CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

Reading comprehension is a part of English that should be mastered as it is

very necessary. Reading comprehension is recognized as the foundation for future

learning. It indicates that if readers are not able to comprehend about what they

have read, it would be a trouble; as a result, they would get problem to achieve

information especially in English written form. Through reading, people do not

only understand about the text they are reading but also get certain information

that can support them to increase and extend their knowledge of aspects the text

talks about. Moreover, it can be a way to sharpen their creativity and critical

thinking in producing or making another reading comprehension texts.

According to Duffy (2009:5), real readers do something with what they

read. It means that the real readers should try to understand and catch the ideas of

the text that they are reading. Therefore, readers think reading is important when

they use reading to achieve a goal important to them, to achieve a purpose of

theirs, or to answer questions they want to answer. Consequently, motivation is

really important for the readers to do a reading activity. There must be a set of

goal of the reading activity to make them responsible with what they read. In

addition, there must be something to be achieved as the consequence of the

reading activity which can lead them to comprehend a text during the reading

activity. The readers should try to generate an information from the text that they

have read in order to gain their knowledge after the reading activity; to make their

reading activity worthwhile.

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Comprehension is not always about how fast the readers do reading

activity effortlessly but also, when people who do reading activity at beginning

time struggle over individual words, reading is slowed to near halt and deeper

levels of comprehension are seriously compromised. Chard et al. (2008:1) state

that comprehension is highly complex cognitive process involving the intentional

interaction between the reader and the text to create meaning. Reading

comprehension is also the ability to read text, process it, and understand its

meaning.

Furthermore, the purpose of reading is to comprehend or to get meaning of

certain written text but without comprehension it would be pointless practice of

word calling. Besides, reading has purpose to connect the ideas on the page to

what the readers already know. Furthermore, it should be mastered and owned by

the readers especially for the students; therefore, it should be exercised and

examined continuously in accordance to enhance the ability of comprehending

and understanding the information that they got.

As we know, every student has different ability in mastering reading

comprehension. Furthermore, teacher should know the ability of students whether

it has increased or not in every term in order to choose the most effective strategy

which is compatible in teaching learning process. Therefore, assessment needs to

be done in order to know the progress of the learning. One of the strategies to

measure reading comprehension is impromptu reading plus comprehension

questions tests. In fact, every proficiency test uses the format and one would

rarely think about assessing reading without components of the assessment

implicating impromptu reading and responding to questions.

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Based on the observation which had been done at SMAN 1 Mengwi by the

researcher, the English teachers of the eleventh grade students of SMAN 1

Mengwi usually used multiple choice test items to assess students’ ability in

reading comprehension. The teacher always used this to assess students’ ability in

reading comprehension; however, the teacher only assessed or gave questions

about the general information of the text

Therefore, the weakness of the test item which had been seen by the

researcher was the teacher mostly assessed general information of the passage that

was given to students. Furthermore, It was also found that the eleventh grade

students of SMAN 1 Mengwi had not been taught about finding and

distinguishing what are general information, specific information, textual

meaning, and textual reference from the passage. Moreover, they were not tested

on the four reading aspects which are very important in order to know how the

students’ ability in reading comprehension tests.

This study related with assessing the students’ reading comprehension.

The major purpose is to assess reading comprehension of the eleventh grade

students of SMAN 1 Mengwi in academic year 2017/2018. The students’ reading

comprehension ability was assessed by using impromptu reading plus

comprehension questions. The impromptu reading plus comprehension questions

included general information, specific information, textual meaning and textual

reference for each number of the questions.

Furthermore, Impromptu reading plus comprehension questions is

consistent with the strategies of affective reading comprehension: skimming for

main idea, scanning for detail, guessing word meaning from context, and etc. It

was given by the researcher in order to know the students’ ability in finding not
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only about general information but they would know how to find specific

information, textual meaning and textual reference from each text that would be

given by the teacher. Thus, this type of test would fairly assess the students’

ability especially in reading comprehension.

In conclusion, reading comprehension considered as an important skill that

should be mastered by students in accordance to understand the reading text.

Consequently, the researcher is motivated to do a scientific research entitled

“Assessing Reading Comprehension of the Eleventh Grade Students of SMAN 1

Mengwi in Academic Year 2017/2018 through Impromptu Reading Plus

Comprehension Questions.”

1.2 Research Problem

As what has been stated in the background of the study, to assess reading

comprehension, the teacher should provide a suitable test. The test itself should be

a measurement tool of how students’ ability in comprehending the texts or

passages that they have read. Based on the description above, the problem of the

research study can be formulated as follows: to what extent is the achievement of

reading comprehension of the eleventh grade students of SMAN 1 Mengwi in

academic year 2017/2018 which is assessed by impromptu reading plus

comprehension questions?

1.3 Objective of the Study

A scientific research is always supposed to answer the research problem,

for example, thesis writing is also intended to solve and respond the research

problem itself which has been formulated for the present study. In addition, in

accordance with the research problem which has been stated previously, the
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undertaking of present research is intended to figure out the level of reading

comprehension of the eleventh grade students of SMAN 1 Mengwi in academic

year 2017/2018 which is assesed by using impromptu reading plus comprehension

questions.

1.4 Limitation of the Study

In order to avoid a wide discussion about this topic, the research study

would be limited on assessing reading comprehension of the eleventh grade

students of SMAN 1 Mengwi in academic year 2017/2018 through impromptu

reading plus comprehension questions. The researcher limited his research in

order to make the research clear and keep on the right track. The texts that would

be used are narrative texts which sources from the internet as the students have

been taught this kind of text in English learning process especially in reading

learning process. In this study, reading comprehension was limited on identifying

general information, specific information, textual meaning and textual reference.

1.5 Significance of the Study

An investigation would be conducted in order to make the findings could

be used as properly as possible for the students and the teachers but at least it

should be useful for particular study being investigated. The findings of the study

would be expected to provide both theoritical and practical significance.

Theoretically, the findings of the investigation were really hoped to have

contribution and strengthen the reading theory that had been found specifically in

reading comprehension. The finding of the study would be also expected being an

empirical review for next researcher which would conduct related study with the
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present study. Thus, the researcher ought to get enough theories of reading

comprehension as their references in carrying out the research.

Practically, the finding of the study would be useful for teachers, students

and other researchers. For the English teachers, this finding would help to value as

feedback to improve their ability in teaching reading. These findings would help

to worth as feed back how successful they are in teaching reading comprehension

and they can use the available findings as a principal to design more efficient and

effective reading comprehension text instruction. On the other hand, the students

would know and understand how to comprehend a reading passage; this study is

expected to motivate the students to elevate and learn their ability in

comprehending a passage. Moreover, for other researcher, hopefully it would be

useful in accordance to be additional reference for his/her study which might be

related with this study. Furthermore, the other researcher might know the

significance and the usage of reading for communication in another purpose and

contexts in literate society.

1.6 Definition of Key Term

The terms which was used in scientific approach might appear or sounds

complicated. In accordance to avoid them from misunderstanding among readers,

it was intended to clarify what the terms were. Moreover, the researcher needed to

define key terms operationally which was used in this study. The key terms were

defined conceptually and operationally as follows:

1 Reading Comprehension

Reading Comprehension was operationally defined as the ability of the

eleventh grade students of SMAN 1 Mengwi in academic year 2017/2018

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in understanding reading text especially in identifying general information,

specific information, textual meaning and textual reference.

2 Impromptu Reading plus Comprehension Questions

Impromptu Reading plus Comprehension Questions is a type of reading

test which includes a typical reading comprehension passage and there are

around five until ten question for each passage. The comprehension

questions are in form of multiple choice test. The options on multiple

choice tests are 5 options (A, B, C, D, E) and there is only one correct

answer.