number, etc, on them which are flashed one by one before a class for quick response in drill. Flash cards can be bright and colourful and make a real impact on visual learners. Flash cards are really handy resource to have and can be useful at every stage of the class. They are a great way to present, practice, and recycle vocabulary and when students become familiar whit the activities used in class, they can be given out to early finishers to use in small group. The cards can be really very big, so as the whole class can see it at the same time (for instance, when teaching students to ask for and to give directions, it would be nice to have a big picture of a city seen from the top and showing many different places, making it easy to present and practice new structures together, before allowing students to produce their own pieces of information) but also can be customized to teacher’s and student’s specific needs and become very small (cue cards) and be used for individual or small groups (for instance, a domino game using small pictures and their corresponding names, verbs, phrasal verbs, preposition, … , the teacher will need more sets according to class size).
A flash card is a little piece of paper, the size of a business card, which has on one side a new word in a language you’re learning, and on the other side a word in your mother tongue. Flash cards are an excellent learning tool for students from pre school to university. It is one of the best ways to learn and study and it is fast and portable. Flash cards can be a great help to learn simple and complex concepts for an array of subjects such as science, social studies, and language. Teacher or students can make flash cards to aid in the learning process.
From some definition above, can make conclusion that flash cards are cards bearing picture and words or something or short sentences are flashed for brief moment. The cards should be bright , colourful, and big enough to be seen clearly by every students in the class in introducing new vocabulary to all level to aid in the learning process. The researcher try to select some pictures which are considered concrete nouns based on the students’ need and level. They must be also related to the theme in the English syllabus material.
2. Concrete nouns
Concrete is existing in a form that can be touched, felt, seen, etc, real, and solid. Noun is a word used to name or identify any of class of things, people, places or action research ideas, or a particular one of these. In this study, the researcher want takes concrete nouns as the material to be taught. Concrete noun is the name of people, objects, places, and so on that can be caught by the five senses, so they can touch and see.
3. Previous Research
The research will describe some works which are relevant to these thesis to make the thesis arrangement easier:
Ismiyati saputri (Teaching Vocabulary Using Flash Cards At Elementary School, A Case Of The Fourth Year Students of SDN Pecangaan 01 in the academic year 2003/2004). Her study is limited to the vocabulary achievement and the benefit of teaching vocabulary by using flashcard at elementary school of SDN Pecangaan 01. Her thesis explained about procedures, the results, the advantages and the disadvantages of teaching vocabulary by using flashcards. She carries out experiments and observation. To know the result of her research, she has given pre test before treatment and after this give post test. She needed two classes, control class and experiment class.
Heidi Gerding and T.F.McLaughlin. (Flash Card Error Drill, Previewing and Praise for See to Say Sight Words With A Young Student With Mild Rental Retardation). They are explained about how to increase the rate of see to say sight words in context (oral reading) using flash cards. The participant was a seven year old male with mild mental retardation. The number of correct and error words read were measured. The participant was reading below grade level, but higher than most of his classmates. The effectiveness of flash card drill with previewing was evaluated in an ABCD single case design. The overall outcomes indicated an increase in corrects and a decrease in errors. The benefits for teachers and students of using previewing and error drill are detailed.
This research is different from previous one. This research focus on teaching concrete nouns to enrich students’ vocabulary with classroom action research approach, so as researcher, i just need one class. I make some cycle in the teaching learning process to repair methods and strategies that should the teacher use in teaching learning process, with this research can improve and increase teachers’ skill in teaching English and also to get some solves from the problem that faced by the teacher. The researcher use observation, field notes, and test as instrument.
The similarities this research with the previous are: using flash cards to aid in the teaching English and applied for young learners.
F. Methods Of Research
1. Kind Of Research
This research is classroom action research on teaching concrete nouns using flash cards. There are some definition about classroom action research. Classroom action research is one of the type investigation that has characteristic reflective participative, collaborative, and spiral that have purpose to repair and to increase the system, method, process, substance, competence, and situation. Classroom action research is one type of research that have reflective character with do certain action in classroom to repair and to increase the teaching and learning process. Action research is method of professional self-development which involves the systematic collection and analysis of data related to practice. Action research might be define as the study of the social situation with a view to improving the quality of action within it…(the) total process-review, diagnosis, planning, implementation, monitoring effects-provides the necessary link between self evaluation and professional development. Action research is method of how a group of teacher can organize their teaching learning condition and learn from their own experience. They can try an idea as reparation in their teaching learning process, and look the real effect of those efforts.
From all the definition above, it concluded that class action research is an action in a research, which can be done by teacher, researcher, and teacher with his/her colleague, etc with involves a group of students to improve teaching and learning process or to enhance the understanding of the students to the lesson.
There are four components in one cycle for doing classroom action research. It consists of: planning, acting, observing, and reflecting. The four phases of the classroom action cycle were conducted integrated. Each phases was concluded based on the previous one and the next. It means that the activities in the classroom action research were based on planning, action, and then to be observed, after that the researcher could reflect to determine the next cycle.
The steps of action research
Taken from: Penelitian Tindakan Kelas, LP3 (UNNES: 2007)
2. Focus Of Research
In this research, the researcher focus on teaching concrete nouns using flash cards to increase students absorbs new vocabulary with classroom action research approach on first graders of MI Raudlatusshubban Tawangrejo Winong Pati.
3. Participant and Setting
The participant that used by the researcher is the students on first graders at MI Raudlatusshubban Tawangrejo Winong Pati. The address is at Tawangrejo village, behind of At Taqwa mosque. Winong subdistrict, and regency of Pati. The reason for choosing the first year students is based on consideration that the first year students get English subject at the first time and they have to studied vocabulary as the basic.
4. Technique of Data Collection
The classroom action research needs the data to support the investigation. The techniques and method which can be used to collect evidence in classroom action research are as follows: diaries, profiles, document analysis, tape or video recording and transcript, using an outside observer, interviewing, the running commentary, the shadow study, check list, questionnaire, inventories, triangulation, and analytic memos.
This research used some of them, which are appropriate to the school environment and can be done there to support the action research. This research gathered the data: observation form, field notes, and test.
The observation form in this research is used to know the activities during the teaching learning process, such as: how the teacher carried out the material, what the teacher did to manage the classroom and the students, and the students’ response.
Field notes it is used to know the activities during the teaching learning process, such as show the teacher carried out the material and the students’ response. In using field notes, she should pay attention to the students’ response during this activity objectively. The uses of field notes, hopefully, would help the researcher observe the class situation. It also showed some notes taken in each action. In the field notes the observer wants to observe and to take notes on students’ activities and response during teaching and learning process.
Test is important part of every teaching and learning experience. Test is a set of questions that is used to measure the skill knowledge, intelligence, and talent of an individual or a group. This research will use an achievement test to measure the students’ progress in memorizing new vocabulary. Achievement tests are used to indicate group or individual progress toward the instructional objective of a specific study or a training program. The forms of the test are multiple choices and matching test., because the writer can get directly the specific skill and learning. She wishes to measure scoring can be done quickly and easily.
5. Procedure and Timeline
There are four components in one cycle for doing classroom action research. It consists of: planning, acting, observing, and reflecting. The four phases of the classroom action cycle were conducted integrated. Each phase was concluded based on the previous one and the next. In this study, the writer using flashcards to improve the students’ new vocabulary especially on concrete nouns.
The action research consisted of four phases as follows:
Planning was the first step of the research procedure. This activity covered the problem identification. This way the most important step in conducting classroom action research, because to identify the problems and to find out a good solution to solve the problems.
The second step is acting. It is done by the researcher to repair the problem like must she do for the first time, how she organize the class, who want to be collaboration, and who is collecting the data.
Observing is the next step to monitoring or watch closely the teaching learning process and collect the data from the result of the action. Its purpose to know what extent the result of acting reaches the objective. The last step is reflecting. In this step, the researcher evaluated about change of students, teaching process, and teacher.
All of the steps above called one cycle action to solve the problem, if in the first cycle not show a significant removement yet, so the action should continue in the second cycle, and so on until the problem finish.
a) Procedure that might be employed using flash card are:
1. Prepare the flash card that will be showed to students.
2. Show the front side of card that included picture and word in English language to students for 2-4 seconds.
3. Read the English text in appropriate pronounce (the way to read) written in behind of card.
4. Read the meaning of word in Indonesia language to make students understood.
5. Ask the student to repeat what the teacher said.
6. Do these roles play repeatedly until the students be able to pronounce and memorize well.
b) Timeline of the research
1. the researcher ask permission with a head school,
2. make planning that will act in classroom,
3. do the planning, teaching concrete nouns with the aid of flash cards,
4. observing and take note of teaching and learning process,
5. giving assessment to the students
6. make reflection with reveal the data taken from observation, evaluating the result of the assessment, and
7. making the graph of the students’ achievement
6. Technique of Data Analysis
In this research, the researcher using mean formula. Formula is the average of a group score. This formula is to find out the students development in learning new vocabulary. The formula is:
M : the mean
: the sum of scores
N : the number of students
First step, the researcher get value uses conventional method from teacher class, then means of value uses conventional method will be compare with means of value from one cycle. Means of value from one cycle will be compare with means of the next cycle and so on until the last cycle, it is to know how far the progress of students in this research.
G. Outline Of Thesis
In order to comprehend the writer’s mind easily, the thesis is necessary to organize systematically. The thesis is arranged in a certain organization. Basically, the researcher divide it into five chapters.
Chapter one is introduction, consist of background of the study, reasons for choosing the topic, objectives of the study, and limitation of the study. Chapter two is review of related literature about theoretical review and previous research. Chapter three is methods of investigation, consist of setting, participants, instruments, analysis, and research procedures. Chapter four is finding, and the last chapter is conclusion, it is concluded about recommendation for future research.
Advisor I Advisor II
Anis Sundusiyah, S.S. M.Pd. M.A. Drs. Abdul Wahib, M.Ag.
NIP 150327114 NIP 150248884
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