THE STUDENTS’ MASTERY IN USING QUESTION TAGS A CASE OF THE THIRD YEAR STUDENTS OF SMP N XXXX

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1  General Background of the Study

It is important to learn English because it is an international language for most people around the world. Moreover, English is the first foreign language in Indonesia and also one of the subjects taught in schools and courses.

Students or learners may get problems in learning English as the foreign language because there are many differences between Indonesian and English in term of grammar, vocabulary, etc. According to the 1994 English curriculum of SMP, the goal of English teaching at SMP is mainly to prepare the students to have the language skills (reading, listening, speaking and writing). The skills must be taught integrated without ignoring  the language components: vocabulary, pronunciation, and structures. Teachers should not teach the language skills and language components separately. And,  it is hoped that the students can communicate in the target language, both spoken and written. Consequently, grammar or structure cannot be separated from language teaching, although the main goal is to teach how to use language communicatively.

English structure plays an important  role in understanding English. By mastering the English structure the students will be able to develop their speaking, listening, reading, and writing skills.

English structure also has an important role to avoid misunderstanding in communication. Question Tags is one of topics which should be taught in the first term program in the third years of SMP. According to Swan (1988:511) short questions or tag questions are very common in spoken English. Native speakers often used them at the ends of their sentences. The term of the same thing in Bahasa Indonesia is kalimat pengukuh. In Bahasa Indonesia, it is also used very commonly in speech. We    often hear Indonesian people say “bukan ?” at the ends of their sentences. Cook and Suter (1980:107) also stated that  tag questions are satements which become questions by having a yes-no question element “tagged” on at?????????????