MYRA DESMAYENNI THE RELATION BETWEEN STUDENTS’ READING SCORE AND THEIR MOTIVATION

Second Language Acquisition Assignment

(THE RELATION BETWEEN STUDENTS’ READING SCORE AND THEIR MOTIVATION)

Arraged by:

MYRA DESMAYENNI (0813042038)

English Department ( S1 Regular )

  

ENGLISH STUDY PROGRAM

DEPARTMENT OF LANGUAGE AND ARTS EDUCATION

THE FACULTY OF TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION

LAMPUNG UNIVERSITY

2011

I. INTRODUCTION

Motivation is very important in learning because learning will be more effective and efficient if it is used by motivation especially motivation which comes from inside. Learning can be shown by a change in behavior as a result of experience through observing, imitating, listening, and reading. Motivation is also an important aspect in the area of all English skill. One might be said has strong motivation if he/she takes a part in reading since in learning process, the most urgently needed is reading skill. No one reads a book without having motivation that pushes and moves him to read. On the contrary, one who have no motivation might not practice to read then might rarely train himself to make sense of the idea of the text in which it might influence his English abilities especially in reading ability. In the other words, his reading ability might be stagnated even get worse.

The aim of teaching learning English in school is that the students will develop English language skills of listening, speaking, reading, and writing in thematic situation. While the 1994 English curriculum in target language both spoken and written. This condition is less useful for the students because of the limited time in teaching learning in class. Facing such situation, the English teacher should always motivate their students to use English in wider environment. In the other words, the English teacher must motivate their students to learn English effectively in any possible opportunity, for example to motivate the students to read some English texts.

The fact that found might indicate of students’ low reading motivation. So, researcher tries to relate between students’ reading score and their motivation in learning English at SMPN 15 Bandarlampung.

II. FRAME OF THEORIES

Huit (2001:1) said that “motivation refers to an internal state (sometimes described as a need, desire, or want) that serves to activate or energize behavior and give it direction”. He also said that “most motivation theorists assume that motivation is involved in the performance of all learned responses, that is, a learned behavior will not occur unless it is energized by motivatiion’. According to David McClelland (1985) in Hamachek (1994:276), “Motivation is associated with a need for achievement”. Moreover, according to Atkinson and Raynor (1978) in Hamachek (1994:276) “motivation stems from a need to avoid failure”. Thus, motivation seems as a power that activates the students’ performance to achieve the goal and to avoid failure in order to be successful.

According to Hamachek (1994:278) there are two types of motivation:

1.      Extrinsic Motivation

Extrinsic Motivation is a power that makes someone do something that comes from outside factor. It is fueled by the anticipation and expectation of some kind of payoff from an external source (e.g. a dollar for every A). For instance, when students work hard to get their parent’s reward, or gain teacher’ praise, or even earn high grade, it seems that their motivation is primarily outside themselves.

2.      Intrinsic Motivation

Contrast to Extrinsic Motivation, Intrinsic Motivation is a power that makes someone does something that comes from himself. It is fueled by one’s own feeling of personal satisfaction or accomplishment).  For example, when students study because they enjoy the subject and desire to learn it, it seems that their motivation is primarily intrinsic; their reasons for learning reside primarily inside themselves.

Hamachek also stated that there are three important functions of motivation:

1.      Energizing us ( i.e., turning the key and starting the motivational engine).

2.      Directing us (i.e., pointing us in a particular direction).

3.      Helping us to select behavior most appropriate for achieving our goals.

Thus, it can be inferred that motivation pushes one to do something. In terms of reading, the first function of motivation might push one to read. Then the second function of motivation might make one to be more concern on his reading purpose. For example his reading purpose is to find a pleasure, he might only pay attention to the text which consists of pleasure. Then the last function of motivation might reflect of how he deals with the text or how he trains himself to be able to make sense the idea of the text easily.

RELATION BETWEEN READING MOTIVATION AND READING ABILITY

It is true that the students must have a motivation to learn, because the students might not engaged learning if they do not have motivation. This statement is supported by Brown (1980:112) who states that “motivation is the most often used to catch all the terms for explaining the success or failure or virtually and complex task”. Therefore, it can be stated that success in a task is simply due to that someone is motivated.

Considering reading as one of language learning skills, the writer assumes that motivation is also important aspect in reading in which it might influence the students reading ability. This is supported by Bamford (1998: 27) who says that “unless students have a motivation they will be able to read a book with understanding, they will most likely not begin the undertaking”. In the other words, by having strong motivation one might read. And this will affect the students reading ability. It can be assumed that by having motivation, students might engage and do more practice in reading.  It seems that motivation in reading may affect the students ability. In short, the higher the students’ reading motivation, the more they might read. The more they read, the more they might train themselves to make sense of the text. And the more they make sense of idea of the text, the better their reading ability. Therefore, researcher assumes that the higher the students’ motivation in reading is, the better their reading ability might be.

III. DATA ANALYSIS

In this research, researcher measured the correlation between two variables.

a.       Independent variable (X)

Motivation in reading is classified as an independent variable because it is assumed that motivation in reading has an influence toward the reading achievement.

b.      Dependent variable (Y)

Reading achievement is classified as dependent variable that is assumed that reading achievement is influenced by motivation in reading.

Score of X variable shows the students’ response which is divided into two parts. First, item numbers from 1 to 10 are used to investigate how strong the students’ motivation is and it has an ordinal scale. Second, item number 11 to 20 are used to investigate which sort of motivation contributes to the students’ reading ability and it has nominal scale. While scores of Y variable shows the students’ reading scores and it has an interval scale. Then, in analyzing the data, the researcher uses the results of motivation questioner and reading test. Researcher uses the correlation of Kendal Tau to investigate whether there is any significant relation between reading motivation and reading ability, and she uses the following formula:

             ∑A -  ∑B

t  =         N(N-1)

                  2

Where,             t  = Kendal Tau Coefficient correlation

            ∑A = sum of the upper rank

∑B = sum of the lower rank

N = sum of the sample

(Sugiyono, 2000:237)

Score of motivation in reading

Interval score	Category	Number of students	Percentage
30-23 22-18 17-10	High Medium Low	15 35 10	25% 58% 17%

In scoring the students’ reading motivation from number 1 to 10, researcher used the Likert scale from 1 to 3 so that the highest score is 30 and the 10. It was found that 25% students have high reading motivation, 58% have medium motivation and 17% students have low motivation in reading. From the table can be seen that more than half of second year students’ of SMPN 15 Bandarlampung have medium reading motivation.

KENDAL TAU CORRELATION

NO.	Reading Motivation	Reading Ability	R1	R2	Sum of Ru	Sum of RI
1	26	80	1	1	59	0
2	26	75	2	4	56	2
3	25	80	3	2	57	0
4	25	75	4	5	55	1
5	25	75	5	6	54	1
6	25	70	6	10	50	4
7	25	65	7	17	43	10
8	24	80	8	3	52	0
9	24	75	9	7	51	0
10	24	65	10	18	42	8
11	24	60	11	23	37	12
12	24	60	12	24	36	12
13	23	70	13	11	45	2
14	23	65	14	19	39	7
15	23	60	15	25	35	10
16	22	75	16	8	44	0
17	22	70	17	12	42	1
18	22	70	18	13	41	1
19	22	70	19	14	40	1
20	22	65	20	20	37	3
21	22	60	21	26	34	5
22	22	60	22	27	33	5
23	21	75	23	9	37	0
24	21	70	24	15	36	0
25	21	65	25	21	35	2
26	20	70	26	16	34	0
27	20	65	27	22	32	1
28	20	60	28	28	31	0
29	20	60	29	29	30	0
30	20	60	30	30	29	0
31	20	55	31	34	25	3
32	20	50	32	43	13	11
33	20	50	33	44	12	11
34	20	50	34	45	11	11
35	20	50	35	46	10	11
36	20	50	36	47	9	11
37	19	60	37	31	23	0
38	19	60	38	32	22	0
39	19	60	39	33	21	0
40	19	55	40	35	20	0
41	19	50	41	48	12	7
42	19	50	42	49	11	7
43	19	50	43	50	10	7
44	19	50	44	51	9	7
45	18	55	45	36	15	0
46	18	55	46	37	14	0
47	18	55	47	38	13	0
48	18	50	48	52	8	3
49	18	40	49	60	0	11
50	18	45	50	59	0	10
51	17	55	51	39	9	0
52	17	55	52	40	8	0
53	17	50	53	53	5	2
54	17	50	54	54	4	2
55	17	50	55	55	3	2
56	17	50	56	56	2	2
57	17	50	57	57	1	2
58	17	50	58	58	0	2
59	16	55	59	41	1	0
60	13	55	60	42	0	0
	Total				1537	210

            ∑Ru - ∑RI

     t =     N(N-1)

                   2

              1537 – 210  

      t =       6(60 – 1)       =   1327  =       1327          = 0.75

                      2                           30(59)         1770     

Ho = There is a significant relation between students’ motivation and their reading score

Ha = There is no any significant relation between students’ motivation and their reading score

Because the coefficient correlation is t is 0.75, it means that there is a relation between students’ motivation and their reading score.

RELATION BETWEEN STUDENTS’ READING MOTIVATION AND THEIR READING ABILITY

Using Kendal tau correlation (Sugiono, 2000:237), it was found that the coefficient correlation between students’ reading motivation and their reading ability is 0.75. and the z found is higher that z table (8.5> 3.1> 2.59), it means that there is a strong positive significant relation between the students’ reading motivation and their reading ability. Relation in this research means that reading motivation as independent variable influences reading ability as dependent variable, which is called asymentry relation (Azwar, 1988:424). Thus it can be said that if the students have high reading motivation, their ability might be high too. And the result shows that the students, who have high reading motivation, get high score in reading comprehension test. This condition is as a result of students’ motivation that forces them to read. By reading a lot, they are used to train themselves to make sense of the idea of the text. In the other words, they sharp their reading ability through reading. It means that reading motivation relates to reading ability.

VI. DISCUSSION

Based on the results discussed above, it was found that many students have medium reading motivation. And they also comprehend reading because as many as 52% students’ reading scores are higher than 60. Moreover, the coefficient correlation found is 0.75. This proves that there is a strong positive relation between students’ reading motivation and their reading ability. It means that higher the students’ reading motivation is, the higher their reading ability will be. From the research findings, we may make an analysis that motivation is an important aspect in reading because it pushes students to read. Moreover, motivation is also useful to force the students to achieve their goal. In the terms of reading the students’ goal is to make sense of the idea of the text or to extract the implicit and explicit information from the text. In short, by having string motivation one will read, then he will be used to train himself to make sense of the idea of the text easily and this will affect his reading ability. So it is clear that reading motivation has strong relationship to students reading score.

V. CONCLUSION

There is a significant relation between students’ reading score and their reading motivation. If the students have high score in reading, their reading motivation is high too. It means that motivation is very important in teaching learning of reading since it will facilitate the students to read and make sense of the idea of the text that can result a good comprehension in reading. Thus, this affects to their score as we se their reading score above. In the other words, the better the students’ reading score is, the stronger motivation they have.