CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
A. Background
English is an international tool of communication. It is used to communicate with each other by people from different countries all over the world. English plays an important role because it is a tool of communication in all aspects in most of the part of the world, whether in social in interaction, science technology, politics, economics, cultural, and education.
It is intended to enable the students to communicate and express their ideas in English and have a good command in reading comprehend text book and information written in English for the shake of national development in the field of education.
In learning English there are four skills that should be mastered by the students, they are listening, speaking, reading, and writing. These skills always become the target of the final learning objectives. In other words, the four language skills are the result of a long process of learning; they are the application of the knowledge of language that the learners get during process.
Reading is one important aspect in learning English. Reading itself is complex and complicated process because it involves the internal and external factors of students. The internal factors are everything from the students which can be taught; as a result of an interaction in reading process external factors are all the factors from outside of the students (Nunan, in Ilvirah, 2010:2).
Mc Worther, in Ilvirah (2010:2) says that reading is an active process of identifying important ideas, comparing, evaluating and applying them; therefore in reading paragraph we have to try to comprehend. Without comprehending the paragraph, it will be very difficult to understand what we have read or what the writer means in reading material.
In relation to the condition of the teaching of English reading comprehension faced by secondary school students. The students, who come to English classes, should be given sufficient opportunities to use their knowledge of language.
Based on the explanation above, the writer is interested to observe the RAFT (Role Audience, Format, Topic) strategy in learning and teaching, because it offers students a creative outlet for demonstrating understanding (Santa, 1988:10) it is flexible post reading strategy that helps students to analyze and reflect upon their reading through personal writing. Based on suggestion provided by the teacher or generated by the class, student choose a role, an audience a format, and a topic on which to write in response to their reading, concerning with the explanation above, the writer is interested in conducting a research improving reading comprehension through RAFT strategy.
