Through Student Teams-Achievement Divisions Method “ (An Action Research At The Eighth Grade Of Smp N 8 Surakarta In The Academic Year 2011/2012)

Oleh :
Cycas Lucky Handono Yudo - K2208029 - Fak. KIP

The objectives of the research are: (1) to identify whether and to what extent STAD method can improve students’ learning English motivation; (2) To describe strength and weakness of implementing STAD in this research. The method used in this research was a classroom action research. The research was conducted in two cycles at the VIII-B grade of SMP N 8 Surakarta from April to June in the academic year of 2011/2012. There are two kinds of data: qualitative and quantitative data. The qualitative data were collected using observation, questionnaire and interview. Then, the quantitative data were collected using tests (pre-test and post-test). Qualitative data were analyzed using the five stages suggested by Burns (1999: 157-159) as follows: assembling the data, coding the data, comparing the data, building interpretation, and reporting the outcomes. The quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. The research findings show that the use of STAD can improve students’ motivation in learning English. The improvements of students’ motivation were that: (1) the students got engaged in certain activities; (2) they knew their goal of their effort; (3) they were more active with games and quiz given to them; (4) they were more focused to the lesson; (5) they listened to the teacher direction in the lesson. Besides, the improvement of students’ motivation can be seen from the improvement of mean score of questionnaire that asked about their motivation (60. 72) before action, in cycle 1 62.03, and cycle 2 63.03. The researcher also found the other improvement in reading comprehension. The improvements were that (1) the students were able to identify the generic structure of the text, (2) the students were able to identify language feature of the text recount and (3) the students were able to determine the reference word in the text recount, and (4) the students were able to identify specific information. The improvement of students’ reading comprehension can also be seen from the improvement of mean score of pre-test (59.75), test in cycle 1 69.25, and post test of cycle 2 74.38. There are some weakness and strength in implemented this research. The strength was that (1) STAD used prize and reward to increase students’ motivation in learning; (2) STAD could be implemented by the teacher in all English skills; (3) STAD makes the students more active in the lesson; (4) STAD could be supported with various teaching media; (5) STAD had simple steps in teaching procedures. The weakness of the implementation of this method was that (1) STAD needed more cost to prepare the prizes and rewards; (2) STAD needed more attention from the teacher to supervise the students’ group; (3) STAD needed more preparation before the method is implemented; (4) STAD was implemented more effectively in small classes than in big classes. vii Based on the result of the research, it can be concluded that STAD method can improve students’ motivation. Therefore, it is recommended that teachers can use STAD method as a good alternative method to improve the students’ motivation in learning English.