THE USE OF ENGLISH COMICS TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ ABILITY
IN STORY RETELLING
A. Background
English is an
important means of communication, which is used by many countries in this
world. It plays an important role as an international language. This is why the
Indonesian government chooses English as the first foreign language to be
taught in schools (Ramelan, 1992:3). English is introduced as a compulsory
subject to be taught from the seventh year of Junior High School up to the
twelfth year of students and as a local content subject in Elementary school.
The writer wants to
discuss one of the many problems connected with English learning. English
learning problems can take place both at home and at school. The teacher and
the students are different, and therefore, we might find different motivations
for learning as well. At school, the problems may appear when the class
consists of a big number of students. The noisy class does not only disturb the
students who really want to study, but also influence the students’ concentration
to the subject given in class. The condition like this can make the students
feel bored and do not like to study. At home, the problems may appear
when they recall the subjects from school and they still
do not understand the lesson and none of the people at home can help them. If
this condition continues they will feel very bored and not interested in
studying English. In this case the teacher’s role is very important, that is to
encourage them to study harder and better.
In addition, students’
problems are not only from the classroom environment but also from the students
themselves. The reality we often see is that, in fact, many students master the
theory better than practice. For example, in speaking, they may have the
knowledge of how to speak, but in practice they find difficulties. They lack
self confidence. To build their confidence, students need more practice so that
teachers are suggested to create and use interesting method. One of such the
methods is story retelling. Generally, story retelling is liked by the students
because they like stories. It is also an appropriate method for the
students at their age.
In order to make
story retelling more interesting, good media are needed. The term ‘media’ is
defined by Brown: J. W, Richard B. L, Fred F: H (1969: 2-3) as tools or the
physical things used by a teacher to facilitate the instruction. According to
Gerlach and Elly (1980: 245), to select the appropriate media, the teacher must
consider the characteristics of the students, which directly related to the
learning process such as verbal abilities, visual and audio perception skills. Other
factors which also ought to be considered in media selection come from our instructional
system model, that is, the organization of groups, the time available and the
space in which the media will be used (Gerlach and Elly: 255).
Comic is one of the
many media to teach story retelling. Comics are an art form using a series of
static images in fixed sequence. Using English comics as a means for teaching
story retelling can be very pleasing and interesting for the students. By using
English comics students will be more interested and more active in learning.
They will feel something new and different from what they usually get in their
class. The writer hopes that with the use of English comics they will be active
as participants and they have more a chance to express their minds, emotions,
feelings and attitudes.
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