CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION
This chapter
presents the background
of the study,
the problems of the
study,
the objectives of
the study, the
significance of the
study, the scope
and limitation of the study, and
the definition of the key terms.
1.1 Background of the Study Reading
is a means
of requiring knowledge
and information. Through reading,
we can get
various information from
any written text,
such as books, newspaper,
advertisements, etc. Reading
is very important
activity because as common saying
that reading is the window
of the world.
It means that
we can know what is happening and happened in this
world. We can also get up to date issues
that published around
us by reading.
Moreover, our religion
has commanded us to read, which
is stated on Surah Al-‘Alaq verse 1: Meaning: “Proclaim!
(Or read!) in the name
of Thy lord
and Cherisher, who created”
It can be concluded that the verse above suggests people to read in order to get
knowledge. Since gain
knowledge is got
from reading activities.
Then, we apply knowledge that we got in our life for
doing interaction with other and be 1 13 aware of
the situation that
happened in our
surrounding. Furthermore, we can
increase our curiosity in different
field of the study.
Concerning with the importance of reading,
Nunan (2003: 68) states that reading is
a fluent process of readers combining information from a text and their own background knowledge to build meaning.
This is in line with the statement of McWhorter (2004:
2) who defines
that reading is
thinking. She also
says that reading
is an active
process of identifying
important ideas and
comparing, evaluating, and
applying them. Now,
reading has become
one of the
primary needs for
everybody because by
reading she or
he can improve
her or his knowledge.
From the definition of reading
above, it can be concluded that reading is very
important in our
daily lives. However,
most of the readers
face many problems
to comprehend text,
especially English text.
To comprehend the
text, there are three aspects
which are crucial to know. They are rhetoric, language, and content. Rhetoric aspect contains how the
author conveys his or her ideas using some
clues likes argumentation, description and narration. Then, language aspect contains about word recognition, vocabulary
and grammatical feature. Meanwhile, the
last aspect is content that includes topic, main idea, and author’s point of
view.
Three aspects
above are very
significant in comprehending
text. Besides, the readers
can use other ways to comprehend the text.
As Johan (1999: 1) states that there are
five fundamental reading
skills in comprehending
text, they are:
(1) deducing the
meanings of word
from context, (2)
understanding the forms
and meanings of non-idiomatic
phrases, (3) understanding sentence meaning through 2 14 syntactical structures, (4) recognizing and
understanding rhetorical structures, and (5) critical reading skills.
One of
five fundamental reading
skills above is
much related to
this research. That
is deducing the
meanings of word
from context. To
deduce the meanings
from context, we must be
able to
know words or phrases
that follow words or phrases mentioned. Next, we are able
to comprehend function of word, word
classes, and meaning of the word. In reading atext, the meaning of difficult or
unfamiliar word can
be deduced without
opening dictionary. It
means that, discovering
the meaning can
be through the
Context Clues given
by the writer which is commonly in the form of synonym,
contrast,and other forms.
Eanes (1997:338)
defines that Context
Clues refer to
the use of surrounding word,
sentence, and paragraph
meaning to decode
words or determine their meanings. Besides, Vacca, et
al (1991:270) states that readers use Context
Clues to identify words they have heard butmay not have experienced visually in print. Furthermore, Laugheed
(1984: 3) defines that Context Clues is unfamiliar
words can sometimes
be understood by
context. In addition,
Spears (2000:98) states
that the word
“context” refers to
the way a
word is used
in a particular sentence or passage, while “the
clues” are other words or phrases that help
reveal the meaning of a word we are unsure of.Context Clues divided into two
types. They are
the use of
Syntactic Clues and
the use of
Semantic Clues (Robinson: 1976). In contrast, Spears (2000:
98) divided Context Clues into four general types:
Synonym, Antonym, Example,
and Situation Clues.
By using Context Clues, people can comprehend reading
text easily, for example, they can 3 15 read
efficiently because they do not need to open dictionary in finding unknown or unfamiliar words.
The phenomena
above have driven
the researcher to
analyze Context Clues. There are three reasons why the
researcher is interested in this topic, first, to
motivate us that
the use of
Context Clues is
very important to
sharpen our reading skill to be a good reader. Second, to
drillour skill in comprehending text using context clues. Third,
to croak clues are implied by the
authors in reading text so that we are able to comprehend text
briefly.
Based on
those reasons above,
the researcher chooses
BARRON’S TOEFL IBT book as an
object of this research. Most of people in public opinions argue
that BARRON’S TOEFL
book is more
complete than others (http://www.urch.com/forums/members/madpharm.html). Moreover,
BARRON’S TOEFL is
considered as important
requirement for achieving
scholarship in different
field of studies
(http://scholarship-position.com/category/toeflpreparation/).
There is one study related to
this research. It is Kusumarasdyati’s research (1996)
that focused on
the Use of
Context Clues by
the Students of
English Department of IKIP (UM) Malang in Reading Comprehension. She
found kinds of Context
Clues used by the students
of English Department
of The State University of Malang
(UM), those are Syntactic
and Semantic Clues. However, she just analyzed kinds of Context Clues in
general.
In short,
compared with the
previous research above,
this research has different
discussion although in similar field. This research focuses on analyzing 4 16 reading text using Context Clues by Robinson
and Spear’s theory. As a student, we
need to be aware to some of linguistics phenomena. The researcher needs to be sensitive
that those phenomena
will be appearing
on another form, even
in the form
of comprehending text.
That is why;
this research is
important to be researched
because it becomes the
starting point to understand one
of linguistic phenomena. Besides, it
becomes effort for us to enrich our knowledge in different field of studies, especially in Context Clues
perspectives. Then, the researcher is interested
in conducted this research entitled “CONTEXT CLUES IN READING TEXTS OF ‘BARRON’S TOEFL IBT’ BOOK”.
1.2 Problems of the Study The problems of the study are stated as
follows: 1. What
are kinds of
Context Clues in
Reading Texts of “BARRON’S TOEFL IBT” book? 2. How
are the impacts of the use of Context Clues used in Reading Texts of “BARRON’S TOEFL IBT” book? 5 17 1.3 Objectives of the Study In relation to the research problems of this
research, the researcher intends to
solve the problems above briefly. The purposes of this study are as follows: 1. To
find kinds of Context Clues in Reading Texts of “BARRON’S TOEFL IBT” book.
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar