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CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

This chapter present the general issues realted to the present study. These include the
background of the study,reason for choosing the topic, research questions, purpose of the
study, significance of the study, research method, research design, scope and limitation of the
study, the hypothesis, and definition of key terms.

1.1 Background of the Study

Reading is one of the English language skills that have to be mastered by all of students.
Having good reading English skill is very important for the students. It can help the students
to enlarge their knowledge because they can get a lot of information through reading.
Reading skill is also very important in learning English as a foreign language. The aim of
teaching reading is to make students able to read English text effectively and efficiently.
They do not only have to understand the structure of the text explicitly but more important
they must comprehend the meaning implicitly. Reading does not only improve their reading
ability but also by having reading activity they can increase their knowledge.

One of the important aspects is linguistic aspect which covers grammar, vocabulary,
pronounciation, structure, and so on. Beside those aspects, the learners also need to master
the skills of the language such as listening, writing, reading, and speaking. However, it
should be kept in mind that those skills cannot be learned more easily.

According to Lehr (2013), reading comprehension is the process of simultaneously

extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and involvement with written
language. This means that reading comprehension is an active process, being able to read
many different materials and being able to understand them.

That is why the reading skills are important to be mastered. However, in some schools,
the researcher found that there were many learners who still had low reading skills. It

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was proven when the researcher observed a learning process in one of junior high school in
Garut. The low level of students’ mean may be caused by their lack of strategies in learning,

Descriptive text is a kind of text with a purpose to give information. The context of this
kind of text is the description of particular thing, animal, person or others in general (Genrot
and Wignel in Mursyid, 2018:4).

The cognitive strategy is the strategy that involves mental manipulation or information of
materials or tasks, and it is intended to enhance comprehension, acquisition, or retention
(Wernke et al., 2011).

According to Desta Aditya (2017), who is conducted the research about “Improving
students’ reading comprehension ability through story mapping strategy” said the researcher
found that one of the problems faced by the students was that the students often found
difficulty in comprehending the text. They also thought that the way of their teacher teach
them is difficult to be understood. The teacher could not make an interesting learning activity
that may make the student more active and easy to understand the material that is given by
the teacher. The teacher also could not help the students to comprehend English text.

According to Elihami (2017), who is conducted the research about “increasing students’
reading comprehension through cognitive strategies of senior high school of sidenreng
rappang regency” This research was a quasi-experimental research at the objective of finding
the increasing students’ reading comprehension achievement through cognitive strategies
(rehearsal, organization, and elaboration). The research findings show that the students’
reading comprehension is increased for both groups from pretest to posttest. The application
of cognitive strategies also positively influences the increasing students’ reading
comprehension achievement. Thus, it is concluded that the use of cognitive strategies is
useful to increase students’ reading comprehension in teaching and learning words.

According to Detty Varita (2017), who is conducted the research about “improving
reading comprehension through literature circles” there was a significant positive difference
between the result from the students who were taught by the Literature Circles technique and
the students who were taught with the standard teacher-centered approach (Reading Aloud)
which can be seen from the scores from the EG and the CG. In conclusion Literature Circles
can be a better ways for teaching English reading comprehension.

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Based on the background of the study above, the researcher thinks that it is important to
conduct a research entitled “improving students’ reading comprehension of descriptive texts
through cognitive strategy”. This study will focus on improving students' reading
comprehension in descriptive texts through cognitive strategy.

1.2 Reason for choosing the topic

Based on the background, the reason why the writer chooses about “improving students’
reading comprehension of descriptive texts through cognitive strategy” as the topic because
it is one of the effective teaching method to improve students’ reading comprehension and it
can make students able to read English text effectively and efficiently.

1.3 Research questions and the objective of the study

This study aims to answer the questions :

1. How does students’ reading comprehension to improve in descriptive texts through

cognitive strategy?
2. What factors influence the improvement of the students’ ability in comprehending
descriptive texts?

1.4 Purpose of the study

The general purposes of this research are to find out the problems faced by the
students of junior high school. Furthermore, the purposes can particularly be formulated
as follows:
1.4.1 To find the students’ difficulties in reading comprehension the English descriptive
text.
1.4.2 To find evidence of increasing student reading in descriptive texts through cognitive
strategies.

1.5 Significance of the study

The study of teaching and learning the right reading comprehension is very important for
students, teachers, education practitioners, and others whose concerns are related in one way

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or another with the same type of field with this research. Theoretically, this study can
improve students' reading comprehension in descriptive texts through cognitive strategies.

1.6 Research Methodology

This study focused on improving students’ reading comprehension of descriptive texts

through cognitive strategy. In conducting the study, the writer used the data based on the
result of Classroom Action Research. Classroom action research is a kind of intervention
done to teaching and learning process based on real problems found and faced by the teachers
in their classroom (Madya, 2013). It is a distinctive approach to inquiry related to teaching
and learning process and it is a good media for teachers to improve their teaching and
students learning (Stringer, 2008; Muslich, 2009).

1.7 Research design

The type of this research is Classroom Action Research. This research conducted in a
classroom to improve teaching and learning process. Classroom action research is a kind of
intervention done to teaching and learning process based on real problems found and faced by
the teachers in their classroom (Madya, 2013). It is a distinctive approach to inquiry related to
teaching and learning process and it is a good media for teachers to improve their teaching
and students learning (Stringer, 2008; Muslich, 2009). The CAR is done by teachers/lecturers
in their classroom to their students because they know more about their class and students.
The teachers work collaboratively with other teachers (commonly those teaching the same
subject) to improve the learning outcome. Gay, Mills, and Airasian (2009) state that CAR is a
systematic inquiry done by teachers and other practitioners in teaching and learning process
to collect data on ways teachers teach and students learn. The purpose of the research is to
provide the researchers with method of solving problems encountered in teaching and
learning process. It enables teachers to investigate their own classrooms, such as, their
method of teaching, students learning, assessment used, etc., intended for improve their
teaching and learning process (Martler,2009).

Plan

Action

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Reflection

Observation

In planning, lecturers or teachers work collaboratively on the problems and what is best to
do to solve the problem. At this step, they meet to decide everything dealing with the
implementation of teaching and learning process. They decide who will teach what, where,
when, and how. They also decide who will do the observation, what instruments to use, and
how the observation is done.

Second, they have so much teaching load that they don’t have time for conducting
research. Every teacher must teach 24 x 45 minutes a week. They feel that this teaching load
make them too so busy that they don’t have time to think and to do the CAR.

Third, they don’t have enough competence and interest in research report. This is found to
be the biggest problem for the teachers. The teachers are said to have insufficient competence
in writing research report, not to mention the article for journal. They need more training on
writing the research report and article.

Fourth, the school principals do not push them to do the research. The principals are
expected to keep pushing the teachers to do the CAR with some financial supports of course.
It is true that some teachers will work when they are pushed to do so.

The teachers/lecturers should feel in need for CAR because they need promotion in their
careers and lives. They may invite resource persons to discuss intensively about CAR,
starting from making plan up to writing the report of the research. This is believed to be more
effective instead of waiting for attending the activities conducted by certain institutions for
the CAR.

1.8 Scope and Limitation of the study

To simplify the study, the writer limits the study as follows :

1. This study to explain the extent to which cognitive strategy can improve the students’
reading comprehension and what a factors that influence the changes of the students’
reading ability by impementing cognitive strategy.

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2. This study focuses of the collaborator and 22 students in class Vll of MTs Nurul Falah
Cigedug.

1.9 Definition of Key Terms

1. According to Lehr (2013), reading comprehension is the process of
simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and
involvement with written language. This means that reading comprehension is an
active process, being able to read many different materials and being able to
understand them (Fitriani, 2015; Samad, Jannah, Fitriani, 2017).
2. Descriptive text is a kind of text with a purpose to give information. The context
of this kind of text is the description of particular thing, animal, person or others
in general (Genrot and Wignel in Mursyid, 2018:4).
3. According to Oxford (2010), Cognitive Strategy such as summarizing or
reasoning deductively , enables learners to ubderstand and produce new language
by many different means. Cognitive Strategy is essential in learning a new
language. It is unified bt common function; manipulation or transformation of the
target language of the learners. This is to say that cognitive strategy is an
instructional approach which emphasized the development of thinking skills and
processes as a means to enhance learning. The aim of cognitive strategies are to
enable the students to become more strategic, self reliant, flexible and productive
in their endeavors.