A correlational study between the students’ interest in game activities, vocabulary mastery, and their reading comprehension of seventh grade students of SMP N 8 Surakarta in academic year 2007/2008

Oleh :
Mahardhika A - - Fak. KIP

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study is to find out the correlation between (1) students’ interest in game activities and their reading comprehension; (2) students’ vocabulary mastery and their reading comprehension; (3) students’ interest in game activities and vocabulary mastery simultaneously and reading comprehension. The research was carried out at SMP N 8 Surakarta in June 2008. The population of this study was the seventh grade students of SMP N 8 Surakarta. The sample of the study was one of six classes, consisting of 40 students. The instruments in collecting the data were test and questionnaire. The test was used to get the data of vocabulary mastery and reading comprehension while the questionnaire was used to get the data of students’ interest in game activities. The technique used to analyze the data was Single and Multiple Regression and Correlation. The result of this analysis shows that (1) there is a positive correlation between Students’ Interest in Game Activities (X1) and their Reading Comprehension (Y), (2) there is a positive correlation between Vocabulary Mastery (X2) and Reading Comprehension (Y), and (3) there is a positive correlation between Interest in Game Activities(X1) and Vocabulary Mastery(X2) simultaneously and Reading Comprehension (Y) of the Seventh Grade Students of SMP N 8 Surakarta in academic year 2007/2008. The result of this study shows that coefficient of determination between X1 and Y is (0.4479)2 x 100 %. It means that 20.06 % variation of reading comprehension (Y) is determined by students’ interest in game activities (X1) and 79.94 % is influenced by other factors. The coefficient of determination between X2 and Y is (0.4605)2 x 100 %. It means that 21.21 % variation of reading comprehension (Y) is determined by vocabulary mastery (X2) and 78.79 % is influenced by other factors. The coefficient of determination between X1 and X2 simultaneously and Y is (0.5752)2 x 100 %. It means that 33.09 % variation of reading comprehension (Y) is determined by students’ interest in game activities (X1) and vocabulary mastery (X2) and 66.91 % is determined by other factors. It can be concluded that both students’ interest in game activities and vocabulary mastery are significant factors that cannot be neglected to improve reading comprehension. Regarding to the result of the study, the writer suggests that to improve reading comprehension, the teacher should consider students’ interest in game activities and their vocabulary mastery.