CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

A. Previous Study

There are some previous studies taken by some researchers around the world

related to the use of Preview, Question, Read, Summarize, and Test (PQRST)

strategy to enhancing students’ reading comprehension. The first research was

conducted by Malia (2015). The researcher conducted the research in XI IPS

Grade of MA Diniyah Puteri Pekanbaru, entitle “Using PQRST Strategy to

Improve Students’ Reading Comprehension of Hortatory Exposition Texts at

Grade XI IPS of MA Diniyah Puteri, Pekanbaru”. In this research use

classroom action research. This research was conducted in two cycle. In the

cycle 1, the students were successful to make considerably positive change in

their reading hortatory exposition text through PQRST strategy. It can be seen

from the results of students’ mean score, based on the results of reading

comprehension test that measured their comprehension when reading

hortatory exposition text. the mean score of the students’ comprehension

increased 4.5 points at the end of Cycle 1. However, the mean scores were not

significantly increased. Then, at the end of Cycle 2, the mean score of the

students’ comprehension increased 10.5 points. The improvement from the

beginning of the research to the end of Cycle 2 can be categorized as

significant. This is one of the reasons for stopping this research at the end of

Cycle 2. The result from this research showed that the use of PQRST
(Preview, Question, Read, Summarize, and Test) strategy enhancing the

effectiveness of the teaching and learning process which then increases the

students’ reading comprehension of hortatory exposition text.

The second previous study was conducted from Susanti (2013). The researcher

was conducted the research in XI Grade of SMA PIRI 1 Yogyakarta In The

Academic Year OF 2012/2013, entitle “Improving Students’ Reading

Comprehension Through PQRST Strategy At Grade XI Of SMA PIRI 1

Yogyakarta In The Academic Year of 2012/2013”. This research is an action

research. The data were qualitative and quantitative in nature. This research

was conducted in two cycle. The results of the research show the increase of

the students’ motivation, classroom interaction, and students’ enthusiastic in

the learning reading process. They also could get involved actively in the

reading learning process. The students could interact well with other students,

the teacher and the materials during the teaching and learning process of

reading. The findings are also supported by the quantitative data. The mean

score of the students‟ reading comprehension test improved from 36.89 in the

pre-test to 44.23 in the post-test. It means that there was an increase of the

students‟ reading comprehension ability by 07.34. In conclusion, the use of

PQRST strategy with its accompanying actions was effective to improve the

teaching and learning process of reading comprehension.

The last previous study was conducted from Ismiyanti (2017). The researcher

was conducted the research in Eleventh Grade of Private Islamic Senior High
School Tahfizhil Qur’an Medan, entitle “Improving Students’ Ability In

Reading Comprehension By Using Preview, Question, Read, State and Test

Strategy”. This research was applied by classroom action research, it consists

of 2 cycles. Based on the research findings, it can be said that through PQRST

(Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy in reading

comprehension is success since the criteria of success were achieved. Related

to the observation result showed that the students’ ability were improved in

reading comprehension. It can be seen from their participation in the

classroom, their motivation in learning reading comprehension in the

classroom. And related to the interview result showed that the students were

interested in reading comprehension study. And also related to the

photography result showed that the activities in learning process, students’

participation and activity while study reading.

Based some research explained above, it has been found that there are

differences

among PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy

applied for reading comprehension. In the first previous study, use classroom

action research. It is found that the students were successful to make

considerably positive change in their reading hortatory exposition text through

PQRST strategy at grade XI IPS of MA Diniyah Puteri, Pekanbaru. The

second previous study show the increase of the students’ motivation,

classroom interaction, and students’ enthusiastic in the learning reading

process. They also could get involved actively in the reading learning process.

The students could interact well with other students, the teacher and the

materials during the teaching and learning process of reading at XI grade of

SMA PIRI 1 Yogyakarta in the academic year of 2012/2013. This research

use classroom action research. And the last previous study also use classroom

action research in Eleventh Grade of Private Islamic Senior High School

Tahfizhil Qur’an Medan. This research show that through PQRST (Preview,

Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy the students’ ability were

improved in reading comprehension. It can be seen from their participation in

the classroom, their motivation in learning reading comprehension in the

classroom. And related to the interview result showed that the students were

interested in reading comprehension study.

Therefore, based on the successful implementation of PQRST (Preview,

Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy in the previous relevant study,

the researcher decided to investigate the implementation of PQRST (Preview,

Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy to enhancing the students’

reading comprehension at the eighth grade of the second semester in SMP

Islam Kebumen academic year of 2018/2019. The researcher conducts a

collaborative action research in order to find out whether PQRST (Preview,

Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy can improve students’

comprehension in reading and in which aspects of reading improves the most

 after being taught by using PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and

Test) strategy.

B. Review of Literature

1. Concept of Reading and Reading Comprehension

There are some ways that can make people get knowledge or information.

One of them is by reading. Reading is a process how to get information

from written text. According to Hill (1997:58), state that reading is a

process to understand a written text which means extracting the acquired

information from it as efficiently as possible. Moreover, Guthrie, Benneth

& McGough (2007) as cited in Acheaw (2014:7) Reading is the act of

getting meaning from printed or written words, which is the basis for

learning and one of the most important skills in everyday life.

The ability how the reader to draw a meaning from the written text which

consist meaning and based on the text is reading, they interpret the

information of it. It is supported by Grobe and Stoller (2002) as cited in

Dewi (2016:2), reading as the ability to draw meaning from the printed

page and interpret this information appropriately. By reading the reader

able to draw and understand the printed page which include written text as

their ability.

When reading, the readers should be able to manage every part of the text,

because it is easy to comprehend the ideas conveyed on the text when they
 are able to analyze the organization of the text. According to Doyle

(2004), comprehension is a progressive skill in attaching meaning

beginning at the same level and proceeding to attaching meaning to an

entire reading selection. Moreover, Snow (2002:11) defines reading

comprehension is the process of simultaneously extracting and

constructing meaning through interaction and involvement with written

language. It can be said that reading is essentially an active process.

From the definition above, it can be concluded that reading is one of

language skills that use the critical thinking of the learners. Reading can

help the reader to construct knowledge, share opinion, feeling, and

experiences. Whereas reading comprehension is the ability to process text,

understand the meaning, and to integrate with what the reader already

knows.

2. Aspects of Reading

To be able to comprehend the text, the reader should be master some

aspect of reading. According to Nuttal (1985), there are five sort reading

aspect that should be mastered by the reader to comprehend the text

deeply, which is as follows:

a. Identifying Main Idea

Determining idea is one of the most important skills in reading

comprehension to grasp and find the main point of the passage by

summarizing the passage and look for repetition of ideas or words. The
 main idea is important to a reader, because it tells what the story is

mainly about. Without knowing the main idea, readers will not know

the purpose of the text.

b. Identifying Information Details

Identifying details are the facts and ideas that explain or prove the

topic sentence or main idea. Supporting details help the reader

knowing more information about the main idea or subject of a passage.

They are pieces of information that help the readers see the big picture

in a text. Supporting details give readers the answers to questions they

might ask before they ask them.

c. Determining Inference

Inference is an educational guess or conclusion drawn based on logic

of the passage. An inference is when the students take clues from a

story plus what they already know from their own experiences to

decide what the teacher means.

The teacher will not always tell them everything, so they need to use

inferences to understand and visualize the story. The students will

make inferences to help them understand what they are reading. As

follow:

1) Think about the type of information the teacher is giving.

 2) Think about how the topic of the text relates to own life or the

experiences of students have had.

d. Understanding Vocabulary

The communication will success or not it depends on the accurate

vocabulary understanding. It means that to comprehend what the

words mean is important in vocabulary. When vocabulary mastery

improves, comprehension will be deeper and apply letter sound

correspondence to a pretend word and matching it to a known word in

the readers’ oral vocabulary. Vocabulary means the understanding of

word meanings and their use, contributes to reading comprehension

and knowledge building.

e. Determining Reference

One of sub process in sentence comprehension is referential

representation; this process identifies the references that words in a

sentence make to external word. Referential representation is aided by

making reference easy to identify. Readers need to identify the

reference of a pronoun when the referent appears recently in the text

and has been mentioned earlier. It is the signal to readers find the

meaning elsewhere in the text.

3. PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test) Strategy

a. Definition of PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and

Test) Strategy

PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy is a

strategy which commonly use in teaching language. Considering the

importance of reading comprehension, PQRST (Preview, Question,

Read, Summary, and Test) strategy should be implemented as a

strategy in teaching reading strategy. PQRST strategy is introduced by

Thomas F. Staton which is consisted by P as Preview, Q as Question,

R as Reading, S as Summary, and T as Test. Based on the explanation,

PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy

consist of a procedure or step by step how to conduct the teaching

reading and it is expected to improve students ability in reading which

can influence their reading achievement.

In reading learning, it is necessary to need a strategy that can help the

students to enhancing their reading comprehension. Susanti (2013),

states that PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test)

strategy as one of the reading strategy can help the students to improve

their reading comprehension . PQRST (Preview, Question, Read,

Summary, and Test) strategy is a powerful reading technique which

provides strong reading background as a key before reading activity.

So, the students know what they should do in reading.

The PQRST strategy stands for Preview, Question, Read, State, and

Test. There are five steps to the PQRST Literacy Strategy according to

Wormerli cited by Susanti (2013: 27). The steps are described below:

1) P – Preview.

In previewing, the teacher leads the students to identify the title,

picture, figure, number, italic words in the text. The reader can get

a sense of where they are going with their reading. This step is

usually done by reading the title or headline. The preview stage

will give the students an overview of the topics covered in the

chapter and how they are organized. The point is to get an idea of

the main topics and sections of the text. If they have a general idea

about what a reading assignment covers, they will be able to

determine how it relates to the course for which they are reading,

and what they want to learn from it.

2) Q – Questioning.

The teacher develops questions to which the students want to find

answers. In this step of the process, the teacher generates questions

to help focus reader’s reading and find the key points in each

section. The questions can lead them to find further information of

text. They should avoid adding questions that might distract or

change the subject. With specific questions in mind about a reading

assignment, they will know exactly what information to look for,

 and they will be motivated to find it. This will help them to learn as

much as they can from reading. The steps are in the following:

a) Reread the heading.

b) Predict questions based on that heading. Include questions

based on who; what; when; where; why; and how or by giving

lead questions after the teacher gives the text.

3) R – Read

The next step is reading the material. The teacher gives the text to

the students. It can be in group reading or individual reading

activity when it applies by a game. The students also can find

difficult or new vocabulary in the text while reading the text. If it is

possible, the students may read the text twice.

4) S – Summarize

After the students finish reading a section of text, the teacher may

ask the students to summarize by recalling the important ideas

from the section reader just read. In this step, the students will state

the central idea or theme.

5) T – Test

In this step, the teacher tries to measure the understanding of the

students by giving a test. The teacher can design the test in form of
 answering questions or ask the students to teach the reading

materials to other students.

PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy helps

the students become active in reading process, make them focus on the

text, attract their motivation have a long-term memory in

comprehending the text and increase their score on the test.

b. Procedure of Teaching Reading Comprehension through PQRST

Strategy

There are some processes in teaching reading through PQRST

(Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy that consist of

six stages (Westwood, 2001). It could be done well if the teacher gave

the appropriate ways in teaching process as follows:

1) Step 1

In the first step, the teacher introduced the concept of PQRST

(Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy and the

effectiveness in learning process. The teacher could also tell them

main purpose using this strategy. So, the students had motivation to

use this strategy.

2) Step 2

The students were given the text of reading by the teacher. As the

first step of PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and

 Test) strategy; previewing. The students can immediately preview

the entire chapter by skimming through it to get an idea of the

major topics. This is done by reading the chapter outline, and then

skimming the chapter, paying special attention to headings of main

sections and sub-sections, the kind of the text, the orientation of the

text, the verb that is used in the text, and glancing at picture, figure,

number, italic words in the text, also noticing the organizational

structure text. If there is a summary, take time to consider each

point in the summary, questions will come to mind that should be

answered later as the students read the full text. The preview stage

will give the students an overview of the topics covered in the

chapter and how they are organized. The point is to get an idea of

the main topics and sections of the text.

3) Step 3

The next step is questioning. In this step, the students tried to ask

specific questions in their mind about reading assignment. The

students could start this stage by turning the chapter headings and

sub headings into questions. The teacher guided the students to

generate questions to help focus reader’s reading and find the key

points in each section. They could use the standard questions such

as who, what, why, which, when, where or how. The questions can

lead them to find further information of text.

4) Step 4

Next, the students read the material in detail. As the students read,

they tried to answer the question which asked in the step Question.

Besides, they could give underline the difficult word and pay

attention the main idea. If the students get difficulties in

comprehending the text, they may read the text twice.

5) Step 5

After the students finished reading the section, the students tried to

recall the main ideas and recite the information. Summarizing is a

powerful means of fixing the material on the students’ memory.

The students try to recite the information and they should know

how much they can recall the information they get from the text

and state it by their own words. Summarizing will reveal blanks in

the students’ knowledge and help them organize the information in

their mind. The students could take notes from the passage they

have read.

6) Step 6

In this final step of PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary,

and Test) strategy, to know and remember what the students have

read. It can be started by recalling as much as they can without

looking at the book or their recitation notes. It helps them to think

 about the relevance of what they learned and how it all fits

together. The reader checks their knowledge by testing themselves

to know how far their understanding of the text they read is. It can

be done by reviewing all the material and storing it into their long-

term memory.

Based on the explanation above, the procedure in teaching reading

through PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test)

strategy has six steps. These steps can be applied well if there is the

good interaction between the teacher and the students.

c. Advantages of PQRST strategy

1) The PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test)

strategy helps to enhance students’ comprehension of a text

(Susanti: 2013). It helped the students arrange the steps of reading.

The students would have a good intention to the text because they

had the preview before they analyse the whole of the text.

2) The benefits of Questioning step led the students to formulate the

questions they need to find. This step helped the students to focus

and create the curiosity toward the text. This motivates the students

to read (Malia:2015). It made the students found the information

details easily. It also made them to focus to the aspects that they

should find in the text.

 3) It helped engage students actively and meaningfully in their

reading (Simatupang & Sihombing: 2012). The students will

actively involve in comprehending the text.

4) This strategy made the students well-planed in reading the text. It

made the reading process more effective in order to reach the

goals. By knowing this ahead of time, the students able to look for

and recognize the most important points when they do read for

details. They did not waste time stumbling through the book and

finding a starting point (Staton: 1982).

d. Disadvantages of PQRST strategy

1) This strategy was time consuming, because it had several stages

that should be done by the students in reading. So, it would rather

difficult for the students who have difficulties in reading. To solve

the problem, the teacher used the simple or short text in order to

make the effective time. The students also did the group work to

discuss the text in some part of learning process.

2) In some stages, the students may get difficulties in doing the step

of PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy.

For example, there are some students with low capability in

summarizing, because they are weak to recognize the most

important points to find the details. Only the students who have

upper knowledge level are able to recall the important points. So, it

was dominated by some students who can do this stage. To solve

 this problem, the teacher divided the class in some groups or

pairing works to discuss the difficult terms. The teacher also asked

the students to consult their dictionary.

C. Frame of Thinking

Reading plays an important role in all of areas of school. This skill is

important as the students need to be mastered. In teaching reading

comprehension, there are some strategies that can help the teacher to reach the

aim of teaching learning process. For this research, PQRST (Preview,

Question, Read, Summary, and Test) strategy is choosen as a strategy in

teaching reading comprehension. This strategy has some several steps that

may lead the students to comprehend and construct the text. Those steps are

used as the guide for the students in learning process. The researcher believes

that this strategy will help the students in constructing the effective way to

achieve the goals. So that, the students will easily understand the reading text.

Moreover, it can help the students easier to find the details. By having the

Questioning step, the students can predict the answer which aims to find the

details. The questions can lead them to find further information of text. It may

help them to manage which information that they should keep. Therefore, the

researcher assumes that PQRST (Preview, Question, Read, Summary, and

Test) strategy may be used in teaching reading comprehension to improve the

students’ reading ability especially in aspect of finding information details.