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CHAPTER II
REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
This chapter deals with literatures related to the research. The first explains
English Language Teaching (ELT) which covers the meaning of language
learning, the meaning of language teaching, the effectiveness of language learning
and teaching, and approaches in ELT. The second is reading comprehension. It
explains the nature of reading, the purpose of reading, and kinds of reading
strategies. The third is Styles and Strategies Based Instruction (SSBI). The fourth
is the rationale of how Styles and Strategies Based Instruction can improve
students’ reading competence. Last but not least is action hypothesis.
A. Theoretical Description
1. English Language Teaching
a. The Meaning of Language Learning
Richard (2001: 22) says that learning refers to formal study of
language rules and is a conscious process. It means that someone who
learns (acquires) language by intention under experts’ guidance in
mastering the language. When someone is taking a language class as his
major, he learns language. He deals with language learning. The focus
role in language learning is the learners.
Learning responses are with two questions. They are what the
psycholinguistic and cognitive processes involved in language learning
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are and what conditions that need to be met in order for these learning
processes to be activated are. Psycholinguistic and cognitive processes
are those within the individuals. How they think and act the language
they learnt. The condition is something outside the individuals. The
dimension of both psycholinguistic (and cognitive) and the condition
might be different but can not be separated in promoting language
learning. Strong individuals’ psycholinguistic and cognitive combined
with supporting condition will promote good learning.
Learning theories associated with a method at the level of
approach may emphasize either one or both dimensions. Process-oriented
theories build on learning processes, such as habit formation, induction,
inferencing, hypothesis testing, and generalization. In other words it is
more on something within the learners. Condition-oriented theories
emphasize the nature of the human and physical context in which
language learning takes place. Condition-oriented relates to something
outside the learners. In conclusion, language learning is the activity of
acquiring language by intention which deals with both something within
the learners (psycholinguistic and cognitive process) and something
outside the learners (the condition).
b. The Meaning of Language Teaching
According to Stern (1996: 21) language teaching can be defined
as the activities which are intended to bring about language learning. It
18
was in nineteenth century that language teaching dealt with Grammar-
translation method. According to its exponent, Richard (2001:5) states
that language teaching under grammar-translation method is teaching
circumstances where: (1) the goal of foreign language study is to learn
language in order to read its literature, (2) reading and writing are the
major focus, (3) vocabulary selection is based on texts used, dictionary
study and memorization, (4) the sentence is the basic unit of teaching and
language practice, (5) accuracy is emphasized, (6) grammar is taught
deductively, (7) student’s native language is the medium of instruction. It
is clear that language teaching under grammar-translation method
concerns more on language theory rather than language performance in
real-life use. The correctness of grammar is important since accuracy is
emphasized. It deals with something within the language rather than
something outside the language.
c. The Characteristics of Effective Learning and Teaching
To some educational theorist, the process of teaching and
learning is a science that should be underpinned by research and
experimentation. To others, it is an art that involves a constant exchange
between knowledge and action. Although some people may be natural
teachers., it is generally agreed that effective teaching is a learned rather
than an innate ability. Regardless of whether teaching is viewed as
science or art, learned or innate, a number of universal concepts and
19
principles have emerged through educational research that can be
observed and applied in real-lifesettings. This section describes concepts
and principles that are most relevant for educating healthcare providers
(World Health Organization and JHPIEGO, 2005: 1-7)
Teaching can be defined as the concious manipulation of the
students’ environment in a way that allows their activities to contribute to
their development as people and clinicians. Learning can be defined as a
change in behavior, perceptions, insights, attitudes, or any combination
of these that can be repeated when the need is aroused. Learning takes
place in each person’s head. People learn for themselves.; no one can do
it for them. Good teaching supports learning. Even though formal
teaching is not required for learning to take place, learning is clearly the
expected goal of teaching.
Effective teaching considers how students learn best. For
example, some students learn better through listening, others by reading,
and still others by viewing and doing something at the same time.
Students can be more effective learners if they are aware of their
preferred learning style. Although it is impossible to accomodate the
individual learning styles of an entire group of students, it is feasible to
engage students in a variety of learning activites: to listen, look at visual
aids, ask questions, stimulate situations, read, write, practice with
equipment, and discuss critical issues.
20
Teachers need to give students good reasons for learning, help
them define what they need to learn, help them organize and make sense
of what they should learn, ensure that students participate and are
involved, make the learning environment interesting and pleasant, give
students plenty of practice, and let them know how they are progressing.
d. Approaches and Method in ELT
Harmer (2004: 79-92) discussed English Language Teaching
methodology into several approaches and methodology, these are:
1) Audio-Lingualism
Audio lingual methodology owed its existence to the
Behaviourist models of learning. Using the Stimulus-Response-
reinforcement model, it attempted, through a continuous process of
such positive reinforcement, to engender good habits in language
learners. Audio-lingualism relied heavily on drills to form these
habits; substitution was built into these drills so that, in small steps,
the students was constantly learning and moreover, was shielded from
the possibility of making mistakes by the design of the drill.
The following example shows a typical Audio-Lingual drill:
Teacher : There’s a cup on the table ... repeatStudents : There’s a cup on the tableTeacher : SpoonStudents : There’s a spoon on the tableTeacher : BookStudents : There’s a book on the tableTeacher : On the chair
21
Students : There’s a book on the chair
This kind of patterned drilling has some drawbacks quite apart
from whether or not it can be shown to lead to grammatical and/or
lexical mastery of the structures being focused on. In the first place
the language is de-contextualised and carries little communicative
function. Second, by doing its best to banish mistakes, so that students
only use correct language, such teaching runs counter to a belief
among many theorist that making (and learning) from errors is a key
part of the process of acquisition. Indeed Audio-lingual methodology
seems to banish all forms of language processing that help students
sort out new language information in their own minds.
2) Presentation, Practice, and Production (PPP)
A variation on Audio-lingualism in British-based teaching and
elsewhere is the procedure most often referred to as PPP, which stands
for Presentation, Practice, and Production. In this procedure the
teacher introduces a situation which contextualises the language to be
taught. The language, too, is the presented. The students now practise
the language using accurate reproduction techiques such as choral
repetition (where the students repeat a word, phrase, or sentence all
together with the teacher “conducting”), individual repetition (where
individual students repeat a word, phrase, or sentence at the teacher’s
arguing), and cue-response drills (where the teacher gives a cue such
22
as cinema, nominates a student by name or by looking or pointing, and
the student makes the desired response, e.g. would you like to come to
the cinema). These have similiarities in the classic kind of Audio-
lingual drill we saw above, but because they are contextualised by the
situation that has been presented, they carry more meaning than a
simple substitution drill. Later the students, using the new language,
make sentences of their own, and this is referred to as production.
3) PPP and Alternatives to PPP
The PPP procedure came under a sustained attack in the 1990s.
It was, critics argued, clearly teacher-centered and therefore sat
uneasily in a more humanistic and learner-centered framework. It also
seems to assume that assume that students learn in straight lines that
is, starting from no knowledge, through highly restricted sentence-
based utterances and on to immediate production. Yet human learning
probably is not like that; it is more random, more convoluted. And by
breaking language down into small pieces to learn them, it may be
cheating the students a language.
4) The Communicative Approach
The Communicative Approach or Communicative Language
Teaching (CLT) is the name which was given to a set of beliefs which
included not only a reexamination of what aspects of language to
teach, but also a shift in emphasis in how to teach. The “what to
23
teach” aspect of the Communicative Approach stressed the
significance of language functions rather than focusing solely on
grammar and vocabulary. A guiding principle was to train students to
use these language forms appropriately in a variety of contexts and for
a variety of purposes.
The “how to teach aspect” of the Communicative Approach is
closely related to the idea that “language learning will take care of
itself” and that plentiful exposure to language in use and plenty of
opportunities to use it are vitally important for a student’s
development of knowledge and skill. Activities in CLT typically
involve students in real or realistic communication, where the
accuracy of the language they use is less important than succesfull
achievement of the communicative task they are performing.
5) Task-Based Learning
The idea of Task-Based Learning (TBL) was greatly
popularised by N Prabhu who working with schools in Bangalore
Southern India, speculated that students were just as likely to learn
language if they were thinking about a non-linguistic problem as when
they were concentrating on particular language forms. Instead of a
language structure, in other words, students are presented with a task
they have to perform or a problem they have to solve. For example,
after a class performs some pre-task activities which involve questions
24
and vocabulary checking (e.g. What is this? It’s a timetable. What
does “arrival” mean?), they task and answer questions to solve a
problem such as finding train-timetable information, e.g. When does
the Brindavan express leave Madras/arrive in Bangalore? Prabhu
(1987: 32 in Harmer 2004: 86). Although the present simple may
frequently be used in such an activity, the focus of the lesson is the
task, not the structure.
6) Four Methods
Four methods, developed in the 1970s and 1980s , have had a
considerable impact upon language teaching even if they are rarely
used exclusively in “mainstream” teaching.
a) Community Language Learning
In the classic for of Community Language Learning (CLL)
students sit in a circle. It is up to them to decide what they want to
talk about. A counsellor or a “knower” stands outside the circle.
The knower provides or corrects target language statements so that
if, for instance, a student says something in their own language, the
knower can then give them the English equivalent for them to use.
Student says what he or she wants to say either in English
or in his or her first language. In the latter case the knower
translates it into English, in effect “teaching” the student how to
make the utterance. The students can now say what he or she wants
25
to the circle. Later, when students are more confident with the
language, they can be put in lines facing each other for pairwork
discussion.
b) The Silent Way
One of the most notable features of the Silent Way is the
behaviour of the teacher who, rather than entering into conversation
with the students, says as little as possible. This is because the
founder of the method, Caleb Cattegno, belived that learning is best
facilitated if the learner discovers and creates language rather than
just remembering and repeating what has been taught. The learner
should be in the driving seat, in other words, not the teacher.
In the Silent Way learners interact with physical objects too,
especially Cuisenaire Rods. There is a problem solving element
involved too, since students have to resolve language construction
problems for themselves. In a classic Silent Way procedure, a
teacher models sounds while pointing to a phonemic chart-or to an
arrangement of Cuisenaire Rods. A student imitates the teacher and
the teacher indicates (silently) if he or she is incorrect. If not,
another student is prompted to help the first student. A third or
fourth student is prompted if necessary until a correct version of
phoneme is produced. The class continues with the teacher ponting
to different phonemes while the students work out what they are-
26
and then how to combine them. Later, students can point to
elements on the chart or arrange the Cuisenaire Rods in such a way
that they have provided a stimulus for the language in the same
way as the teacher did. They and their colleagues have to work out
what the correct language is.
Through all this procedure the teacher indicates by gesture
or expression what the students should do and whether or not they
are correct. Examples and corrections are only given verbally if not
student can do it first time round. Thus it is up to the students-under
the controlling but indirect influence of the teacher-to solve
problems and learn the language.
c) Suggestopedia
It is developed by Georgi Lozanov, Suggestopedia sees the
physical surroundings and atmosphere of the classroom as of vital
importance. By ensuring that the students are comfortable,
confident and relaxed, the affective filter is lowered, thus
enhancing learning. A feature of Suggestopedia is referred to as
“inflantilisation”; that is the teacher and students exist in a parent-
children relationship where, to remove barriers to learning, students
are given different names from their outside real ones. Traumatic
themes are avoided, and the sympathy with which the teacher treats
the students is vitally important.
27
A suggestopaedic lesson has three main parts. There is an
oral review section in which previously learnt material is used for
discussion. This is followed by the presentation and discussion of
new dialogue material and its native language equivalent. Finally in
the concert session, students listen to relaxing music (slow
movements from the Baroque period at about sixty beats per
minute are preferred) while the teacher reads the new dialogue
material in a way which synchronises with the taped music. During
this phase there are also several minutes of solemn silence and the
students leave the room silently.
d) Total Physical Response
The originator of TPR, James Asher, worked from the
premise that adult second language learning could have similiar
developmental patterns to that of child language acquisition. If
children learn much of their language from speech directed at them
in the form of commands to preform actions, then adults will learn
best in that way too. Aaccordingly, TPR ask students to respond
physically to the language they hear. Language processing is thus
matched with physical action.
Like many other methodology devisers, Asher sees the need
to lower the affective filter and finds that organising physical
actions in the classroom helps to do this. A typical TPR class might
28
involve the teacher telling students to pick up the triangle from the
table and give it tome or walk quickly to the door and hit it (Asher,
1977:54-56 in Harmer, 2004:90). When the students can all
respond to commands correctly , one of them can then start giving
instructions to other classmates.
7) Humanistic Teaching
Humanistic teaching has a greater acceptance at the level of
procedures and activities in which students are encouraged to make
use of thier own lives and feelings in the classroom. Such exercises
have a long history and owe much to a work from the 1970s called
Caring and Sharing in the Foreign Language Classroom by Gertrude
Moscowitz in which many activites are designed to make students feel
good and remember happy times whilst at the same time practising
grammar items. Students might be asked to make sentences with was
and were about their favourite things, for example When I was a child
my favourite food was hamburgers or When I was a child my favourite
relative was my uncle.
A more recent example of the same kind of thinking is the
following “choosing the passive” activity. Students are asked to read
paired active and passive sentences and to underline the sentence from
each pair which best fits their personal story. They can change words
too (e.g. from loved and ignored) if they want.
29
PASSIVE AND ACTIVE LIST
I was born I pushed out of my mother’s wombI was taught to yawn I gave my first yawnI was shown how to crawl I crawled all over thhe floorI was loved by my Dad I loved my Dad
Students then explain their choices to each other and, later,
write their own passive and active sentences. By the end of the
activity they will have said a lot about themselves, reflected on thier
lives, and will have come to understand a lot about the relationship
between active and passive verb forms.
8) Lexical Approach
The Lexical approach is based on the assertion that language
consists not of traditional grammar and vocabulary but often of multi-
word prefabricated chunks (Lewis 1997:3 in Harmer 2004:91). Lewis
proposes that fluency is the result of the acquisition of a large store of
fixed and semi-fixed prefabricated items which are available as the
foundation for any linguistic novelty or creativity.
This highlighting of an area of language that was, perhaps,
previously undervalued has played a valuable role in provoking debate
about what students should study. A lexical approach would steer us
away from an over-concentration on syntax and tense usage (with
vocabulary slotted into these grammar patterns) towards the teaching
of phrase which show words in combination, and which are generative
30
in a different way from traditional grammar substitution tables. Thus,
instead of teaching will for the future, we might instead have students
focus on its use in a series of “archetypical utterances” such as I’ll
give you a ring, I’ll be in touch, I’ll see what I can do, I’ll be back in a
minute, etc.
2. Reading
Reading is the on-going understanding of what is read while
reading. It is the ability to transform written text into meaningful
understanding. It requires the reader to be able to read the words, know the
vocabulary, be relatively fluent, and understand the language structure
underlying the text. In addtition, a reader must be able to relate the current
text being read to the previous text in order to develop a clear
understanding of the entire passage. This requires on-going monitoring of
one’s ability to “build the story” or comprehend as the text is read.
A good way to understand reading is to consider what is required
for fluent reading. Fluent readers, especially good L1 readers, typically do
all of the following: (1) Reading rapidly for comprehension (2)
Recognizing words rapidly and automatically (3) Drawing on a very large
vocabulary store (4) Integrating text information with their own
knowledge (5) Recognizing the purpose for reading (6) Comprehending
the text as necessary (7) Shifting purpose to read stategically (8) Using
31
strategies to monitor comprehension (9) Recognizing and repair
miscomprehension (10) Reading critically and evaluate information
(Grabe&Stoller, 2001:188).
1. The Nature of Reading
Reading consists of making out the meaning of written
language. An analysis of reading must embody an analysis of writing.
1) Reading is Visual
Reading is carried out through the sense of sight, which
carries some limitations but many advantages. Effective reading
requires the training of the muscles of the eye to perform a number
of tasks: to change focus as necessary; to seek a brief, large scale,
general view of the text; to find a starting-point; to change focus and
scale so as to identify the language at the starting-point; and then to
follow along the text altering direction as needed, and proceeding at
a speed which meets the understanding rate of the learner’s brain.
2) Reading is Organised and Systematic
Written language possesses beginnings and endings (if this
seems trivial, consider a text in an unfamiliar language with a very
different writing system; where does the text begin? In which
direction should the eye travel? Where is the end?) it contains many
internal breaks and divisions-spaces between letters or characters;
bigger spaces between words; bigger ones still between sentences;
32
spaces between lines; paragraph divisions; chapter divisions; the
conventions of punctuation; etc. It selects, separately for each
language, a set of visual symbols-letters or characters, together with
diacritics, upper case/lower case distinctions, different styles of
representation of the same shape (roman, italic, gothic, printed or
handwritten, etc.) and it arranges these symbols in sequences or
strings of varying length. The strings are always arranged in a linear
sequence, at the lines may be either horizontal or vertical, and if
horizontal they may run either from left to right as in English or right
to left as in Arabic. Sometimes the symbols may be arranged on the
page in a way which evokes artistic or aesthetic meaning, as in
poetry, or as in the ‘Mouse’s Tale’ in Alice in Wonderland. The
reader has to learn to be familiar with all these conventions of shape,
sequence, arrangement, and visual effect.
3) Reading is Arbitrary and Abstract, but Meaningful
With some rare and partial exceptions (e.g. Egyptian
hieroglyphics; some characters in Chinese) the shapes of the symbols
used in written language are arbitrary-they are unrelated to the real-
life forms of whatever it is they refer to. Letters, words, sentences
and longer streches of text relate to meanings of several kinds, and
these relations are specific to each particular language. At the same
time, written language always embodies visual clues to information,
33
of three kinds: of a grammatical kind, a lexical kind, and a semantic
kind; and in most writing systems the written language is a direct
transform of the spoken language. Writing represents speech, not
vice versa.
4) Related to A Particular Language and Society
Writing is not solely a mechanical process. It has great
social and cultural importance. It can become the embodiment of the
history, achievement, customs, literature, values, beliefs, of a whole
people, because it can build up and fix over a long period the
reflection of a society’s organized thought. However, the
transmission of culture and ideas is only one of the functions which
writing performs: it is to these functions that we should now turn.
2. The Purpose of Reading
When we read, we read for a variety of purposes, we
sometimes read to get the main idea but not much more (e.g.,
skimming a newspaper story), and sometimes we read to locate
specific information (e.g., scanning for a name, date, or term).
Commonly we read texts to learn information and sometimes we are
expected to synthesize information (i.e., reading to learn) from
multiple texts, or from a longer chapter or book, in order to take a
critical position with respet to that information. Perhaps most often,
we read for general comprehension (i.e., reading to understand main
34
ideas and relevant supporting information). We also read for pleasure,
with the intention of being entertained or informed, but not tested.
In academic settings, almost every major purpose for reading
comes into play. Thus, an EAP reading curriculum must account for
how students learn for multiple purposes, including at least the
reading (1) to search for information (2) for general comprehension
(3) to learn new information (4) to synthesize and evaluate
information (Grabe&Stoller, 2001: 187).
3. Reading Skills
Students, like the rest of us, need to be able to do a number of
things with a reading text. They need to be able to scan the text for
particular bits of information they are searching for (as, for example,
when we look for a telephone number, what’s on television at a
certain time or search quickly through an article looking for name or
other detail). This skill means that they do not have to read every word
and line; on the contrary, such an approach wouls stop them scanning
successfully.
Students also need to be able to skim a text-as if they were
casting their eyes over its surface- toget a general idea of what it is
about (as, for example, when we run our eyes over a film review to
see what the film is about and what the reviewer thought about it, or
when we look quickly at a report to get a feel for the topic and what its
35
conclusions are). Just as with scanning, if students try to gather all the
details at this stage, they will get bogged down and may not be able to
identify the general idea because they are concentrating too hard on
specifics. Whether readers scan or skim depends on what kind of text
they are reading and what they want or need to get out of it. They may
scan a computer “Help” window to find the one piece of information
they need to get them out of a difficulty, and they may sim a
newspaper article to pick up a general idea of what’s been happening
in the world.
Reading for detailed comprehension, whether this entails
looking for detailed information or picking out particular examples of
language use, should be seen by students as something very different
from the skills mentioned above. Many students are perfectly capable
of doing all these things in other languages, of course, though some
may not read much at all in their daily lives. For both types of student,
we should do our best to offer a mixture of materials and activities so
that they can practise using these various skills with English text
(Harmer, 2007:100-101).
4. Reading Principles
Harmer (2007:101-102) divided students’ reading principles
into six categories. These are:
36
Principle 1: Encourage students to read as often and as much as
possible
The more students read, the better. Everything we do should
encourage them to read extensively as well as-if not more than-
intensively. It is a good idea to discuss this principle with students
Principle 2: Students need to be engaged with what they are reading
Outside normal lesson time, when students are reading extensively,
they should be involved in joyful reading-that is, we should try to help
them get as much pleasure from it as possible. But during lessons, too,
we will do our best to ensure that they are engaged with the topic of a
reading text and the activities they are asked to do while dealing with
it.
Principle 3: Encourage students to respond to the content of a text
(and explore their feelings about it), not just concentrate on its
construction
Of course, it is important for students to study reading texts in class in
order to find out such things as the way they use language, the number
of paragraphs they contain and how many times they use relative
cluses but hte meaning, the message of the text, is just as important as
this. As a result, we must give students a chance to respond to that
message in some way. It is especially important that they should be
allowed to show their feelings about the topic-thus provoking personal
37
engageent with it and the language. With extensive reading this is
even more important. Reading for pleasure is-and should be-different
from reading for study.
Principle 4: Prediction is a major factor in reading
When we read texts in our own language, we frequently have a good
idea of the content before we actually start reading. Book covers give
us a clue about what is in the book; photographs and headlines hint at
what articles are about; we can identify reports as reports from their
appearance before we read a single word. The moment we get these
clues-the book cover, the headline, the web-page banner-our brain
starts predicting what we are going to read. Expectations are set up
and the active process of reading is ready to begin. In class,
researchers should give students “hints” so that they also have a
chance to predict what is coming. In the case of extensive reading –
when students are choosing what to read for pleasure-we should
encourage them to look at covers and back cover copy to help them
select what to read and then to help them “get into” a book
Principle 5: Match the task to the topic when using intensive reading
texts
Once a decision has been taken about what reading text the students
are going to read (based on their level, the topic of the text and its
linguistic and activation potential), we need to choose good reading
38
tasks,-the right kind of questions, appropriate activities before during
and after reading, and useful study explotation, etc.
The most useful and interesting text can be undermined by boring and
inappropriate tasks; the most commonplace passage can be made
really existing with imaginative and challenging activities, especially
if the level of challenge (1.e. how easy it is for students to complete a
task) is exactly right for the class.
Principle 6: Good researchers exploit reading texts to the full
Any reading text is full of sentences, words, ideas, descriptions, etc. It
doesn’t mae sense, in class, just to get students to read it and then drop
it and move on to something else. Good researchers integrate the
reading text into intersting lesson sequences, using the topic for
discussion and further tasks, using the language for study and then
activation (or, of course, activation and then study) and using a range
of activities to bring the text to life. Where students have been doing
extensive reading, we should use whatever opportunities present
themselves to provoke useful feedback.
5. Reading Strategies
1) Strategies for Reading Comprehension
The following are ten strategies which are proposed by Brown
(2001: 306-311).
39
a) Identifying the purpose in reading
Efficient reading consists of clearly identifying the purpose in
reading something. By doing so, readers know what they are
looking for and can weed out potential distracting information.
b) Using graphemic rules and patterns to aid in bottom-up
decoding (especially for beginning level learners)
At the beginning levels of learning English, one of the
difficulties students encounter in learning to read is making the
correspondences between spoken and written English. In many
cases, learners have become acquainted with oral language and
have some difficulty learning English spelling conventions.
They may need hints and explanations about certain English
orthographic rules and peculiarities. While you can often
assume that one to one grapheme phoneme correspondences
will be acquired with ease, other relationship might prove
difficult. Consider how you might provide hints and pointers
on such patterns as these:
(1) “short” vowel sound in VC patterns (bat, him, leg, wish,
etc)
(2)“long” vowel sound in VCe (final silent e) patterns (late,
time, bite, etc)
(3)“long” vowel sound in VV patterns (seat, coat, etc)
40
(4)Distinguishing “hard” c and g from “soft” c and g (cat vs
city, game vs gem, etc)
These and a multitude of other phonics approaches to reading
can prove useful for learners at the beginning level and
especially useful for teaching children and non literate adults.
c) Using efficient silent reading techniques for relatively rapid
comprehension (for intermediate to advanced levels)
If you are teaching beginning level students, this particular
strategy will not apply because they are still struggling with the
control of a limited vocabulary and grammatical patterns.
Intermediate-to-advanced level students need not be speed
readers, but researcher can help them increase efficiency by
teaching a few silent reading rules:
(1) It doesn’t need to “pronounce” each word
(2)Try to visually perceive more than one word at a time,
preferably phrases
(3)Unless a word is absolutely crucial to global understanding,
skip over it and try to infer its meaning from its context.
Aside from these fundamental guidelines, which if followed
can help learners to be efficient readers; reading speed is
usually not much of an issue for all but the most advanced
learners. Academic reading, for example, is something most
41
learners complete the material. If students can read 250 to 300
words per minute, further concern over speed may not be
necessary.
d) Skimming the text for main ideas
Perhaps the two most valuable reading strategies for learners
(as well as native speakers) are skimming and scanning.
Skimming consists of quickly running one’s eyes across a
whole text (such as an essay, article or chapter) for its gist.
Skimming gives readers an advantage of being able to predict
the purpose of the passage, the main topic or message and
possibly some of the developing or supporting ideas. This
gives them a head start as they embark on more focused
reading.
e) Scanning the text for specific information
The second in the most valuable category is scanning, or
quickly searching for some particular piece or pieces of
information in a text. Scanning exercise may as students to
look for names or dates, to find a definition of a key concept or
to list a certain number of supporting details. The purpose of
scanning is to extract specific information without reading
through the whole text. For academic English, scanning is
absolutely essential. In vocational or general English, scanning
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is important in dealing with genres like schedule, manuals,
forms, etc.
f) Using semantic mapping or clustering
Readers can easily be overwhelmed by a long string of ideas or
events. The strategy of semantic mapping, or grouping ideas
into meaningful clusters, helps the reader to provide some
order to the chaos. Making such semantic maps can be done
individually, but they make for a productive group work
technique as students collectively induced order and hierarchy
to a passage.
g) Guessing when you aren’t certain
This is an extremely broad category. Learners can use guessing
to their advantage to:
(1) Guess the meaning of a word
(2) Guess a grammatical relationship (e.g.,
pronoun reference)
(3) Guess a discourse relationship
(4) Infer implied meaning (“between the lines”)
(5) Guess about a cultural reference
(6) Guess content messages
The key to successful guessing is to make it reasonably
accurate. Researchers can help their students to become
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accurate guessers by encouraging them to use effective
compensation strategies in which they fill gaps in their
competence by intelligent attempts to use whatever clues are
available to them. Language based clues include word analysis,
word association, and textual structure. Nonlinguistic clues
come from context, situation, and other schemata
h) Analyzing vocabulary
One way for learners to make guessing pay off when they
don’t immediately recognize a word is to analyze it in terms of
what they know about it. Several techniques are useful here:
(1) Look for prefixes (co-, inter-, un-, etc) that may give clues
(2) Look for suffixes (-tion, -tive, -ally, etc) that may indicate
what part of speech it is.
(3) Look for roots that are familiar (e.g., interviewing may be a
word a student doesn’t know, but recognizing that the root
ven comes from Latin “to come” would yield the meaning
“to come in between”).
(4) Look for grammatical contexts that may signal information
(5) Look at the semantic context (topic) for clues.
i) Distinguishing between literal and implied meanings
This requires the application of sophisticated top-down
processing skills. The fact that not all language can be
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interpreted appropriate by attending to its literal, syntactic
surface structure makes special demands on readers. Implied
meaning usually has to derive from processing pragmatic
information, as in the following examples:
(1) Bill walked into the frigid classroom and immediately
noticed Bob, sitting by the open window.
“Brrr!” he exclaimed, simultaneously eyeing Bob and the
open windows, “It’s sure cold in here, Bob.”
Bob glanced up from his book and growled, ‘Oh, all right,
I’ll close the window.”
(2) The policeman held up his hand and stopped the car
(3) Mary heard the ice cream man coming down the street. She
remembered her birthday money and rushed into the house.
Each of these excerpts has implied information. The request in
(a) is obvious only if the reader recognizes the nature of many
indirect request in which we ask people to do things without
ever forming a question. We can’t be sure in (b) if the
policeman literally (physically) stopped the car with his hand,
but the assumption is that is a traffic policeman whose hand
signal was obeyed by a driver. Rummelhart’s classic example
in (c) leads the reader, without any other context, to believe
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Mary is going into the house to get money to buy ice cream
until the last few words are supplied:”… and locked the door!”
j) Capitalizing on discourse markers to process relationships
Many discourse markers in English signal relationships among
ideas as expressed through phrases, clauses, and sentences. A
clear comprehension of such markers can greatly enhance
learners’ reading efficiency. Table 2.1 enumerates almost one
hundred of these markers with which learners of intermediate
proficiency levels ought to be thoroughly familiar.
Table 2.1Types of Discourse Markers (Mackay 1987: 254 in Brown 2001:311)
Notional Category/Meaning Marker1. Enumerative. Introduce in order in which points are to be made or the time sequence in which actions or processes took place.
Firstly, secondly, thirdly one two three / a, b, c, next, then, finally, lastly, in the first/second place, for one thing/for another thing, to begin with, subsequently, eventually, finally, in the end, to conclude.
2. Additive2.1 Reinforcing. Introduces a reinforcement or confirmation of what has preceded.2.2 Similarity. Introduces a statement of similarity with what has preceded.2.3 Transition. Introduces a new stage in the sequence of presentation of information.
Again, then again, also, moreover, furthermore, in addition, above all, what is moreEqually, likewise, similarity, correspondingly, in the same way.Now, well, incidentally, by the way, O.K, fine
3. Logical Sequence3.1 Summative. Introduces a summary of what has preceded.
3.2 Resultative. Introduces an
So, so far, altogether, overall, then, thus, therefore, in short, to sum up, to conclude, to summarize.So, as a result, consequently, hence,
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expression of the result or consequence of what preceded (and includes inductive and deductive acts)
now, therefore, thus, as a consequence, in consequence.
4. Explicative. Introduces an explanation or reformulation of what preceded.
Namely, in other words, that is to say, better, rather, by (this) we mean
5. Illustrative. Introduces an illustration or example of what preceded
For example, for instance
6. Contrastive6.1 Replacive. Introduces an alternative to what preceded6.2 Antithetic. Introduces information in opposition to what preceded6.3 Concessive. Introduces information which is unexpected in view of what preceded.
Alternatively, (or) again, (or) rather, (but) then, on the other handConversely, instead, then, on the contrary, by contrast, on the other hand.Anyway, anyhow, however, nevertheless, nonetheless, notwithstanding, still, though, yet, for all that, in spite of (that), at the same time, all the same.
6. Types of Classroom Reading Performance
Variety of reading performance in the language classroom is
derived more from the variety of texts (refer to the list earlier in this
chapter) to which researcher can expose students than from the variety
of overt types of performance.
Figure 2.1 Types of Classroom Reading Performance
Classroom Reading Performance
Oral Silent
Intensive Extensive
Linguistic Content Skimming Scanning Global
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1) Oral and Silent Reading
Occasionally, researcher will have reason to ask student to read
orally. At the beginning and intermediate levels, oral reading can
a) Serve as an evaluative check on bottom up processing skills
b) Double as a pronunciation check, and
c) Serve to add some extra student participation if you want to
highlight a certain short segment of a reading passage.
For advanced levels, usually only advantage (c) can be gained by
reading orally. As a rule of thumb, you want to use oral reading to
serve these three purposes because the disadvantages of too much
oral reading can easily come into play:
a) Oral reading is not a very authentic language activity
b) While one student is reading, others can easily lose
attention (or be silently rehearsing the next paragraph)
c) It may have the outward appearance of student
participation when in really it is mere recitation.
2) Intensive and Extensive Reading
We need to make distinction between extensive and
intensive reading. The term extensive reading refers to reading
which students do often (but not exclusively) away from the
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classroom. They may read novels, web pages, newspapers,
magazines or any other reference material. Where possible,
extensive reading should involve reading for pleasure-what Richard
Day calls joyful reading. This is enhanced if students have a chance
to choose what they want to read, if they are encouraged to read by
the researcher, and if some opportunity is given for them to share
their reading experiences. Although not all students are equally
keen on this kind of reading, we can say with certainty that the ones
who read most progress fastest.
On the other hand, the term intensive reading refers to the
detailed focus on the construction of reading texts which takes
place usually (but not always) in classrooms. Researcher may as
students to look at extracts from magazines. Poems, internet
websites, novels, newspapers, plays and a wide range of other text
genres (that is, styles or types of text). The exact choice of genres
and topics may be determined by the specific purposes that students
are studying (such as business, science or nursing). In such cases,
we may well want to concentrate on texts within their specialities.
But if, as is often the case, they are a mixed group with differing
interests and careers, a more varied diet is apropriate, as the reading
sequnces in this chapter will demonstrate. Intensive reading is
usually accompanied by study activities. We may ask students to
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work out what kind of text they are reading, tease out details of
meaning, look at particular uses of grammar and vocabulary, and
then use the information in the text to move on to other learning
activities. We will also encourage them to reflect on different
reading skills.
7. Principles for designing interactive reading techniques
1) Follow the “SQ3R” sequence
One effective series of procedures for approaching a reading text
has come to be labeled the SQ3R technique, a process consisting of
the following five steps:
a) Survey: Skim the text for an interview of main ideas
b) Question: The reader asks questions about what he or she wishes
to get out of the text
c) Read: Read the text while looking for answers to the previously
formulated questions
d) Recite: Reprocess the salient points of the text through oral or
written language
e) Review: Assess the importance of what one has just read and
incorporate it into long-term associations.
This series of techniques of course may not fit all classes and
contexts, but it serves as a general guide for a reading class.
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2) Subdivide your techniques into pre-reading, during-reading,
and after-reading phases
a) Before you read: spend some time introducing a topic,
encouraging skimming, scanning, predicting, and activating
schemata. Students can bring the best of their knowledge and
skills to a text when they have been given a chance to “ease
into” the passage.
b) While you read: not all reading is simply extensive or global
reading. There may be certain facts or rhetorical devices that
students should take note of while they read. Give students a
sense of purpose for reading rather than just reading because
you ordered it.
c) After you read: comprehension questions are just one from of
activity appropriate for post-reading. Also consider vocabulary
study, identifying the author’s purpose, discussing the author’s
line of reasoning, examining grammatical structures, or
steering students toward a follow up writing exercise.
3) Build in some evaluative aspects to your techniques
Reading is totally unobservable, it is as important in reading to be
able to accurately assess students’ comprehension and development
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of skills. Consider some of the following overt responses that
indicate comprehension:
a) Doing: the reader responds physically to a command
b) Choosing: the reader selects from alternatives posed orally or in
writing
c) Transferring: the reader summarizes orally what is read
d) Answering: the reader answers questions about the passage
e) Condensing: the reader outlines or takes notes on a passage
f) Extending: the reader provides an ending to a story
g) Duplicating: the reader translates the message into the native
language or copies it (beginning level, for very short passages
only)
h) Modeling: the reader puts together a toy, for example, after
reading directions for assembly
i) Conversing: the reader engages in a conversation that indicates
appropriate processing of information.
3. Styles and Strategies Based Instruction (SSBI)
a. What is Styles- and Strategies-Based Instruction?
Styles and Strategies Based Instruction (SSBI) is a learner-
focused approach to language teaching that explicitly combines styles
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and strategy instructional activities with everyday classroom language
instruction (Cohen & Weaver, 2005:5). The underlying premise of the
styles- and strategies-based approach is that students should be given
the opportunity to understand not only what they can learn in the
language classroom, but also how they can learn the language they are
studying more effectively and efficiently.
Traditionally, it was assumed that if L2 researchers did their
jobs well, students would learn and retain the language. It has become
clear, however, that if students are not taking responsibility for their
own language learning or are not motivated to learn, it may not matter
how well the researchers are teaching. With this realization, the
development of SSBI began.
b. The Evolution of Styles- and Strategies-Based Instruction
1960s – Psychology of Learning
In the 1960s there emerged a focus on the learner and on learning to
learn. Educators drew from cognitive theory, based on the information
processing model with two kinds of knowledge; declarative
knowledge; which dealt with the facts; and procedural knowledge,
which focused on the procedures for using declarative knowledge. The
cognitive theory approach was a departure from the behaviorist
stimulus-response approach to learning which had spawned the audio-
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ligual method of having learners practice patterns over until they
learned them. The tendency was now directed toward a more
reasoned, controlled learning of rules and accepting that some rules
were learned or “acquired” automatically.
1970s - Good Language Learner
The 1970s saw the advent of a rather prescriptive approach to
language learner strategies, with the emphasis on what the good
language learner can teach us. The following strategies used by good
language learners:
1) Making an effort to communicate and to learn through
communication
2) Finding strategies for overcoming inhibitions in target language
interaction
3) Making reasoned guesses when not sure
4) Paying attention to meaning
5) Monitoring their speech and that of others
6) Attending to form (i.e., grammar)
7) Practicing the language whenever possible
Decades later, these strategies are still among the most significant for
language learners the world over.
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1980s – Classifications of Strategies and Descriptions of
Learners
The 1980s was marked by effrots to classify strategies. Language
educators like O’malley and Charnot (1990), Oxford (1990) and
others created classification schemes which labeled strategies
according to whether they had a primarily “metacognitive,”
“cognitive,” “social,” “affective” or other function, drawing primarily
on the rich L1 literature about reading strategies.
1990s – Strategies-Based Instruction (SBI)
In the 1990s there was a shift from simply describing and classifiying
strategies to experimenting with different kinds of interventions in the
classroom. The interest was now on whether learners could enhance
their language learning by either using new strategies or by using
familiar ones more effectively. An example of such an intervention
was the University of Minnesota experiment with intermediate
learners of french and Norwegian. It was also during this decade that
summer institutes in strategies-based instruction were started at the
University of Minnesota. Chamot and colleagues initiated strategy
institutes for language researchers through the National Capital
Language resource Center in washington, D.C.
200s – SSBI
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This decade has seen styles and strategies-based instruction become
one entity. Some language educators have long insisted that language
learner stratgeies need to be viewed through the perspective of the
style preferences of the learners. As strategy classification systems
have been sorted out and categories become more fine-tuned, there is
a growing interest in how specific tasks might favor certain learning
style preferences and call for certain language strategies. In other
words, the one-size-fits-all approach is becoming custom fitted.
c. Self-Directed Learning
As language teaching has become more learner-focused and
interactive, there has also been an emphasis on helping students take
more responsibility for meeting their own language learning needs.
Students are asked to self-direct the language learning process and
become less dependent on the classroom researcher. SSBI helps
learners to become more aware of different learning strategies, to
understand how to organize and use strategies systematically and
effectively (given their learning-style preferences), and to learn when
and how to transfer the strategies to new language learning. SSBI has
a series of components that develop the students’ relationship with
learning strategy:
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1) Strategy Preparation
The given learners already have. There is no sense in assuming that
students are a blank slate when it comes to strategy use. They most
likely have developed some strategies, but may not use them
systematically and well. The goal is to find out how much students
know about strategies and if they are able to use them.
2) Strategy Awareness-Raising
SSBI tasks explicitly raise the students’ general awareness about:
a) what the learning process may consist of, b) their learning style
preferences or general approaches to learning, c) the kinds of
strategies that they already use, as well as those suggested by the
researcher or classmates, d) the amount of responsibility that they
take on for their learning, or e) approaches that can be used to
evaluate the students’ strategy use.
3) Strategy Instruction
Students are explicitly taught how, when, and why certain
strategies (whether alone, in sequence, or in clusters) can be used to
facilitate language learning. Researchers describe, model, and give
examples of strategies.
4) Strategy Practice
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Knowing about a given strategy is not enough. Learners must have
the opportunity to try them out on numerous tasks. These activities
are designed to reinforce strategies that have already been
discussed and allow students time to practice the strategies at the
same time they are learning the course content. These activities
should include explicit references to the strategies. Students either:
a) plan the strategies that they will use for a particular activity,
b) have their attention called to the use of particular strategies
while they are being used, or
c) "debrief" their use of strategies (and their relative
effectiveness) after the activity has ended.
5) Personalization of Strategies
Learners evaluate how they are using the strategies and look at
ways they can use of them in other contexts.
In SSBI, it is the curriculum researchers’ and the researchers’ role
to see that strategies are integrated into everyday class materials
and are both explicitly and implicitly embedded into the language
tasks to provide for contextualized strategy practice. Researchers
may:
a) start with the established course materials and then insert
strategies
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b) start with a set of strategies and design activities around them,
c) insert strategies spontaneously into the lessons when
appropriate.
These strategies-based activities are designed to raise awareness
about strategies, to train students in strategy use, to give them
opportunities to practice strategy use, and to encourage them to
personalize these strategies for themselves. Researchers also allow
students to choose their own strategies and do so spontaneously,
without continued prompting from the language researcher.
d. Learning Style Preferences
Why do some students have trouble understanding directions in the
second language while other students get them easily? Why do some
students do well in large groups, while others are at their best when
they can work alone or with a single partner? What can you do to help
each student when there can be such a variety of learners in your
classroom? Those are because of the diversity of students’ learning
styles preferences.
1) What are Learning Style Preferences?
Learning style preferences refer to the way you like to learn.
According to Oxford and Anderson (1995 in Cohen 2005:12) have
five interrelated aspects:
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a) The cognitive aspect includes preferred or habitual patterns of
mental functioning (usually referred to as cognitive styles)
b) The executive aspects is the extent to which learners look for
order, organization, and closure in managing the learning
processes
c) The affective aspect relates to preferred degree of involvment
with other people while learning
d) The psychological element involves what are at least partly
anotomically based sensory and perceptual tendencies of the
learners
e) The behavioral aspect concerns the learners’ tendency to
actively seek situations campatible with their own learning
preferences
There are no positive or negative traits, only preferences, and even
strong preferences can change. Students tend to learn better when
the classroom instructor nurtures their learning style. If researcher
can present language material in a variety of ways, the language
styles of all of students are morelikely to be nurtured. For example,
researcher could teach the present and past perfect tenses in the
target language by having students listen to a tape and then draw a
chart in their notebook of a timeline that describes when to use
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each form of the perfect aspect. In this way, researcher teaches to
both the auditory and visual learners.
2) The Value of Learning Styles
Research suggests that the greater the number of styles students can
use, the more successful they will be at learning language.
Research also shows that we all have learning style preferences and
thus may tend to favor our preferred approaches in our learning.
You can help students by getting them to think about learning in
strategic terms and to expand or stretch their learning approaches.
You can laso accomodate to style differences by prviding
opportunities during class for your students to learn in different
ways. You may already do this, but the idea is to vary the tasks so
as to continually favor one style preference over another.
Consider the perceptual style dimensions:
Visual – relying more on the sense of sight, and learning best
through visual means (either through text-based resources such as
handouts, lists, flashcards, and other verbal sources; or through
spatial information, such as charts, diagrams, pictures, and videos)
Auditory – preferring listening and speaking activities (e.g.,
discussions, debates, audiotapes, role-plays, and lectures); and
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Hands-on – benefiting from doing projects, working with objects,
and moving around. For those who remember words best by seeing
them spelled out, you may want to write new words on the board or
in a handout (when it doesn’t detract from the activity).
So, when it comes to learning new vocabulary, students who learn
visually may benefit from writing the new words in their notebook
or from seeing a still picture or video of the object or action which
involves the new vocabulary in some way. Learners with an
auditory preference may want to hear the words pronounced clearly
several times or to hear themselves pronouncing them. For hands-
on learners, it may help to perform the action to which the new
words refer.
3) Types of Learning Styles
There were three types of students’ learning styles, these are:
(Sensory/Perceptual, Psychological/Personality Type, and
Cognitive) which give an overview of the characteristics of each
learning style and ways to facilitate learning for each type. But, this
Classroom Action Research only choose one of types of learning
styles related to students’ sensory or perceptual which is divided
into three different characteristics of learners. These were as
follow:
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Table 2.2Sensory /Perceptual Learning Style
Sensory /Perceptual
Characteristics of Learners
Support Researchers Can Provide
Visual Preferring to charts, graphs, something to read, or a picture
Using flash cards, videos, or other visual aids
Tactile/ Kinesthetic
Preferring to aids that can be touched, manipulated, or written; and may practice language by drawing and/or tracing
Providing hands-on experiences to understand language and culture (e.g., cultural interchanges using nonverbal communication strategies)
Auditory Preferring to listening to lectures, conversations, tapes, etc., when learning
Providing opportunities to listen to lectures and discussion. Recap verbally
e. Teaching Learning Process in Ganesha Operation
1) Cornel Method
This kind of method is adapted from the cornel note-taking
system which is a widely-used note taking system devised in the
1950s by Walter Pauk, an education professor at Cornell University.
In this method, students divide the paper into two columns: the note-
taking column (usually on the right) is twice the size of the key word
column (on the left). Students should leave five to six lines, or about
two inches, at the bottom of the page. Notes from a lecture or
teaching are written in the note-taking column; notes usually consist
of the main ideas of the text or lecture, and long ideas are
63
paraphrased. Long sentences are avoided; symbols or abbreviations
are used instead. Relevant questions (which should be recorded as
soon as possible so that the lecture and questions will be fresh in the
student's mind) or key words are written in the key word column.
The student also writes a short summary on the last four lines.
Students then cover up the note-taking (right) column to
answer the questions/keywords in the key word or cue (left) column.
Students are encouraged to reflect on the material and review the
notes regularly. The Cornell method provides a systematic format for
condensing and organizing notes. After the notes have been taken,
the student writes a brief summary at the bottom of the page. This
helps to increase understanding of the topic. When studying for
either a test or quiz, the student has a concise but detailed and
relevant record of previous classes. (in Walter Pauk:1950
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornell_Notes (adapted at 14/9/2010))
This method is adapted by Ganesha Operation which
divides its book into two columns, the left column is the printed
lesson and the right column is an empty column. It is for students to
take note of the lesson given, important information, and draw short
summary. This method is applied because students often lose their
notes after classes and it is to ease them review and learn their
lesson. The same method is also applied at the whiteboard which is
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divided into columns. It means to give advantages for teacher and
students in drawing the materials at the whiteboard, make it
sistematic and rapi.
2) Mind Map
A mind map is a diagram used to represent words, ideas,
tasks, or other items linked to and arranged around a central key
word or idea. Mind map is used to generate, visualize, structure, and
classify ideas, and as aid in study, organization, problem solving,
decision making, and writing. In other words, mind map is a creative
and effective way to place whatever stated in mind which then is
visualized into a diagram started with central key words on it.
It is one of ways to ease the learners to arise imagination
and memory. In order to memorize words and vocabulary,
everybody may use mind map since there are rules to make the mind
map succeed helping the maker. There are association, imagination,
ideas, colors, lines and symbols inside it. Tony buzan (2007: 15)
gives seven steps how to make a mind map. The steps are:
a) Write down central key words in the centre of a blank sheet in
landscape way because it gives freedom for the maker to spread
out ideas in any direction.
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b) Use pictures or photos as central key word since pictures or
photos are considered helping the maker to have lots of
imaginations
c) Use different colors, because colors create the imagination more
vividly than only use one or two color, such as, black and white.
They also appeal the brain’s pleasure in building the mind map,
and the learners’ interest in returning to, reviewing, and using it.
d) Make a series of connect lines from the central key words to the
sub-key words. Because brain works with association. It means
that association will tie one thing to the others.
e) Connect every sub-key word to the ideas which relate to the
theme with unlinear line, the reason is because the use of
straight lines is boring for the brain.
f) Give one key word in every branch of idea. It means do not write
the key word with complete sentence.
g) Draw pictures to describe the ideas. Just like central picture, it
represents thousands words to say.
In Ganesha Operation, mind map is used to lock student’s
learning focus. It was given in the beginning of the class. Teachers
write and draw it in the whiteboard by using three different colors of
boardmarker, then explain it to students about what will be learned
and discussed at the lesson.
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3) Memory technique
Memorizing well in the process of learning needs ways to
make it remain in longer period. For instance, by plotting or
chunking the longer words or number into small words. This way
will give better result if the memory techniques are weird, odd,
vulgar, funny, or even absurd forms Buzan (2007: 121-122) strongly
advises seven rules to strengthen memory as follows:
a) Exaggerating the size of the important parts of the image. The
more exaggerate the information, the easier the brain memorizes
the information.
b) Using humor because funny or peculiar things are easier to
remember than normal ones.
c) Applying sense to code information of an image. Everybody
has sense to see, to hear, to feel, to taste, to touch and to smell.
All of them are trigger to memorize.
d) Using vivid, colorful image and ignore black and white color
only or traditional color. Use different colors of the information
that need to remember since right brain loves colors.
e) Making rude rhyme of the mnemonic. If the words are
combined into mnemonics or acrostics, they could be more useful
by rhyming them.
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f) Creating positive, pleasant images. By and large, it will be
easier to memorize words by having a positive thinking on the
word itself. In other words having interesting information will
stimulate the memory well.
g) Giving pictures and symbols, it can be code quite complex
message quickly and effectively. Pictures represent thousands
words to say.
4) Break
Another way of learning suggested by Buzan (1984: 43-55) is giving
break time as many as possible during teaching learning process; it is
because our brain will be tired if it is used in a long period. Although
the materials given is interesting and well prepared. It can be
inappropriate for those who learn something in a long period.
Because the longer the students study, the harder the brain works and
this causes tiredness of the brain. Therefore, Ganesha Operation
applied break time. Applying lesson with breaks, it means many
starts and many ends of lesson. In Ganesha Operation, break is given
after 45 minutes of learning process takes place which took for 5
minutes. At this time, students will listen a ringing bel first, then a
motivated message from audioline was delivered by Mr. Jack-the
leader of Ganesha Operation Semarang- followed by a popular music
prepared and sometimes requested by students. The core is make
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students forget the lesson for a while and make them fresh to
continue the lesson.
5) Music
Prashnig (2007:185) said that another way to succeed in
learning is through listening to music. Why? The following
explanation will discuss the importance of music for learners. Music
has become central culture and plays important role to influence
people’s mind and emotion. Music is also believed to be a favorite
choice to accelerate learning. Prashnig belived that music gives great
benefit to brain while music is used to stimulating the brain to work
well. He made a very well known research in revealing the
correlation between listening to classical music and learning. The
result explained that the students who listened to Mozart had greater
score than those who did not have the music while they were
studying.
6) Teacher Centered
Teacher has a very important role in teaching and learning
process since the teacher is the model for the students to do activities
in class and out of class. However, the role of the teacher sometimes
is used only as a motivator, and facilitator. These two points of view
bring the writer to underline two teaching methods. The teaching
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methods can be grouped into namely pupil centered and teacher
centered.
According to Alabi (2008: 843) teacher centered method puts
teachers as the main actors while the pupils are passive listeners. The
pupils remain silent most of the time during the lesson. On the other
hand, pupil-centered is the opposite of the teacher centered. Pupil
centered methods tend to use the teacher act as a guide or an advisor
to the pupils, suggesting activities that are appropriate. The pupils
are actively doing the study under the leadership of the teacher. In
other words the teacher is the central of all activities to manage and
to advise the students in the teaching process.
Therefore, GO adapts teacher-centered methods in its
learning process. Mostly, the teacher gives teaching presentation in
front of the class and the students listen and do exercise based on
what the teacher act, teacher centered method is the most appropriate
methods than learner-centered method used in teaching learning
process in the classroom. Because Ganesha Operation -an
institutional course- has limitation time and syllabus which must be
completed in each meeting, so every teacher must be able to present
a whole material and discuss the exercise from the handbook.
Besides, there is no other activity requiring communication between
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learners such as small group, work in pairs, conversation, and group
discussion.
B. Rationale
As reading becomes the major requirement in passing State
University Entrance Test, every student is encouraged in mastering this kind
of competence. But students’ achievements at Alumni Class of Ganesha
Operation Semarang 2010-2011 academic year are far from satisfaction and
need to be improved. Therefore, this research implement Classroom Action
Research which was mainly purposed to improve students’ reading
competence through Styles and Strategies Based Instruction.
This technique was considered the solution of students’ problems in
reading and was able to improve students’ reading competence. It is based on
several reasons. (1) in Styles and Strategies Based Instruction, teacher
becomes the instructor and facilitator to guide students in finding certain clues
for getting the best answer. So, students are encouraged to be active and eager
since they have to listen and follow certain instruction. (2) The
implementation of reading strategies will give advantages for passive,
unskilled, shy, afraid, nervous, and unself confident students to learn reading.
These strategies will avoid them being laughed by their friends. (3) since these
strategies are based on students learning style, the teaching learning process is
created as close as students’ learning style by applying certain equipment such
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as: three different colors of boardmarker, using mind map, playing classical
music, and doing break. (4) institutionally, it is meant to accomodate Ganesha
Operation’s regulation related to teaching learning processes where teacher
becomes the source of learning while students become the passive listeners.
So, Styles and Strategies Based Instruction are chosen to bridge this kind of
condition. (5) Ganesha Operation’s teaching concept is based on students’
learning style, so it is in line with the Styles and Strategies Based Instruction
because this technique is based on students’ learning style in learning. (6)
Ganesha Operation is kind of informal institution or course which facilitates
its students with quick solution concept in answering items quickly and
accurately. The applying of Styles and Strategies Based Instruction becomes
the right choice because it offers certain strategies in answering items quickly
and accurately. Hopefully, Students will master English reading and make
maximum improvement in their reading competence, psychological changes,
and classroom atmosphere. So, Students will feel more comfortable and
enjoyable in having reading lesson and get easier in doing reading items.
C. Action Hypothesis
Styles and Strategy Based Instruction (SSBI) can improve
students’ reading competence at Alumni Class of Ganesha Operation
Semarang 2010-2011 Academic Year.