IMPROVING STUDENTS’ READING COMPREHENSION OF NARRATIVE TEXT BY ACTIVATING GROUP WORK

Abstract

This study was designed to improve students’ reading comprehension of
narrative text by activating group works. This study is categorized as the
Classroom Action Research (CAR) method in which to indetify and to
solve the problem on students’ reading comprehension. Reading is the
most essential skill for the students’ success in learning English. However,
there are still many problems faced by students in reading activities. In
the Group Work Teaching Strategy activities, the students were trained to
make predictions, clarifications, questions, and summaries. In the
implementation of the strategies, students worked in small group. This
study was conducted in one cycle with fifth meetings. There were 32
students, consisted of 16 males and 16 females. The Grouping Work
Teaching Strategy that was implemented in teaching reading covered
four strategies: predicting, clarifying, questioning, and summarizing. The
finding showed that the students’ ability in reading comprehension had
improved from individual to grouping. It could be seen that the students’
involvement during the discussion in group improved 84%. Furthermore,
in the reading test, the students were able to show their progress from
52% to 85%. The result of this study will provide English teachers and
alternative strategy.