CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

This chapter describes background of the study, identification of the

problem, limitation of the problems, formulation of the problems, objectives of

the study, and significance of the study.

A. Background of the Study

As the output of study, students of junior high school are expected to

master the four skills of English language, especially speaking since

speaking is essential in daily life. As Richards (2008: p. 19) said in his book,

speaking is a skill students should master as it is a priority for many second-

language or foreign-language learners. He (ibid) also stated that students or

teachers see their improvement in spoken language proficiency to measure

their English ability. In the end, it is important for students to master the

speaking skill and for teacher to teach the skill.

Teaching speaking skill in the eighth grade of junior high school is also

mentioned in the curriculum. Students should master the speaking skill

under the aspects of pronunciation, fluency, grammar, comprehension, and

vocabulary. Not only the aspects of speaking skill but students also need to

master the basic skills of speaking which are interpersonal or transactional

function.

In that case, it is important to teach speaking. However, students of

junior high school still face difficulties in learning speaking because they

1
start learning English from VII grade of junior high school and it is too early

for them to master speaking skill in grade eight. Furthermore, mostly

students are not interested in learning English because they do not really

familiar with the language; they find the material is not interesting because

only using media such as book and recordings or videos; they feel that it is

not necessary to study English by their age. Also, they tend to be passive

students and it makes the learning process hard as teaching learning process

needs the involvement from both parties, teachers and students. Teachers

also tend to use the same method to teach English and do not optimize the

use of media in the classroom.

In those many reasons, teachers are challenged to change the mind of

students by using interesting methods or techniques to teach English. Also,

teachers need to find a good method or technique to teach speaking skill for

grade eight students. Researcher has observed from articles and some book

of how to teach speaking in interesting and effective way. There are a lot to

use and one of which is storytelling. There are also many proofs that

storytelling is a useful technique to teach English, especially speaking which

is the main concern of this research. Storytelling is more likely an effective

method and as Indiana (2007: p. 2) mentioned in his writing that storytelling

can be a bridge between students first language and second language.

Therefore, there should be an effort to improve students speaking skill

one of which is by using storytelling technique and optimizing the use of

media in the classroom. Storytelling improves students creativity besides

2
 that, it has a potential to help the students gaining their insight of human

behaviour and fostering them in the emotional intelligence (Dujmovic,

2006: p. 75). Storytelling can also drive away students anxiety for language

learning, motivate the students, and enrich their vocabulary along with the

language structures (ibid). These benefits of teaching through storytelling

have also strengthen the will of researcher to conduct this research by using

storytelling as a method in improving students speaking skill.

B. Identification of the Problems

Based on the previous background, the researcher concludes that there

are two factors which influence students speaking ability. These come from

the students and the teaching learning process.

The first factor is from the students. The students tend to be passive

learners. In other way, students are afraid to express themselves and it affect

their ability of learning. Then, it will result in their vocabulary mastery,

pronunciation skill, and so on. Therefore, the researcher will conduct a

research in order to increase students vocabularies and their pronunciations

as well as their speaking in general.

Another reason is the teaching learning process. In teaching and

learning process, there are some aspects which must be watched, for

instance the media, the material, and the method.

To have a conducive teaching and learning process, teachers should pay

attention to the media of the teaching and learning process. If the media is

not available, then the teachers should work more to find another alternative.

3
 Material is one of the most crucial parts of teaching and learning

process, without material teacher cannot inform the students in an easy way.

In other words, material helps the teachers in teaching learning process, a

lot. Hence, the choosing of material also should be watched as teacher is the

person who has the competence to choose the material. Boring material can

also make boring teaching learning process.

Teaching and learning method is a method which is used by the teachers

to create new atmosphere. Choosing the right method in learning process is

also needed because it is crucial to make teaching learning process more

valuable and funnier.

C. Problem Limitation

In this research, researcher will only focus on the use of storytelling

method to improve students speaking skill. In which the curriculum 2013

of English language includes speaking in its core competence as KI 4 which

is mentioned as follow:

KI 4 Mengolah, menyaji, dan menalar dalam ranah konkret

(menggunakan, mengurai, merangkai, memodifikasi, dan
membuat) dan ranah abstrak (menulis, membaca,
menghitung, menggambar, dan mengarang) sesuai dengan
yang dipelajari di sekolah dan sumber lain yang sama
dalam sudut pandang/teori.

D. Problem Formulation

As researcher decides the problem and the limitation of the research,

the formulation of the research will be as follow:

4
 How can storytelling method be used to improve students speaking

skill of eight grade students in junior high school?

E. The Objective of the Study

The objective of the research is to improve the eighth grade students

speaking skill at Smpit Al-Khairaat Yogyakarta in the academic year of

2017/2018.

F. The Significance of the Study

The researcher expects that this research will give benefits and

contributions to English language teaching. There are three significances:

1. The Teacher

The English teacher can adapt the narrative storytelling

technique in order to give a new atmosphere, to encourage

students to be active learners, and to improve students speaking

skill.

2. The Students

Students are expected to get better speaking skill by

involving themselves in teaching learning process through

telling stories besides that, it can improve their confidence.

3. The Researchers

Other researchers who are interested in conducting the same

topic of the research. The findings of the research are expected

to give more information on storytelling technique in improving

students speaking skill.

5
 CHAPTER II

LITERATURE REVIEW AND CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

This chapter presents the literature review and the conceptual framework.

The discussion of the literature review will cover related theories of the research

and related research studies. The conceptual framework relates the theory of the

study.

A. Theoretical Review

1. Speaking

a. The Notion of Speaking

Not only it helps to communicate but speaking also a way to

express our mind. In recent years, many children are taught to

speak because it will be one of crucial ways to be accepted in

society. As Way (1997: p. 3) mentioned in her writing, pragmatic

knowledge that we get from language learning in childhood can

lead to a conversational ability. This conversational ability has

helped the students, in this context, to learn better, especially in

classroom or school. Speaking itself is one of the four major

abilities which have an important role for people to be accepted

by the public. In todays society, the mastery of the speaking

ability in English language as a second or foreign-language

becomes a priority (Richards, 2008: p. 19).

6
 There are many scholars define speaking as a necessary

ability that should be taught to students, for instance speaking is

the process of building and sharing meaning through the use of

verbal and non-verbal symbol, in variety of contexts (Chaney,

1998: p. 13 as cited in Shrouf). In addition, Brown (1994), Burns

& Joyce (1997) as cited in Shrouf stated that speaking is an

interactive process of constructing meaning that involves

producing, receiving, and processing information.

By the process of accepting and giving, speaking also plays

important roles in teaching and learning process. Furthermore,

todays schools require the students to have a good speaking

ability meaning students also need to improve their

communicative skill.

b. The Importance of Speaking

As it has been mentioned before, that speaking is a crucial

ability to be mastered in a way to be accepted in society. As for

EFL/ESL learners, speaking English is not a difficult ability to

do as they already learn it. However, for students of junior high

school or senior high school who learned English as for

condition to graduate, they would find it difficult to master the

speaking ability.

Speaking is a productive ability involving speech to

communicate or express feeling to others (Spartt, Pulverness, &

7
Williams, 2001: p. 34). Unlike writing, speaking is more

challenging because it happens in real time situation. Many

students feel difficult in expressing their feeling through

speaking because when you speak you cannot revise what you

said like in writing production; secondly the person whom you

speak with may wait for you to speak right so it will consume

more time to express our ideas (as cited in pronceton.edu: p. 48).

There is significantly difference in spoken and written language

(van Lier, 1995: p. 88 as cited in pronceton.edu: p. 48).

The table below shows the difference between spoken and

written language.

Spoken Language Written Language

Auditory Visual
Temporary; fast reception Permanent; delayed reception
Prosody (rhythm, stress Punctuation (mechanic)
intonation)
Fast feedback Delayed or no feedback
Planning and editing limited Unlimited planning, editing,
by channel and revising
Table 1. The Difference of Speaking and Writing (van Lier,
1995: p. 88)

While Jones (1996: p.12) as cited in Richards (2008: p. 19)

mentioned, the difference between speaking and writing is a

reflection of the different purposes for which those language are

used.

In speaking and listening we tend to be getting

something done, exploring ideas, working out
some aspects of the world, or simply being
together. In writing, we may be creating a
record, committing events or moments to paper.

8
 By giving the difference from van Liers (1995) perspective,

students who often read books in English language and try to

communicate using English will sound bookish. Unlike van Lier

(1995), Richards (2008) tends to conclude that spoken and

written language only differ in the purpose. By concluding the

idea of both, the researcher agreed that schools requires the

students to speak normally (not highly formal) as if they

communicate in a formal or informal way of a different

purposes. Yet, those who are anti-social or who are hardly

expressing themselves in spoken language will tend to keep their

ideas for themselves. For this reason, researcher highlight that

speaking ability is crucially needed for students so they can

express their ideas spontaneously.

From the importance of speaking, there are some functions

of speaking which should also be highlighted as a main course

in teaching learning process. As Brown and Yule (1983) cited in

Richards (2008: p. 21), the functions of speaking are: serving to

establish and maintain social relations, helping in transactional

purposes, and focusing in an exchange information. These

functions will discussed more in teaching speaking part.

9
c. Teaching Speaking

Teachers should be aware of the students special needs

when it comes to teaching learning process. Same as teaching in

general, teachers should know what needs to be taught in

teaching speaking process. Way (1997: p. 4) has mentioned in

her writing that there are four elements to be taught before jump

to the formal instruction or spoken language. These are:

Awareness of broad rules that govern social interaction

Non-verbal behaviours

Rules for listening

Rules for speaking

After considering those four early elements, teacher can jump

to a formal discussion of oral language. Harmer (2007) and

Brown (2000), as researcher compared, their findings of

teaching speaking are almost alike. Therefore, the researcher

will use one resource which is Harmer (2007) with a

consideration as the newest finding. In order to master the

speaking ability, Harmer (2007: p. 343) mentioned that students

especially second language learners have to be able to use range

of conversational rules and conversational strategies; as it

mentioned before that students should be aware of the functional

exchange.

10
 Foremost, in every class, every teacher must have different

goals of teaching speaking yet, it only has one purpose which is

to encourage the students to speak bravely. The different goals

of teaching may lead to the different speaking event. Thornbury

(2005: pp. 13 -14) as cited in Harmer (2007: p. 343) said that

various dimensions of different speaking events in order to

describe different speaking genre such as the distinction of

transactional and interpersonal functions. In conclusion,

speaking can also be seen as an interactive and non-interactive

event.

To deal with that interactive and non-interactive speaking

ability, Harmer (2007: p. 344) has packed the conversational

strategies in helping the learning teaching process.

a). Conversational rules and structure

This process requires four steps which are opening,

interrupting, topic shift, and closing (Dornyei and Thurrell,

1994: pp. 42 43 as cited in Harmer, 2007: p. 344).

b). Survival and repair strategies

This process is meant to help the students interacting or

responding the speaker talk. As in Conversational rules, this

process also requires three abilities. These are: being able to

paraphrase, being able to use an all-purpose phrase to round the

11
problem of not knowing a word, and being able to appeal for

help.

c). Real talk

This process helps the students to face the real talk outside

the classroom. Instead of commonly using question in course

book, students are asked to spontaneously speak their mind or

feeling.

There are more ways which can be done to improve students

speaking ability. The teacher can apply the following ways

(Harmer, 2007: pp. 345 347):

a. Preparation

Giving time for planning and rehearsal, it is one of a

preparation can be done for students to think and prepare what

they want to say.

b. The value of repetition

Even though repetition is an old technique, it still becomes a

favourite teachers technique. Besides that, repetition also has it

is own benefit such as helping student to re-word or re-think

what will they say. In this case, it improves the students ability

of what they did before.

c. Big groups, small groups

This will give a chance for students to both speak with

courage in front of smaller group or bigger one.

12
 d. Mandatory participation

Besides those, the researcher adds that to have successfully

teaching learning process, teachers should find more fun and

new ways to encourage students, for instance controlled role-

play, role-play, learning outside the classroom for new

atmosphere, joking while learning, and some more.

d. Materials for Speaking in Junior High School

This research material is based on the standard of

competence of the curriculum 2013 (K-13). The table below

presents the standard competence for speaking in junior high

school.

Standard of Competence Basic Competence

4. Mengolah, menyaji, dan
menalar dalam ranah
konkret (menggunakan,
mengurai, merangkai,
memodifikasi, dan
membuat) dan ranah
abstrak (menulis,
membaca, menghitung,
menggambar, dan
mengarang) sesuai dengan
yang dipelajari di sekolah
dan sumber lain yang sama
dalam sudut pandang/teori.
4.7 Menyusun teks
interaksi transaksional
lisan dan tulis sangat
pendek dan sederhana
yang melibatkan
tindakan memberi dan
meminta informasi
terkait keadaan/tindakan/
kegiatan/
kejadian yang
dilakukan/terjadi
secara rutin atau
merupakan kebenaran
umum, dengan
memperhatikan fungsi
sosial, struktur teks
dan unsur kebahasaan
yang benar dan sesuai
konteks
4.10 Menyusun teks
interaksi
transaksional lisan
dan tulis sangat pendek dan

13
 sederhana yang
melibatkan tindakan
memberi dan
meminta informasi
terkait keadaan/
tindakan/kegiatan/
kejadian yang
dilakukan/terjadi,
rutin maupun tidak
rutin, atau menjadi
kebenaran umum di
waktu lampau,
dengan
memperhatikan
fungsi sosial, struktur
teks, dan unsur
kebahasaan yang
benar dan sesuai
konteks
Table 2. Standard Competence and Basic Competence of
Speaking, Grade VIII

Due to this curriculum, the researcher decided to do a

research on speaking using storytelling as a goo and an effective

technique to be applied.

2. Storytelling

a. The History of Storytelling

Stories have been widely used by people to

communicate with others. By telling a story, people will be

more interested to listen to what other people said. For that

reason, teachers also use stories to grab the attention of the

students.

14
 Storytelling has been used by teachers from years to

years. The oldest record of storytelling is 4000 B.C. as

written by Ruth Sawyer entitled Tales of the Magicians

(Arahamsen, 1998 as cited in Eck, 2006: p. 19). The role of

storytelling in society is not only to deliver an information

but also as a tool to share cultural costumes, beliefs, and

heritage. As Eck (2006: p. 19) stated in her writing,

storytelling is an effective way to acknowledge in oral

cultures since it can be memorized and passed on easily. In

the Egyptian and medieval era, it was used by the Gypsies.

Roman culture also proved that they used storytelling in their

communication. Abrahamsen (1998) as cited in Eck (2006:

pp. 19-20) claimed that it appears through a review of

literature that the story is one of the most important

inventions of humankind.

b. The Notion of Storytelling

Traditionally, storytelling can be meant by students

who sit crossed legged on the floor and the teacher tells the

fictional stories. However, as time changing, storytelling

also has more meaning and form in classroom, such as

written text, oral narration, and instructional media. Also,

researchers has defined storytelling on more narrow or

specific terms.

15
 The definition of storytelling according to The

National Council of Teachers of English (2005) as cited in

Eck (2006: pp. 21-22) is storytelling as the relating of a tale

to one or more listeners, and they emphasize that it is not

congruent with simply acting out a drama or reciting a story

from memory or a text, but it is the creation of mental images

of the elements of a story through voice and gestures to an

audience.

While according to other theorists, storytelling is a

way of re-telling a story with different word construction

after being told by the storyteller (Safdarian, 2013: p. 208 as

cited in Zuhriyah, 2017: p. 14). Moreover, Ling as cited in

Zuriyah (2017: p. 15) said that students can transfer

information and deliver messages through storytelling as a

learner-centred method. Caine at al. (2005) as cited in Eck

(2006: p. 22) believed that storytelling is an important way

to access, show, and retain information and knowledge. As

Caine et al. (2005) argued, the brain research confirms that

in a story form, information can be naturally organized in the

mind.

The similarity of the definition of storytelling among

nearly educational theorist has led to the conclusion that

storytelling is a fundamental strategy to deliver meaning and

16
 making meaning in a short and interesting way of our

experiences.

c. Storytelling for Young Learners and The Benefit of

Storytelling

As it has been discussed before, storytelling is

fundamental way for teachers to teach their students and can

be an effective way to improve students essential principles.

Stories are proved to be effective in developing students

essential principals which include language, content,

communication, cognition, and culture (Ioannaou-Georgiou

& Verdugo: p. 1). By showing new content and language to

young learners, it can foster their learning interest and

motivation. The effectiveness of storytelling also actively

involves to help the teachers save time and space.

Environment to teach storytelling has also taken into

a consideration. For young learners storytelling can be so

extremely interesting when they learn in a conducive funny

environment. In contrast to that, if the environment does not

support the teaching leaning process, the students will be

helplessly learning the language. The study of neuroscience

has proved that relax and non-threatening environment based

have strictly affect the various functions of different regions

of the brain (Dwyer, 2002; Rose and Nicholl, 1997 as cited

17
in Eck, 2006: p. 29). Therefore, a good and relaxing

environment is needed for young learners in the learning

process as it will affect their brain and can foster their

learning ability.

McKillop (2004: p. 2) mentioned that storytelling is

important to develop our status as social beings. However,

stories with ease and struggle in its presentation have its own

advantages such as the more a story is indexed in memory,

the more knowledge it is linked to and the more useful that

story and its knowledge will be (ibid).

The table below also shows some of benefits of

storytelling in each principle.

Stories and The wide range of stories can lead

Language Learning children to extend childrens
knowledge. Linguistically, stories
introduce grammar, vocabulary, and
formulaic speech include
meaningful and structured context.
By reading or listening, it gives
children a joyful experience in
feeling the sounds and viewing
the form of new language.
Stories and Stories can be an awesome bridge
Communication for children to understand new
languages and to prepare them to be
actively involved in an interaction
and global communication. Stories
in the classroom will encourage
children to not be a passive learners
as they will come to interact will
each other. It also increase their
fluency and advance their content in
knowledge.

18
 Stories and Culture Stories can make students aware of
the diversity of cultures. It also
prepares children for openness,
awareness, tolerance, and
acceptance. Besides that, stories also
extend children point of view about
different people, countries, and
culture.
Stories and Predicting, guessing, and linking to
Cognition another topic include in telling
stories. In that case, that help
children to feel supported just by
reading the topic or listening to the
stories. By remembering and re-
telling plot of stories, children are
also helped in their cognitive and
social skills.
Stories, multiple Teaching stories increase children
intelligences and intelligence since stories are defined
individual learning as multimodal entities. It allows
styles children to move, to focus on
pictures, to listen to music and sing.
Focusing on interpersonal
environments, solving problems,
setting goals or expressing emotions
can be found by teaching stories.
Table 3. Storytelling of Each Principles (Ioannou-
Georgiou & Verdugo: pp. 2-4)

d. Choosing Stories

In order to teach using storytelling, teachers should

know how to choose stories appropriately. Choosing stories

are not easy. Teachers should know whether they should use

authentic stories or adapted stories.

There are number of consideration in selecting

stories. The students grade differs whether the material used

will be authentic or adapted. Not only grade but also age,

interest, and developmental level should also be considered.

19
 Ioannou-Georgiou & Verdugo (p. 5) have mentioned for

young learners, in particular, the selected stories should

have:

1. A clear storyline

2. Plenty of repetition

3. Opportunities for participation

4. Helpful illustration

5. Appropriate linguistic level

The five points above can be applied to older learners

also. Notwithstanding, as children grow older, selected

stories should not only be based on the appropriate language

level but also it can stimulate and attract them and meet the

demand of their particular interest.

e. Teaching Storytelling to Young Learners

Once an appropriate story is chosen, teachers need to

prepare how it will be taught in the classroom. There are few

stages teachers should consider while teaching storytelling;

stage one is before the lesson, stage two is during the lesson,

stage three is while the lesson and the last is after the lesson.

Ioannou-Georgiou & Verdugo have wrap them into a neat

teaching learning through storytelling.

20
Before the lesson

This stage will focus more on the teacher. The

teacher needs to decide whether the story will be narrated or

read to the children, whether the teacher will use media or

not. Teacher should prepare him/herself as teaching

storytelling will also mean maintaining eye-contact,

modifying the verbal input, enriching the vocal, facial

expression, and gestures.

The key of this stage should be a dummy run

rehearsal. Teacher should prepare him/herself as it is very

important since only reading the story will not help creating

good atmosphere and recognizing potential difficulties in

narrating a story. A rehearsal allows teacher to find a solution

when the story is rather difficult to be narrated such as

simplifying the sentences, using known words, or including

important information.

During the lesson

There are three stages included in this step: the pre-

storytelling, while-storytelling, and after-storytelling.

a. Pre-storytelling stage

This stage helps students to comprehend the story

which includes raising the interest and motivation of

the students so they can be focused more when the

21
 story is narrated. Pre-storytelling stage also prepares

the setting of the classroom, setting the scene and

creating the context for the story thus, students can use

their previous knowledge to better understand the

story. Also, if the story contains new vocabulary, this

stage is a good stage to introduce in order to make the

learning runs smoother.

b. While-storytelling stage

While-storytelling stage helps learners to be actively

involved in the learning process and also maintains

their attention and assist them in understanding the

story. In this stage, teachers can pick one of the

students to read stories and give like cue cards or

picture to complete a diagram or list base on the story.

Not only that, there are also movement which can be

applied while storytelling is narrated which more

suitable when students are listening to the second story

reading. It helps them to understand the story better.

Another example of while-storytelling stage is to give

the students masks relating to the characters so when

the story is narrated the students with the mask in the

character mentioned should stand up or perform certain

activities.

22
c. After-storytelling stage

The after-storytelling stage is where the students have

chance to further their knowledge or they can explore

further through content-related activities. This stage

also check their understanding of the story. After-

storytelling stage activities usually depends on the

plans of the teacher aims to achieve.

Ioannou-Georgiou & Verdugo gives the example in

their writing. The story was The Gruffalo by

Donaldson and Scheffler. This story helps to review the

various topic in plants and animals in the forest. A big

book and flashcards were used as the resources. Final

performance was conducted in the after-storytelling

activity which dramatized the story besides, it can

further consolidate the students knowledge in the area

under focus.

Another example of this stage is to produce or create

something. Students will enjoy this activity as they can

express their idea in this stage such as creating

jewellery for the character in the story or drawing based

on their imagination while still stick to the story.

23
 3. Related Research Studies

There are some researchers who conducted the same research area

which is action research. The research was conducted by the students of

Hasyim Asyari University, Mukminatus Zuhriyah, which is entitled

Storytelling to Improve Students Speaking Skill. This research resulted

that storytelling can improve students speaking comprehension, fluency,

vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation. It can be said that storytelling can

improve students speaking skill.

Another research was conducted by Novita Asmeri Br. Batubara,

Hadriana, Syafri K from Riau University entitled Using Story Telling

Technique to Improve the Speaking Ability of The Second Year Students of

SMK Muhammadiyah 2 Pekanbaru. The result said by storytelling,

students motivation and interest improved. Storytelling also improve their

ability to speak English in terms of grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation,

fluency, and comprehension. This study measured that the speaking skill of

the students were improved from 48.2 to 76.1 from the pre-test to the post-

test 2.

Connecting to this study, those researches have the same method with

this research. However, the field and the subject of the research are different.

Those researches conducted the research for high school students while this

research will be conducted for young learners in junior high school students.

Furthermore, this research will be conducted in Smpit Al-Kahairaat

Yogyakarta which is different from those previous researches.

24
B. Conceptual Framework

It has been discussed before that speaking is one of main skills

students should master. Besides that, speaking is also consider as a hard skill

as it happens in real time situation. Junior high school students are

sometimes lack of attention when they learn something. As the result of the

observation in Smpit Al-Khairaat Yogyakarta, students tend to ignore the

teachers talk and get busy with their own business. Furthermore, speaking

English maybe will sound awkward for them as in Indonesia teaching

speaking cannot be taught in elementary school so junior high school

students still have limited vocabulary and grammar knowledge. Else,

students have to deal with the different sounds in English.

For those reasons, teaching speaking cannot only focus on the

grammar or fluency rather it should focus on the all aspect of speaking.

Storytelling has been mentioned as a good technique to use in teaching

learning process. Previous study also mentioned that applying storytelling

technique can enhance students grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation,

fluency, and comprehension. In addition, Ioannaou-Georgiou & Verdugo

(p. 1) mentioned that stories also one of effective activities to develop

students essential principles such as language, content, communication,

cognition, and culture. It also enriches students creativity and skill as it the

end of the learning students can express their thought through the activities

such as drama, drawing, sing, making souvenir and so on.

25
 To improve speaking skill, the researcher finds that storytelling can

be a useful technique to be applied. It can give an improvement in the

students speaking skill as it is already used from time to time. The history

of storytelling also shown that it is very effective for teaching culture, social

connections, and joining different ideas. Storytelling will also increase

students interest in learning English as the materials or sources to teach

storytelling can be varied.

26
 CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHOD

This chapter covers the method of the research. It consist of type of the

research, setting of the research, subjects of the research, the schedule of the

research, instruments of the research, data collection technique, the validity and

reliability of the data and the procedure of the research.

A. Type of the Research

This research uses action research type. In this research, the

researchers aim is to improve students speaking skill. It is a process of

using research principles in which the educational process is applied to

improve the daily practice aspect in or outside the classroom.

It uses action research study because it tries to solve problems found

in teaching learning process which can lead students to have a better

speaking skill. Burns (1999; p. 10) stated that action research is aimed to

solve problem in social situation. Burns (2010; p. 2) also mentioned that

action research is a part, for some time, a broad of movement in education

generally.

This action research will involve English teacher and the researcher

herself. They will intend to improve students speaking skill in the teaching

learning process, especially with the storytelling technique. The researcher,

first, should conduct an observation and after observation, the researcher

will collect bunch of data which will be used to analyse the obstacle and

27
 weaknesses in the teaching learning English process. Then, the researcher

along with the teacher will work on action research.

The number of cycles will be based on the improvement of the target

language. There should be more cycles if there is no progress shown after

conducting the research. The process of the cycle can be seen in the picture

below.

Picture 1. Cyclical action research model based on Kemmis and

McTaggart.
B. Setting of the Research

There are three issues included in this part. First is place of the research,

second is schedule of the research, and the third is learning setting.

28
 1. Place of the Research

The research will be conducted at Smpit Al-Khairaat Yogyakarta. It

will involve the students of eight grade in academic year of 2017/2018.

2. Schedule of the Research

This research will be conducted in the first semester of the academic

year 2017/2018. It will be conducted from late August to late September

2017. In conducting the research, researcher will follow the schedule of

eight grade students of English class in Smpit Al-Khairaat Yogyakarta.

3. Learning Setting of the Research

The learning setting will be in the classroom and outside classroom.

In the classroom students will gather around as the story-teller will come

in front sit or stand up. Outside the classroom, it will be the same yet, it

will give different environment. In the first cycle of learning, researcher

will gives guideline of how the learning process will be conducted. Then

the presented story will be told using media such as pictures or videos.

In the next cycle, students will be asked to present their own story or

adapted story.

C. Subjects of the Research

The English teacher and the students of Smpit Al-Khairaat

Yogyakarta will be involved in this research. The subject of the research

will be the grade VIII students at Smpit Al-Khairaat Yogyakarta in the

academic year of 2017/2018.

29
D. Instruments of the Research

The researcher will use instruments which are:

1. Interview Guidelines

The interview guidelines will be used for the researcher as the

criterion to conduct the interview. It will cover the description of

speaking learning process, the difficulties of the speaking, and the

activities in the classroom.

2. Observation Guidelines

The observation guidelines will be used to guide the researcher in

the process of observation in classroom. The result of this guidelines

will be in form of field notes which recorded the data of the teaching

and learning sequence.

3. Photographic Data

The picture documentation will be the form of photographic data.

The researcher will work together with the collaborator to collect

pictures during the research process spontaneously. The picture data will

be taken using hand phone camera since it is easy and available in the

field.

4. Tests

Several test will be conducted in the research to measure the

improvement of students speaking skill. The test will be held during the

research implementation.

30
E. Data Collection Technique

The data will be qualitative and quantitative. The information on the

teaching and learning process of this research which is qualitative data will

be collected by observing the teaching process, interviewing the English

teacher and students. Moreover, the quantitative data will be collected from

speaking test scores.

1. Observation

Classroom observation will be used to know the real problem

existing in the class teaching and learning process. As the researcher will

conduct the research in grade VIII class, the researcher will take some

notes related to the students activities and behaviours in the teaching

learning process, English teachers action in the class, and the problems

which occur in the teaching learning process.

2. Interview

Interviews will be conducted as a support data for students speaking

ability improvement. It is also used by the researcher to know how far

students speaking ability is. The interview will be conducted before,

during, and after the implementation of the research.

3. Test

This test is being conducted to select how the individuals will behave

in an actual situation. This test is a shortcut to determine the behaviours

of the students in the set of situation (Tuckman, p. 165 as cited in Hanafi,

31
2010). In order to know the students way of using the target language

which is English, there will be two tests, pre-test and post-test. The

scoring of the test will base on the five aspects of speaking scoring:

grammar, vocabulary, comprehension, fluency, and pronunciation.

Scoring technique of the test

In the pre-test, the students will be given a conversational reading.

While the students read the dialogue, the researcher will measure their

speaking ability used the analytic scale. The analytic score has five items

and each items scores five and the maximum score is 25. However, the

maximum score will be multiplied with 4 so the final score will be 100.

The scoring rubric of the speaking ability is as follow:

Aspects Score Description

Grammar 1 Errors in grammar are frequent but can be
understood.
2 Can usually handle elementary
construction quite accurately but does not
have thorough of confident control of
grammar.
3 Control grammar is good and able to
speak the language with sufficient
structural accuracy.
4 Able to use the language accurately and
errors in grammar are quite rare.
5 Equivalent to that of an educated native
speaker.
Vocabulary 1 Speaking vocabulary inadequate to
express anything but most elementary
needs.
2 Has speaking vocabulary sufficient to
express himself.
3 Able to speak the language with
sufficient vocabulary and the vocabulary
is broad enough.

32
 4 Can understand and participate in any
conversation with a high degree of
precision vocabulary.
5 Speech on all levels is fully accepted by
an educated native speaker.
Comprehension 1 Within the scope of a very limited
language experience and can understand
simple questions and statements.
2 Can get the gist of most conversation of
non-technical subjects.
3 Comprehension is quite complete at a
normal rate of speech.
4 Can understand any conversation within
the range of his experience.
5 Equivalent to that of an educated native
speaker.
Fluency 1 Has poor fluency.
2 Can handle with confidence but not with
facility most social situations.
3 Can discuss particular interest of
competence with reasonable ease and
rarely has grope for words.
4 Able to use the language fluently on all
levels normally and can participate in any
conversations.
5 Has complete fluency in the language
such that his speech is fully accepted by
an educated native speaker.
Speaking 1 Errors in pronouncing the words are
frequent but can be understood.
2 Accent in intelligible though often quite
faulty.
3 Errors never interfere with understanding
and rarely disturb the native speaker.
Accent may be obviously foreign.
4 Errors in speaking are quite rare.
5 Equivalent to and fully accepted by an
educated native speaker.

Table 4. Based on Oral Proficiency Scoring Categories by Brown

(2001: pp. 406 407) as cited in Brown (2004: pp. 172 173).

While in the post-test, after the implementation of the research,

students will be given various activities including re-telling the stories

33
 of making up their own stories. Afterwards, the researcher will evaluate

the students speaking skill using the same scoring rubric.

F. Analysis of the Data

The data will be analyzed using reflections of the cycles which will

be conducted in the research. The fields notes and interview transcripts and

the photographs will be collected to be selected, simplified, and

summarized, to interpret the data in the reflection stage. Finally, the data

will be used to judge whether students give improvement in their speaking

skill or not by implementing storytelling technique.

G. Validity and Reliability of the Data

There will be two types of data in this research, qualitative and

quantitative data. In order to ensure the data, the researcher will bring the

five criteria of validity by Anderson et al. as cited in Burns (2010). The five

criteria are democratic validity, result validity, process validity, catalytic

validity, and dialogic validity.

First is democratic validity. This validity is done by interviewing.

The interview is done by the researcher to share opinions, comments, and

ideas related to the study.

Second, result validity will be done by measuring the result of each

cycle in the research. The solution of the result will be the option of the

satisfied test whether it is enough or still need to conduct another cycle.

34
 Then the process validity, it concerns with the dependability and the

competence of the research. It will be done by observing the teaching

learning process of the speaking skill and will be applied to validate the data.

Next, the catalytic validity will be conducted by interviewing the

English teacher and the students, also, by asking feedback from the students.

This validity functions to know the stakeholders response of the changes

that will happen in the research.

Finally, the dialogic validity will be conducted by having discussion

with the English teacher and the consultant to measure the thesis report

which will be presented in the discussion.

H. Research Procedure

This research will use research procedure as proposed by Kemmis

and McTaggart cited in Burns (2010: p. 7). There are four broad phases in

the cycle of the research. The first cycle is the continuing process and stages

will be going in a loop. For that reason, researcher must redo the process

until researcher satisfied with the result. The phases will be as follow:

1. Reconnaissance

Research will work with English teacher in this stage and identify

the existing problems regarding to speaking skill. After the problem is

identified, researcher will prepare a plan related to the problems which

the students face, especially on speaking skill.

35
2. Planning

In this stage, the problem issue is identified and the researcher

develops the plan in order to improve the specific skill of the research

context (Kemmis & McTaggart as cited in Burns, 2010: p. 8). The

researcher with the English teacher will do the identifying and decide

the action plan that is suitable in the field. After that, researcher will

prepare the technique and teaching material along with the instruments

to collect the data.

3. Observation

This phase requires researcher to observe on the effects of the action

and documenting the context, action, and opinion of the subject (ibid).

In this phase, researcher will require to collect a data about the current

situation. The data will be in form of notes and based on the data, the

researcher will implement the action plan in order to improve the

speaking skill.

4. Action

This stage is considered when the teaching situation will be matched

to apply the action (ibid). Thus, after the plan is agreed, researcher will

implement the action into the classroom. The actions will be

implemented in some cycles according to the satisfaction of the result.

5. Reflection

Finally, the researcher can reflect on, evaluate, and describe the

effects of the action plan and this happens to know the sense of what had

36
happened and to understand the issue of the experience that researcher

have (ibid).

This is the end of the phase. After the researcher finishes the research,

research is required to write a reflection. It is done to find out the result,

whether it is a successful result or not. If the result is successful, the

researcher and English teacher can still implement the actions. Yet, it is

a failure, researcher and English teacher can change or modify into more

suitable actions.

37
 REFERENCES

Burns, Anne. (1999). Action Research in Second Language: Teacher

Education. New York: Routledge.

Burns, Anne. (2010). Doing Action Research in English Language

Teaching. New York: Routledge.

Eck, Jill. (2006). AN ANALYSIS OF THE EFFECTIVENESSS OF

STORYTELLING WITH ADULT LEARNERS IN

SUPERVISORY MANAGEMENT. University of Wisconsin-

Stout. Retrieved from www.citeseerx.ist.psu.edu on

27/05/07

Ioannou-Georgiou, Sophie & Maria Dolores Ramirez Verdugo.

(____). Stories as a tool for teaching and learning in CLIL.

Retrieved from www.schools.ac.cy on 27/05/07

McKillop, Chris. (2004). StoriesAbout Assessment : supporting

reflection in art and design higher education through on-

line storytelling. The Robert Gordon University. (Presented

at NILE 2004 Edinburgh, Scotland) Retrieved from

www.citeseerx.ist.psu.edu on 27/05/07

McKillop, Chris. (2005). Storytelling grows up: using storytelling as a

reflective tool in higher education. The Robert Gordon

38
 University (presented at SERA 2005 Perth, Scotland)

Retrieved from www.desarrollodocente.uc.cl on 05/05/07

Richards, Jack C. (2008). Teaching Listening and Speaking From

Theory to Practice. USA: Cambridge University Press.

Shrouf, Dr. Fayzeh. (____). TEACHING AND IMPROVING

SPEAKING SKILL. Philadelphia University. Retrieved from

www.philadelphia.edu.jo on 11/11/16

Way, Joyce. (1997). Five Components of Effective Oral Language

Instruction. Dublin: PDST. Retrieved from www.pdst.ie on

11/8/16

Zuhriyah, Mukminatus. (2017). Storytelling to Improve Students

Speaking Skill. Hasyim Asyari University. Retrieved from

https://ejournal.radenintan.ac.id/index.php/ENGEDU on

27/05/07

Silabus Mata Pelajaran Sekolah Menengah Pertama/Madrasah

Tsanawiyah (SMP/MTs). 2016. Jakarta: Kementerian

Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan.

39