CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

In this chapter, the researcher presents about background of the research,

problem of the research, objective of the research, research hypothesis, assumption,

significant of the research, scope of the study, and definition of key terms.

1.1 Background of The Study

Speaking skill is really need for someone who are study a language to be

able to communicate with another student, especially for students who are learning

English as Foreign Language. There is some problem faced by the teacher when

teaching English such as “Which strategy that is the best improving students

speaking skill?” and “Why some of the students who are learning English as a

Foreign Language afraid to speak up?”. There are some strategies that is stated and

reputed by some researcher can develop students speaking skill that can be used by

the teacher to improve students speaking ability.

The researcher already read some journal article that discuss about speaking

skill and about some strategy that can improve speaking ability. Here, the researcher

provides some result from researchers that already conducted a research.

Nurdevi Bte Abduh (2013) conducted a research to know whether or not the

use of Information Gap activities improves students’ accuracy in speaking skill that

cover three elements of accuracy; vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar; and to

know whether or not the use of Information Gap activities can improve the speaking

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and reading ability. This research applied a quasi-experimental design, the non-

equivalent control group design. The data obtained from the test was analyzed

quantitatively and then its’ result was compared with t-table to know whether they

were significantly different or not. The data showed students’ mean score of

accuracy in speaking skill and literal comprehension in reading skill improved after

teaching by using Information Gap activities. In experimental class, the students’

accuracy of pretest was 1.55 and improved to be 3.06 in posttest, students’ literal

comprehension of pretest was 0.82 and posttest was 3.21. In control class, the

students’ accuracy was 1.90 for pretest and 2.32 for posttest; students’ literal

comprehension was 1.63 for pretest 2.27. These findings indicate that the mean

score of posttest was greater than pretest for that both class. However, the students’

mean score in experimental was greater than control class where accuracy

(3.06>2.37) and literal comprehension (3.21>2.27). The result the of the research

was that implementing Information Gap activities were effective to improve the

students’ speaking and reading skills.

Mashur (2015) tried to investigating the effect of information gap technique

and achievement motivation toward the Reading ability of the tenth grade students

of MA NW Darussolihin Kalijaga. Designed as an experimental study, it examined

a sample of two classes of grade ten students of MA NW Darussolihin Kalijaga.

Cluster random sampling technique was used to take the sample. The data were

collected through a reading test and questionnaire of achievement motivation and

analyzed by using two-way ANOVA analysis and Tuckey test. The result,

information gap technique is more effective than conventional technique for

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teaching reading either for high achievement motivation students or for those with

low achievement motivation students.

Safieh Fallahi (2015) conduct a research about the implementation of

information gap in reading activity. In order to address this issue, a quantitative

research conducted on two randomly selected intact classes at Mohadese School in

Kermanshah. Classes assigned as experimental group and control group. It was

hypothesized that the students taught according to the information-gap tasks would

score higher in the posttest than in the pre-test and that there would be statistically

significant differences at the confidence level of.05 between the post-test mean

scores of the experimental group and the control group. At the end of the

experiment, a post-test was assigned to both groups to determine whether the

information-gap tasks had positively affected the students' reading comprehension

abilities. The experiment lasted for sixteen sessions. The study has revealed that:

(1) the information-gap tasks had a positive effect on the students' reading

comprehension; (2) the experimental group obtained higher scores in the post-test

than in the pre-test, making the difference between the pre-test and post-test scores

statistically significant.

Merita Ismaili & Lumturije Bajrami (2016) conducted a research about

Information Gap can improve speaking skill in elementary school. She tried to find

that the information gap can foster the speaking skill and find the students

perception about the activities. The researcher used quasi-experimental design to

find the answer of her research problem. She used questionnaire in order to collect

the students’ perception and feel about the activity and an oral exam to collect the
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data in order to see the effect of Information Gap Activity. The research conducted

on a sample of two different group those are an experimental group and control

group taught by conventionally. A pre-test and post-test activity have been held to

assess the effect of information gap activities on students speaking skill. The

teachers given three minutes to the students to explain the material. The result was

based on the rubric that already created by the teacher. There is significant

improvement on students speaking skill. The result can bee seen on the students’

progress in the class and from the oral exam scores. Then, the researcher think that

the research of Information Gap can improve speaking ability.

Fahimeh Akhoundbaba (2016) conduct a research about information gap

can improve students reading comprehension. The research aimed to investigate the

impacts of using information gap tasks on developing reading skill and their effects

on motivation. To this aim, 56 learners were selected by the researcher randomly.

Two groups were determined: the experimental group and the control group. The

treatments of this study were information gap tasks. The study was collected data

from multiple sources through: a) OPT test, b) motivation questionnaire, and c)

information-gap tasks, and d) pre-test and post-test. For analyzing the data, the

Wilcoxon-Signed Rank Test was run for the pretest-posttest comparison of the

reading based on information gap tasks in the experimental group. The Independent

Samples T-Test was run for the posttest comparison of the motivation between the

control and the experimental groups. The results of the study revealed that that

information gap task did not have any statistically significant effect on reading

comprehension and motivation of Iranian intermediate EFL learners.

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Rini Venta Almira et al (2017) conduct a research about Information Gap

technique. The research was examined whether or not the use of information gap

technique can improve students’ performance in English speaking ability and helps

teachers in teaching speaking. The research design used in this study is

experimental quantitative research. The population in this study is the ninth grade

students in SMPN 13 Banda Aceh. There were five classes of ninth grade students.

There are around 25 students in each class. The number of research population was

125 students. The writer refers to alternative hypothesis (Ha) and null hypothesis

(Ho). The level of significant is 5% (α = 0.05). The sample of this experiment was

26. The degree of freedom (df) was N-1= 26-1 = 25 is 1.71. The obtained t-score

was 11.75. The result of t-score was higher that t-table (t = 11.75 > t table = 1.71).

The (Ha) is accepted, and the (Ho) is rejected. The improvements could be seen

from the result of the final result test. The result of students’ pre-test was 1140 and

the result of students’ post-test was 1745. It could be concluded that the different

of students’ score after the treatment gave a good impact for students’ speaking

skill. The result of the implementation of information gap can give a significant

improvement to the students. It explicitly means that information gap can be one of

alternative techniques used by teacher in teaching English particularly in teaching

speaking.

Based on the journal article that have been read by the researcher above, the

researcher thinks a research about Information Gap need to research again because

the researcher wants to know that Information Gap can give contribution to improve

students reading ability on another level of students especially for beginner level
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students or elementary students. Information Gap does not only used for reading

but also for writing listening and speaking. The reason why the researcher tries to

implement a research about Information Gap and Reading Ability because reading

ability can be score as an objective. So, the researcher can analyze the students’

improvement based on the fact but not the assumption from the researcher. Here,

the researcher also read from a lot of journal article about Information Gap, the

researcher cannot find more research about Information Gap and Reading Ability

but there are many research about information gap and speaking ability. So, it is

need to be verified that Information Gap can improve students reading

comprehension ability and there is a research show that information gap not

significantly give impact in improving students reading ability. The researcher also

wants to know about their perception on learning English, because the Elementary

students in Indonesia have an obligation in learning or studying another subject for

their final examination because English is a local content. The researcher chooses

the beginner level or elementary school because the researcher teaching in

elementary school and already know about the background, attitude and etc. about

the students. So here, the researcher tries to find the impact of information gap on

elementary students reading comprehension ability and the researcher also has

assumption about gender also impact the result of this research.

1.2 Problem of The Research

Based on the background above, the researcher creates some research

question about Information Gap activity can improve students reading ability.
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1. Do the information gap have a good impact on students reading comprehension

ability?

2. Do gender also affect the students achievement?

1.3 Objective of the research

Based on the problem of the research, the researcher creates some objective:

1. To know the impact of information gap on students reading ability.

2. To know gender also can give an impact on students’ achievement.

1.4 Research Hypothesis

The researcher creates a general hypothesis based on the background and

research questions.

“The students who taught by information gap has better achievement that the

students who taught by conventional method”

1.5 Assumption

The researcher also has a assumption that there are another factor influence

students achievement such as students attitude while teaching and learning process.

To find the answer of this assumption the researcher give questionnaire to the

students.
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1.6 Scope of the research

The researcher tries to limit the research scope. The researcher only focuses

on the use of information gap on elementary students and the subject of this research

was only sixth grade of elementary students in malang. The school is SD

Muhammadiyah 1 Malang. The researcher tries to find that the gender can also give

the impact in the achievement.

1.7 Significance of the research

This research is expected to give many benefits both theoretically and

practically.

1. Theoretically

Theoretically, this research is expected to be beneficial to the world of

teaching and learning at schools that learning EFL. The researcher hopes that this

researcher can be a reference to the teacher who have difficulties in teaching reading

especially in elementary school.

2. Practically

Practically, this research will give some knowledge about teaching and

learning way and the writer expects that the research can contribute to the

development of teaching and learning technique and method.

1.8 Definition of key term

The writer clarifies the key terms to avoid a mistake in understanding about

the content above:

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1.8.1 Information Gap

Information gap is a technique or method or activity that will used by the

researcher to improve students reading ability. In these activities, individual

students do not have all of the information needed to achieve the activity’s goal,

which creates a ‘gap’ that can only be overcome by exchange students information.

The missing information required to complete the activity can be facts, opinion, or

details related to text, audio or visual content.

1.8.2 Reading Comprehension Ability

A student’s ability to understand the context, meaning, message,

information from the text or context. Reading comprehension is an intentional,

active, interactive, process that occurs before, during and after a person reads.

1.8.3 Gender

Based on the scope of this research and the background of the research.

Gender can be defined as a sex that have different ability or skills and attitude that

can affect the teaching learning process.

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