THE EFFECT OF COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE TEACHING (CLT) METHOD ON ENGLISH COMPREHENSION
FOR STUDENTS AT THE FIFTH GRADE OF
SD Kartika x-3
skripsi
The purpose of the study is to fulfill the requirements for the degree
of Sarjana Pendidikan in Edudation
KARTYCA NAYA
NIM : 0621002
Major in Language Education
Faculty of Education
ADVENTIST UNIVERSITY OF INDONESIA
BANDUNG
2009
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study
Everybody has learned mother tongue since childhood. The process occurs naturally and properly in communicating in the society. Communication is a part of human’s daily activities. Through communication, people share ideas and thought with others. In that way, active interaction among people can take place. In line with the more sophisticated world, people are demanded to be able to communicate not only in mother tongue but also in foreign language, especially English. Obviously English is difficult due to limited knowledge in foreign language.
On the other hand as an international language, English is used to communicate information in science and technology. Moreover, English is also very important in education and business world. English has been the first foreign language taught formally in
The indicators of the learning process of these competition standards and basic competency that the students are able to: 1) Show how to do something, 2) Give orders and incquire informations, and 3) Give instructions to do something.
In learning English sometimes the students are bored with certain teaching atmosphere. There are various approaches and methods used in teaching language skills: one of them is Communicative Approach. Communicative Approach assumes that students are able to acquire written or oral language when they are motivated and are not nervous. Communicative language teaching (CLT) is an innovation in English language teaching (ELT). CLT emerged as a new teaching approach in
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) or the “communicative approach” it is an approach to the teaching of second and foreign languages that emphasizes interaction as both the means and the ultimate goal of learning a language. This approach aims to enable students to read and appreciate foreign language. The “communicative method to the teaching of foreign languages” emphasizes learning a language through genuine communication.
By introducing CLT, teachers are able to catch up with the modern development of English teaching methods in the world. They are able to come to the realization that teaching English is not only teaching grammar and mastering of a language involves in communicative competence, but also written. Because CLT aims at communicative competence, students might be more competent in the use of English for communication. A good level of English will help him/her considerably: to enter and graduate from university; to get better jobs, especially for those who work in companies or joint ventures which have international connections; to read technical materials; and to study abroad.
Learning a new language is easier and more enjoyable if it is truly meaningful. The communicative approach is a flexible method rather than a rigorously defined set of teaching practices. It can be defined with a list of general principles.
1.2 Statement of the Problem
The teaching of English through Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) will improve the ability to speak.
Teaching speaking is not easy, moreover if the students do not use English in their daily activities as well. The students will not be brave to speak English without enough knowledge and courage. Besides, there are many aspects that discourage the students to speak. In this case the writer hopes, that the students can improve their ability to master English by learning more and practicing, especially in speaking skill. The appropriate method in teaching English to the students is really important especially for the fifth grade students. So that she takes “THE EFFECT OF COMMUNICATIVE LANGUAGE TEACHING (CLT) METHOD ON ENGLISH COMPREHENSION FOR STUDENTS AT THE FIFTH GRADE” as the title of this paper.
The problem that the writer would like to observe in her study is:
“Is there any significant improvement in the students’ English comprehension through Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) method?”
1.3 Significance of the Study
This study will benefit the English Department in Adventist University of Indonesia-Bandung, since it will discover among various methods and strategies or reading instructions that most effective, efficient, and practical in teaching of speaking.
By assessing the existing methods and strategies, this study will be considered as the gate for future research; since it can open our mind to design new approach to enhancing comprehension skill that will be suitable for local educational system.
1.4 Scope and Delimitation of the Study
The researcher will limit the paper to the teaching of English by using Communicative Approach to the Fifth Grade Students of SD Kartika X-3.
1.5 Hypothesis
This study makes use of the following hypothesis:
H0 = There is no difference between the mean of the pre-test and post test scores.
H1 = There is a difference between the mean of the pre-test and post-test scores.
If Tcounted > TTable = it means that Hypothesis is accepted, and Null hypothesis is rejected.
If Tcounted <>Table = it means that Hypothesis is rejected, and Null hypothesis is accepted.
1.6 Assumptions
In this study, it is assumed that students will be more active in their english class, because they have learned how to get along easily in learning English with Communicative Language Teaching, like Role-Play, Games, Pair work, Information gap, et cetera.
CHAPTER II
REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE STUDIES AND CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
This chapter discusses some related theories. The theories are put forward to underline the study.
2.1 Review of Related Literature Studies
2.1.1 CLT Method
Communication is a process; knowledge of the forms of language is insufficient (Freeman 2000:128). Here, teachers are expected to be able to express and transfer their knowledge through communication to their students.
Communication may be regarded as a combination of acts, a series of elements with purpose and intent. Communication is not merely an event, something that happens; it is functional, purposively, and designed to bring about some effect, some change, however subtle or unobserveable on the environment of hearers and speakers. (Brown 2000:250)
Richards, J. C (1942), said that “Communicative Language Teaching is a broad approach to teaching that resulted from a focus on communication as the organizing principle for teaching rather than a focus on mastery of the grammatical system of the language.”
According to the study of Richards and Rodgers (2001), they said that “Communicative Language Teaching is consider the best as an approach rather than a method. It refers to a diverse set of principles that reflect a communicative view of language and language learning and that can be used to support a wide variety of classroom procedures.”
According to Freeman (2000), “Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) aims broadly to apply the theoretical perspective of the Communicative Approach by making communicative competence the goal of language teaching and by acknowledging the interpendence of language and communication.”
According to Savignon as quoted by Brown (2000:246), noted that “communicative competence is relative, not absolute, and depends on the cooperation of all the participants involved.”
Richards and Rodgers (2001:159) wrote The Communicative Approach in language teaching starts from a theory of language as communication. This statement also supported the goal of language teaching by Hymes(1971), that he coined this term in order to contrast a communicative view of language, and Hymes supported also with his theory of communicative competence was a definition of what a speaker needs to know in order to be communicatively competent in a speech community.
According to Richards and Rodgers that they cited from Henry Widdowson’s book, Teaching language as Communication (1978). There, Widdowson presented a view of the relationship between linguistic systems and their communicative values in text and discourse.
According to Richards and Rodgers (2001) there are several of the characteristics of this communicative view of language as follow:
1. Language is a system for the expression of meaning.
2. The primary function of language is to allow interaction and communication.
3. The structure of language reflects its functional and communicative uses.
4. The primary unit of language are not merely its grammatical and structural features, but categories of functional and communicative meaning as exemplified in discourse.
Furthermore, Richards and Rodgers (2001) also quoted Johnson (1984) and Littlewood (1984) consider an alternative learning theory that they also see as compatible with CLT, there is a skill learning model of learning. According to their theory, the acquisition of communicative competence in a language is an example of skill development.
Stemming from the socio-cognitive perspective of the socio-linguistic theory, with an emphasis on meaning and communication, and a goal to develop learners’ “communicative competence”, Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) approach evolves as a prominent language teaching method and gradually replaced the previous grammar-translation method and audio-lingual method (Warschauer & Kern, 2000). Since the concept of “communicative competence” was first introduced by Hymes in the mid-1960s, many researchers have helped develop theories and practices of Communicative Language Teaching approach (Brown, 1987; Canale, 1983; Hymes, 1971; Littlewood, 1981; Nattinger, 1984; Nunan, 1987 and 1989; Richards and Rodgers, 1986; Widdowson, 1990).
Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and Applied Linguistics defines the Communicative Approach or Communicative Language Teaching as “an APPROACH to foreign or second language teaching which emphasizes that the goal of language learning is COMMUNICATIVE COMPETENCE.” (Richards et al 1992:65)
According to the same dictionary, the approach which has been developed by British applied linguists as a reaction away from grammar-based approaches stated that:
1. It teaches the language needed to express and understand different kinds of functions
2. It is based on a NOTIONAL SYLLABUS or some other communicatively organized syllabus
3. It emphasizes the process of communication, such as using language appropriately in different types of situations; using language to perform different kinds of tasks, e.g. to solve puzzles, to get information , etc.; using language for social interaction with other people.
The CLT method owes its origins to linguists like Dell Hymes and Michael Halliday who regarded language primarily as a way of communication. Their method became popular because of the criticism leveled at earlier language teaching methods by Noam Chomsky who criticized providing languages learners with discrete grammatical rules and forcing them to memorize the rules. The purpose of the CLT method is to provide the learner with unrestrained access to the social, cultural, and pragmatic aspects of language.
The purpose of the CLT method is to provide the learner with unrestrained access to the social, cultural, and pragmatic aspects of language. Assimilating real-life situations and integrating them in the classroom is the method’s primary object. With the CLT method, communication is emphasized as the means of reaching competency. The CLT method does not focus on the teaching of grammar, syntax, or other linguistic ‘rules’ but seeks to assist the student in creating meaning in verbal communication and in understanding the basic ideas that other speakers attempt to relate. It does not, however, put restrictions on the explanation of grammar and other linguistic structures and assumes that the teacher can explain these issues whenever they appear in a particular situation.
Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) is an approach to the teaching of second and foreign languages that emphasizes interaction as both the means and the ultimate goal of learning a language. It is also referred to as “communicative approach to the teaching of foreign languages” or simply the “Communicative Approach”.
CLT originated from many places, but initially appeared in Europe in the 1970s (Galloway, 1993), and CLT has mushroomed worldwide over the last twenty years. However, CLT has no monolithic identity and has been implemented by many different instructors in different ways (Li, 1998).
Myong-Sook (1995) also reported that CLT does not focus on grammar and only on teaching speaking. Another misconception of CLT reported by Medgyes (1986) was that it places greater demands on the teacher than other traditional widely-used approaches. Moreover, Li (1998) reported that all teachers who attended in-service teaching training in South Korea considered that the major constraint of implementing CLT is their own deficiency of spoken English.
In the application of the communicative language teaching (CLT) method in the classroom, there are still several misconceptions about what it involves (Thompson, 1996). Since the main goal of CLT is communicative competence and its emphasis is on communication, several theorists and teachers state that CLT does not involve teaching grammar at all. These ideas have been argued by Thompson (1996) who claims that learners will learn better if they themselves are involved in what they learn and see the relevancy in their learning. In other words, the method has moved from ‘teacher covering grammar to the learners discovering grammar’ (p.11). I fully agree with Thompson’s opinion because from my personal observation, teaching grammar explicitly to and out of context to the students will be a useless effort. It is because the students will not be able to relate the form that they learn in the class with the real situation they face outside the classroom. The other misconception is CLT only teaches speaking skills. As CLT emphasizes communication skill, it seems that CLT ignores the other three important skills in language learning which are listening, reading and writing. Again, Thompson (1996) point out that communication does not only take place through speech, but it also involves both writing and reading. Thompson’s view is a concrete statement because when we write, we are actually communicating with our reader and when we read, we are having communication with the text as well as the writer of that particular text. That is why when we read, we can argue with what the author writes in the paper. The third misconception about CLT is the narrow scope of using other techniques besides pair work which means role play in most of the activities conducted in the classroom. Thompson (1996) once again, opposes the view by stating that we should look at pair work from another angle such as it can actually work as ‘a preliminary stage to any contribution from the learners’ (p.13). The last misconception about CLT is the demand on the teacher is practically greater. It means that the non-native teachers should have a high degree of proficiency in the target language since the lesson in the classroom tends to be less predictable. In my point of view, this is not a misconception about CLT, instead a challenge to the non-native teachers to re-evaluate and re-develop their skills in the target language. He concludes that these misconceptions could arise from teachers who do not wish to change their old way of teaching (Thompson, 1996).
2.1.2 Role-Play Techniques
Role Play is classroom activities in which students take the roles of different participants in a situation and act it out what might typically happen in that situation (Richard 1992:318). Here, the students are expected to be able to express their argument, idea, and even self-existence through certain roles in which the speaking skill is explored. The teachers however should consider some points in designing the activities, because not all students feel easy to speak or even to pretend to be someone else.
Freeman (2000) said that, “Role plays are very important in CLT because they give students an opportunity to practice communicating in different social contexts and in different social roles.”
Referring to what Freeman (2000) states that role plays structured like this also provide information gaps since students cannot be sure what the other person or people will say. Students also receive feedback on whether or not they have effectively communicated.
According to the study of Tompkins (1998:1), role-play is an extreme method that can encourage thinking and creativity. It means that the students are expected to develop and practice new language behavior skill by themselves, while in other side; teachers are merely needed to supply the materials which are completed with clear information and directions, so that the role of the teachers is only to control the students’ works. The statements are also supported by what Dougill (1987:17) says in his book as being stated follow:
“Role-taking (role-playing) is also flexible in its application in education that it will work for all personalities and under all teaching circumstances. The main benefit of role-play is that it enables a flow of language to be produced that might be otherwise difficult or impossible to create.” (Dougill, (1987:17))
Furthermore, Tompkins also quotes Livingstone’s ideas (1983) that says role-play can also help recreate the language used in different situation, the sort of language students are likely to need outside the classroom, and by simulating reality, role-play allow students to prepare and practice for possible future situations. Thus far, in role-playing the most important things is students’ improvisation as it can make the used to create new language that have already acquired. The idea is also supported by what Sadtono (1987:89) says in his book, “In role-playing, students are required to make some improvisation based on certain situations.”
2.1.3 Pair work
Pair work is learners working together in pairs. One of the main motivations to encourage pair work in the English language classroom is to increase the opportunities learners to use English in the class. For example, the learners are answering comprehension questions in pairs after reading a text. This allows them to compare answers, and clarify problems together using English.
‘Pair work’ is a classroom activity in which the whole class is divided into pairs. (It is really a type of group work, using 'groups' of two.) Because the point of pair work is to get students speaking and listening, the content of a pair work session should be mainly oral. (For some types of pair work, it is best if students have no books, papers, or pencils.) It is difficult to give instructions once a pair-work session is underway, so the activity should be well planned and carefully explained. Otherwise it is likely to be unproductive. The idea of pair work is to improve listening and speaking skills by requiring students to exchange information with each other. Pair work should always be accompanied by some sort of ‘test’ to ascertain whether or not information really has been exchanged. In some kinds of pair work, split dictations for example, the test is built in to the activity itself. In other cases, it will be a follow-up activity of some sort.
The unique advantage of pair work: Like classroom work with larger groups, pair work has two important advantages: it offers intensive, realistic practice in speaking and listening; and it promotes a friendly classroom ambiance that is conducive to learning. But beyond that, pair work has another important advantage that activities done with larger groups do not have. Pair work is a way — the only way, I believe — of getting everyone in a classroom speaking and listening at the same time. In other words, it is an efficient, productive way of spending precious classroom time. If a teacher were to spend, say, three minutes talking individually to each student in a class of, say, twenty students, the whole procedure would take an hour. Working in pairs, those twenty students can get the same amount of practice in three minutes.
The difficulties of pair work: There's a price to pay for the productivity gain offered by pair work, however. It presents several difficulties and it's important to be prepared for them and to know how to alleviate them.
(1) High noise level:
If pair work is successful, it's noisy. I don‘t think there’s any way of avoiding this problem in a classroom — except perhaps in the unusual situation of a room that is much too large for the class it contains. Of course, students can be asked to speak quietly, but pushing this may have an inhibiting effect. In a normally crowded classroom equipped with easily movable desks or tables, the problem can be alleviated by keeping as much distance as possible between the pairs. The best ‘solution,’ however is simply to keep pair-work sessions short — twenty minutes is probably a reasonable maximum. A high level of noise can be tolerated for approximately that amount of time. If the session lasts longer, the noise will become distracting and annoying.
(2) Furniture
The best furniture for an ESL classroom is small, light tables, and simple, light chairs; these can easily be rearranged for pair work. But, of course, many classrooms are not ideally furnished for ESL work. Large tables are difficult to move and to arrange but if they are accompanied by light, movable chairs, they can often be left in place and chairs placed opposite each other on both sides. Fixed tables or fixed desks, particularly those with attached seats discourage pair work but they do not make it impossible. Something that works fairly well can always be figured out.
(3) Partners with no information to offer
Since information exchange is essential to pair work, if one student in a group has no information to exchange, the activity will fail. When pair work is preceded by an ‘information-acquiring activity’ — as in the paired stories activity for example — this problem can be largely eliminated by making sure that everyone understands their material well. And of course it is also important to make sure that the information and the method of conveying it are appropriate for the students’ level.
The best way to alleviate this difficulty is by ‘rotation’ — having students change partners — once, twice, or more — during the activity. Doing this means that each of the conversations will have to be kept quite short in order to keep the whole activity within the twenty-minute time span, but that, it is to be hoped, will bring a healthy intensity to the conversations. Rotation also requires a good deal of shifting from one place to another and that may cause some complaints during the first pair-work sessions. These complaints will quickly be forgotten, however, as students get used to doing pair work.
Work with larger groups presents the same difficulties that pair work does but not to the same degree: the noise level will be lower because fewer students will be speaking at the same time; furniture is less likely to be an obstacle because less moving is required and large tables work well; and the success of the activity will not be jeopardized because one student can’t participate fully.
2.1.4 Information gap
An information gap activity is an activity where learners are missing the information they need to complete a task and need to talk to each other to find it.
Example: Learner A has a biography of a famous person with all the place names missing, whilst Learner B has the same text with all the dates missing. Together they can complete the text by asking each other question.
During the communication some knowledge exchange should take place. Asking to someone who knows what today is “What is today?”, and getting his response is not a true communication. Besides, Scrivener states that we normally communicate when one of us has information (facts, opinions, ideas, etc.) that another does not have. This is known as an “information gap” (1994:62)
Info-gap decision theory is a non-probabilistic decision theory that seeks to optimize robustness to failure – or opportune ness for windfall – under severe uncertainty, in particular applying sensitivity analysis to modeling assumptions. It has some connections with minimax; some authors distinguish them, others consider them instances of the same principle.
It has been developed since the 1980s by Yakov Ben-Haim, and has found many applications. It is described as a theory for decision-making under "severe uncertainty", but has been criticized as unsuited for this purpose, and alternatives proposed, including such classical approaches as robust optimization.
In Information Gap activities, each student has information that the other student(s) don't have. The objective is for students to ask questions to find out what they can from the other(s).
2.2 Conceptual Framework
The participants will be given the pre-test by the researcher and the researcher will check the result of the pre-test. The researcher will give Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) method to the participants. After the treatment is finish the participants will be given the post-test to see whether there is an improvement of participants’ knowledge in English learning.
2.3 Definition of Term
To avoid unnecessary misunderstanding, some terms are clarified as follows:
o Teacher = The researcher
CHAPTER III
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
This chapter describes the research methods and procedures in the study. In this study is descriptive method in used.
3.1 Research Schedule
The research will be conducted in the first semester of the school year 2009-2010 at SD Kartika X-3. It will begin since participants will be required to following standardize the speaking skill there, as a pre-test on November 9th, 2009 prior to the research program and will end with post-test which will be held on December 18th, 2009.
3.2 Research Design
This research will use quantitative method, the method will be applied to analyze, and to classify. The group for both pre-test and post-test is the same.
O1 X O2
O1 = Pretest
X = Treatment
O2 = Post test
3.3 Samples
In this study, the writer will take the students of SD Kartika X-3 as population. The samples would be the fifth grade students, there are 38 students. Their age range from 10 to 11 years old and there were 13 boys and 3 girls. They have 3 hours of English classes in a week. They are multi-culture and different social economic status. Some of them are Bataknese, Chinese, Sundanese, et cetera. And they have different religion also, they are Adventist and Moslem.
3.4 Instruments of the Research
The instrument used in this research are the pre-test and the post-test. The test is objective tests in the term of multiple choice, essays, puzzle words and matching items.
Communicative language activities will be use in this research to stimulate for their comprehension samples of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) through Information gaps, Games, Pair work, et cetera.
3.5 Data Gathering
In gathering the data the researcher used the following procedures:
1. Prepatory phase is the preparation that will be done before the researcher begin the research.
a. Construction of all instruments needed
· Questionnaire
b. Pilot test or try out of instruments to other groups of students not from intended participants in the study to test the clarity of the instructions and to observe the behavior of the participants.
c. Polishing the instrument
2. Actual research
a. Identification of participants/subjects.
b. Setting up of Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) task.
· Questionnaire will be distributed
· Instruction will be given and the participants will have a few minutes to read the direction and to scan the questions to be answered. They wil be given time to ask questions regarding unclear instructions, if any.
The writer gives the students pre-test to find out students’ skill without teaching and learning activities. She will give the post-test to the students to find out their ability of speaking after teaching and learning activities.
3.6 Data Analysis Procedures
The writer will give the students pre-test to find out student’s skill of speaking with teaching and learning activities. She will give post-test to the students to find out their ability of speaking after teaching and learning activities.
The data will be gathered from the experiment which she analyze using the ttest. The steps of the data analysis process are as follows: Find out the mean (M) of each group. According to Burns (1995:33) that for the most common measure of central tendency in educational research is the arithmetic mean, the mean (M) is simply the sum of all the scores (
) divided by the number of scores (n), or
(Burns, 1995:33)
Where:
M is the means of a sample
is the total amount of all the individual observation
n is the samples
Find out standard deviation (SD) of each group. According to Burns (1995:39) that standard deviation reflects the amount of spread that the scores exhibit around some central tendency measure, usually the mean. The standard deviation is device from the variance. The formula for obtaining the standard deviation is:
Finding differences Mean:
Finding standard Deviation from differences mean:
Finding the t-counted
Finding the t-table distribution
= Mean of pretest
= Means of post test
S1 = Standard deviation pretest
S2 = Standard deviation post test
n = Sum of respondent
Conclusion:
If 
, it means null hypothesis is rejected
If 
, it means null hypothesis is accepted
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