FINAL PROJECT
UTILIZING VOCAB-O-GRAM TO DEVELOP READING
COMPREHENSION OF GRADE 5 ENGLISH AS SECOND LANGUAGE
LEARNERS
In partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the Education degree
By:
NAME
: Bhim Bahadur Paudel
ID NUMBER
: 01314170004
PRIMARY EDUCATION PROGRAM
INTERNATIONAL TEACHERS COLLAGE
UNIVERSITAS PELITA HARAPAN
TANGERANG
2021
THE FINAL PROJECT AUTHENTICITY STATEMENT
I, student of the Primary Education Program, Faculty OF International Teachers
Collage., Universitas Pelita Harapan,
Name
: Bhim Bahadur Paudel
Registration Number
: 01314170004
Program
: Primary Education
hereby declare that my FINAL PROJECT with the title “UTILIZING VOCABO-GRAM TO DEVELOP READING COMPREHENSION OF GRADE 5
ENGLISH AS SECOND LANGUAGE LEARNERS.” is:
1. an authentic work of my own, that incorporates material gleaned from
various lectures, field-study, related literature as listed in the Reference
List,
2. not a result of plagiarism or duplication of someone else’s published work,
academic paper, or final assignment/dissertation of Bachelor degree in
other university except for the references which are clearly and
appropriately indicated in accordance with the academic referencing
regulations, and
3. not a translated work of any collection of resource books or journal listed
in the Reference List.
In the event that my FINAL PROJECT is proven to be incongruent with the
declaration above, I would accept its disqualification.
i
Tangerang, November 30, 2021
Bhim Bahadur Paudel
UNIVERSITAS PELITA HARAPAN
FACULTY OF EDUCATION
FINAL PROJECT SUPERVIOR’S APPROVAL
UTILIZING VOCAB-O-GRAM TO DEVELOP READING
COMPREHENSION OF GRADE 5 ENGLISH AS SECOND LANGUAGE
LEARNERS.
By:
Name
: Bhim Bahadur Paudel
ID Number
: 01314170004
Study Program
: Primary Education
has been examined and approved to be presented and defended in a
comprehensive examination for Degree of Education, Primary Education
Program, International Teachers Collage, Universitas Pelita Harapan.
Tangerang, November 30, 2021.
Approval Signatories:
Supervisor
(Dr. Spanogle)
Department Chair of International Teachers College
(Jeffery Spanogle, PhD)
Dean
(Curtis Taylor, PhD)
ii
UNIVERSITAS PELITA HARAPAN
FINAL PROJECT EXAMINER PANEL’S APPROVAL FORM
On Click here to enter text. a comprehensive examination was conducted as a
partial fulfillment of academic requirements for degree of Education, Study
Program, Faculty of International Teachers Collage, Universitas Pelita Harapan,
named:
Name
: Bhim Bahadur Paudel
Registration Number : 01314170004
Study Program
: Primary Education
Faculty
: International Teachers Collage
with title “UTILIZING VOCAB-O-GRAM TO DEVELOP READING
COMPREHENSION OF GRADE 5 ENGLISH AS SECOND LANGUAGE
LEARNER.” by an examiner panel which comprised of:
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iii
ABSTRACT
Bhim Bahadur Paudel. (01314170004.)
UTILIZING VOCAB-O-GRAM TO DEVELOP READING
COMPREHENSION OF GRADE 5 ENGLISH AS SECOND LANGUAGE
LEARNER ENVIRONMENT.
(viii + 23 pages; 0 figures; 0 tables; 6 appendices)
God made the world, and He loved it. He was happy with what He created until sin entered the
world. Sin affected everything, including the language. Ever since then, students have struggled in
reading due to the complex structure of languages. Scholars believe that reading comprehension
can bring so many benefits in a student’s life if the school focuses on it. They say that reading
comprehension helps students understand cultures, socialize with each other, and make reasonable
predictions using prior knowledge. Seeing all the benefits, the researcher wanted to use the VocabO-Gram strategy to test if it can enhance students’ reading comprehension. He used three different
stories for three distinct cycles. The researcher used two tools to aid this strategy, mainly the
Vocab-O-Gram tool and Google form questions. The final result of the experiment showed that the
strategy was very effective. The result showed that the more teachers use the Vocab-O-Gram
strategy, the more students better their reading comprehension. The results also showed that
students were open and very active in the class. Therefore, the researcher highly recommended
using the Vocab-O-Gram strategy to help students to enhance their reading comprehension.
Key words: Vocab-O-Gram, Vocabualry, reading comprehension, prediction
References: 21. (1997-2021)
iv
FOREWORD
Praise the Lord Jesus Christ for His continual grace and blessings that I have
finished this final paper. It is He who has guided me along the journey and
renewed my strength each day to complete this well. All glory belongs to Him.
This final project with the title “UTILIZING VOCAB-O-GRAM TO
DEVELOP READING COMPREHENSION OF GRADE 5 ENGLISH AS
SECOND LANGUAGE LEARNERS.” is prepared and written as partial
fulfillment of academic requirements for a Bachelor's degree in Primary
Education for Faculty of International Teachers Collage, Universitas Pelita
Harapan, Tangerang.
I realize that without supervision, support and prayers from every party, it is
impossible to finish this final project in timely manner. Therefore, I would like to
express my gratitude for the following people whom He has sent to walk and
share with me through this journey. Along the way, they have supported me
through prayers as well as words of encouragement. May God bestow His
abundant blessing upon you:
1.
Curtis Taylor, PhD. the Dean of International Teachers Collage.
2.
Jeffrey Spanogle, Ph.D., the Department Chair of International Teachers
College.
3.
Dr. Jeffrey Spanogle, Ph.D., the supervisor who supervised and gave me
many inputs.
4.
My faithful instructors and professors of ITC diligently helped to
discover knowledge and truth of education.
vi
Lastly, I am fully aware that there are things than can be improved in this
study. Thus, critics and suggestions from readers will be useful. Hopefully, this
study will be beneficial for every party reading it.
Tangerang, 30th November 2021
Bhim Bahadur Paudel
vii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Pages
Table of Contents
ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................... IV
FOREWORD ................................................................................................................. VI
TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................................. VIII
INTRODUCTION ....................................................................................................... 2
LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................................ 6
RESEARCH METHOD AND DATA ANALYSIS, RESULTS, AND DISCUSSION
................................................................................................................................................. 10
DATA ANALYSIS, RESULTS, AND DISCUSSION .............................................................. 15
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION.......................................................... 20
REFERENCES .......................................................................................................... 24
APPENDICES ................................................................................................................ 27
viii
UTILIZING VOCAB-O-GRAM TO DEVELOP READING
COMPREHENSION OF GRADE 5 ENGLISH AS SECOND LANGUAGE
LEARNERS
Bhim Bahadur Paudel
bp70004@student.uph.edu
Primary education
International Teachers Collage
ABSTRACT
God made the world, and He loved it. He was happy with what He created until sin entered the
world. Sin affected everything, including the language. Ever since then, students have struggled in
reading due to the complex structure of languages. Scholars believe that reading comprehension
can bring so many benefits in a student’s life if the school focuses on it. They say that reading
comprehension helps students understand cultures, socialize with each other, and make reasonable
predictions using prior knowledge. Seeing all the benefits, the researcher wanted to use the VocabO-Gram strategy to test if it can enhance students’ reading comprehension. He used three different
stories for three distinct cycles. The researcher used two tools to aid this strategy, mainly the
Vocab-O-Gram tool and Google form questions. The final result of the experiment showed that the
strategy was very effective. The result showed that the more teachers use the Vocab-O-Gram
strategy, the more students better their reading comprehension. The results also showed that
students were open and very active in the class. Therefore, the researcher highly recommended
using the Vocab-O-Gram strategy to help students to enhance their reading comprehension.
Keywords: Vocab-O-Gram, Vocabualry, reading comprehension, prediction
1
INTRODUCTION
From the very beginning, God made humans a social being so that we
could depend on and understand each other using language. Language is a
precious gift to humans as it was a part of being made in the image of God.
Through language, God wanted us to express our desires to him and his creation.
All in all, God’s purpose of language is to have fellowship and to be good
stewardship of his creations.
Adam and Even disobedience to God brought sin into the world. Erickson
(2001) says that "sin is falling to let God be God and placing something or
someone in God's rightful place of supremacy” (p. 187). After Adam and Eve
sinned, the language became limited to humans. The language changed from the
pureness it was created to be, a way to express love, to a counterfeit. Instead of
using language to praise God by songs and encouraging words, people used
language as a tool to be gods. The sin made it students more challenging to
understand foreign languages. They need a lot of practice because the defects of
sin are throughout the process.
God loved humans so much that He sent Jesus Christ to restore His
original plan. When Jesus died on the cross, he defeated all the evil forces that had
covered people’s lives, including the use of language. Jesus took all our
imperfections and guilt on him and announced people innocent by his
righteousness (Olyott, 2014). Not only that, but he unsealed the mysteries of
heaven and the earth by communicating clearly with people. Teachers know the
truth, and they can use that truth by helping students to “identify and critique
areas impacted by sin and then discern God’s purposes” (Threads, p. 62).
2
Jesus used language to remove confusion and to reveal truth-THE truth.
As a result, students have a renewal of mind to see things from different
perspectives. If they make mistakes on the way, they can learn from them with the
teacher's help. We can teach difficult words from Bible stories to help them
understand the truth about God and their roles in God’s grand story. Farnell and
her colleague (1997) say that “the Christian teacher has a wonderful opportunity
to introduce pupils to the world of literature, and to give them the skills to select
what they read with discernment” (p. 131). One of the ways to help students to
learn new words and express themselves is by using various strategies like VocabO-Gram, rating your knowledge, reflection, summary, and constructive feedback.
Research problem and the need of doing research
The researcher observed the Grade 5c class for four weeks and
came to notice that many of the students were having trouble in the SSR reading
log where they had to write the summary of the story. These students can read the
words in the story, but they struggle to understand the structure of the story. As a
result, they could not fully understand the story to write the summary well. The
researcher also found that all his students in the class were second language
learners. Thus, he concluded that reading stories and understanding their essence
in English is naturally difficult for them without using some strategies and tools.
So, the research worked along with Ms. Rachel, SDH 5th grade homeroom
teacher, to discuss this problem and to find possible solutions to help students.
“Develop reading comprehension skills” topic is important for the
researcher as he sees more potential of helping students to read stories by
3
understanding structure. Sometimes students do not understand the structure
because they are not familiar with some words. Alqahtani (2015) says that nonnative English speakers depend more on word meaning, but lack of it will lead
them to fail to use it in their lives. As a result, it affects the confidence of students
in sharing or working with friends. Grade 5c students read stories every day for a
certain period to do their SSR reading log. If the researcher does not help these
curious and excited students who are eager to read stories, they will slowly
develop hate towards it because they find difficult words and complex
organizations. The researcher has seen many examples of higher-grade students
struggling with this very problem of understanding stories. As a result, they
misinterpret the meaning and the lesson of the stories with poor predictions.
Guiding question and Research question
I have three guiding questions to guide my paper such as “how important
is reading skills in kids?” “What happens if teachers neglect students’ reading
comprehension?” “What are the long-term benefits of developing reading
comprehension skills?” Research question: “How effective is Vocab-O-Gram for
second language learners of grade 5 SDH Daan Mogot students to develop
reading comprehension?
Purpose of the Study:
The researcher wants to find out how effective is Vocab-O-Gram for 5th
grade SDH Daan Mogot students to develop reading comprehensions skills. If by
chance Vocab-O-Gram is an effective strategy, he wants to know how many times
4
does it needs to be applied in the class. This research is also done to know how
students view Vocab-O-Gram and if they would like to recommend it to their
friends or not. If they want to recommend, that tells the researcher that this
Vocab-O-Gram is a fun and effective strategy. Lastly, the purpose of the study is
to know how well students can write summaries of stories and make predictions.
The information that is collected will be beneficial to help students better
understand the stories by making proper inferences about words that open doors
for curiosity and in-depth inquiry.
Definition of Terms:
Vocab-O-Gram: Vocab-O-Gram is a strategy to help students learn vocabulary
and make good predictions by classifying words into five elements of the story
(Riback, 2018, p. 22). The words are in the chronological order of the story.
Students read the words provided by the teacher and try to classify them into five
categories: settings, characters, problems, actions, and resolution. After showing
words, students will write any questions they have on a box called “any
questions?" and difficult words in the "Mystery words” box.
Vocabulary: According to Online Etymology Dictionary, the word vocabulary is
from the “eval Latin word vocabularium”, which means “list of words with
explanations.” Alqahtani (2015) defines vocabulary as “the total number of words
that are needed to communicate ideas and express the speakers' meaning” (p. 25).
Based on both definitions, we can infer that vocabulary is a tool for
communicating as it carries meaning to self and others.
5
Reading comprehension: Fatma Susar Krmz (2010) says, “Comprehension
involves constructing meaning that is reasonable and accurate by connecting what
has been read to what the reader already knows and thinks about all of this
information until it is understood” (p. 4753).
Prediction: According to the online Merriam-Webster dictionary, the
word prediction is defined as “a declaration that something will happen in the
future”. McTighe and Silver (2020) define it as “to predict is an attempt to foretell
an outcome before it occurs” (p. 68). Combining both definitions, we can
conclude that a prediction is an act of guessing the coming event. The authors
further say that prediction skills help our minds to think creatively to solve
various problems
LITERATURE REVIEW
As human beings, we want to test our philosophies developed by our
interests and religious beliefs. But sometimes, our interests go beyond our
religious beliefs and bring disputes and disgrace to the people of the same faith. In
the end, such person comes to a point where they find it challenging to call
themselves a part of a particular religion and decide to be atheist at the extreme.
American Dictionary defines an atheist as “someone who believes that God does
not exist." Such people base their beliefs only on science. They want to see the
raw data that proves what they want to believe.
On the other hand, some people want to believe in religion so extreme that
they forget the reality. Nicholas M. Baker (2015) points out this problem by
saying that most Christian parents ask kids to ask God for solving math problems
6
instead of offering possible help. This is a common mistake not only Christians do
but also people of other faith. These misconceptions also have led teachers to
believe that only few students can solve or understand the lessons in the
classroom. As a result, week students are left alone on their own. Donovan
Graham (2009) firmly says, "to reduce the human being to less than what God
created is to thumb our noses at God" (p. 73). Students are capable of learning the
right things if good teachers direct them. So, we can conclude that moving to both
extremes, our interests, and religion, is dangerous. Keeping this in mind, the
researcher comes with possible solutions to help students develop reading
comprehension skills using Vocab-O-Gram.
Kids learn better when they are involved in reality on any kind of
teachings. Wolterstorff (2002) captures this idea and says, “We are interactive
creatures: We have a structure, and reality has a structure, and we interact” (p.
82). Kids want to experiment and observe the process. They want to know the
small pieces or structures of units or lessons to know the bigger picture of what
they are about to learn. English language also has a structure, and helping students
see those structures will help them understand the concepts and principles.
Students read stories books, religious books, school textbooks, and so on daily,
but if they do not know what they are reading, at one point, they will slowly start
to hate reading. Let us know the importance of reading.
SDH Daan Mogot grade 5 students are second language learners. So, it is
difficult for them to read and understand stories in English if their reading
comprehension skills are poor. But there are a lot of benefits if student’s reading
comprehension skills are developed. According to Muhittin Sağirli (2015) says,
7
“It increases academic knowledge, expands the general culture, provides
socialization (p.105).” When the reader involves in reading, they can connect their
life events and be more skilled in sharing ideas. They can do better in real-life
problem-solving.
Reading is the main door to appreciate other cultures as students can learn
how to walk and talk with people. Students can make friends easily once they
understand the cultures and practices of another group of people. They will give
glory to God for creating beautiful cultures as they know the work of God in
various cultures. But lack of knowledge on culture due to poor reading
comprehension may lead students to dislike readings. Azizah Rajab et al. (2012)
say, “Not being familiar with English or other cultures might inhibit their reading
comprehension process and cause anxiety as the culture represented in the texts is
foreign to them” (p. 364). When students fail to appreciate culture due to their
poor reading comprehension, it affects their social skills. Finally, reading
comprehension develops a social skill. Collins English Dictionary defines social
skills as "the skills that are necessary to communicate and interact with others."
Good communication requires a proper understanding of the topic that is going in
the conversation. Once students develop critical thinking skills to communicate,
they get the confidence to share their ideas. They can make sound judgments and
find common ground to agree or to disagree. They can mentally interpret the ideas
by relating them to their prior knowledge. Thus, students can actively get involved
in discussions with friends in and outside of school.
Fatma Susar Krmz's (2010) research found out that the time spent for
reading is directly proportional to reading comprehension. It means that the
8
students who spend more time reading will understand the stories or any text
better. She further concludes that teachers should focus on helping students to use
the various strategies to read.
Among many strategies, the researcher wants to use Vocab-O-Gram to
find how effective it is to enhance student’s reading comprehension skills. Larry
and Valentine-French (2019) say that students can understand better and faster if
the hard work is broken down into several parts. They further state that complex
structures may confused students if they are directly taught before any rehearsal.
Vocab-O-Gram is one of the strategies that help to break down the big story into
several parts, such as settings, characters, problem, action, and resolutions. This
strategy invites students to rehearse to think and connect their life experiences
before they read the story. It also gives opportunities to write the problematic
words and any questions that they find during prediction time. According to Allen
(2007), Portsmouth (2004), and Sontosa (2015), Vocab-O-Gram is an effective
tool that operates the structure of the story by taking the essential words to help
students make initial predictions. After her research, she concluded that the
Vocab-O-Gram helped students in many aspects of their learning, such as writing,
expanding vocabulary knowledge, and developing confidence in sharing the story.
Allen further supports saying that the Vocab-O-Gram does three things to
help students to know "meaning of the words," "understand the text quickly," and
“enrich their ideas to make a prediction” (Zalukhu, 2015, p. 58). When students
have more knowledge of vocabulary, they can use words in speaking and writing.
Luke and Hollie say that grade 5 students can recite 120 words to 150 words in 60
seconds. They further state that grade 5 kids can understand multiple-meaning
9
words and elements of the stories and write on various topics. Larry and
Valentine-French (2019) say, “By fifth grade, a child's vocabulary has grown to
40,000 words” (p. 174). Since grade 5 can understand multiple-meaning words
and the story's structure, they can also learn to read fast by scanning and dishonest
strategies.
Vocab-O-Gram's objective is to allow students to use prior knowledge to
predict the story. Elleman and Oslund (2019) say that earlier transfer learning
promotes literary memory for kids throughout their growth and enhances the
potential to draw conclusions and acquire new terms. Kids make judgments based
on prior knowledge to make decisions in their lives, and there is an equal
possibility of getting in the right direction or the wrong direction. Teachers can
help students make proper predictions so that later when students read stories,
they can easily understand. When researchers Rusli, Cecep, and Acep (2019)
experimented to know the effectiveness of prediction skills, they found that posttest was way better than pre-test. Therefore, they concluded that prediction helps
second language learner students “to be creative and critical readers” (p. 522). In
short, the researcher believes there is a huge opportunity to improve students'
reading comprehension using Vocab-O-Gram. Thus, the researcher aimed to use
Vocab-O-Gram to find its effectiveness in improving the reading comprehension
of grade 5 students.
RESEARCH METHOD AND DATA ANALYSIS, RESULTS, AND
DISCUSSION
Research Methodology
10
The researcher used a quantitative research method to test the
effectiveness of Vocab-O-Gram in students' English reading compression. The
research was done with grade 5c students of Sekolah Dian Harapan (SDH). The
school is in Kalideres, West Jakarta City. There were 23 participants for this
research. All the students were non-native English speakers. Their first languages
were either Bahasa Indonesia or other dialects from their tribes. Due to Covid-19,
the whole research was held online via the Team app using various teaching tools.
They will be discussed later in the procedure section. The study was done in a
three-month teaching practicum starting from July to October.
All the data will be collected in two ways. First, in the pretest, the data will
be collected using the Vocab-O-Gram template. See in Appendix 1.
Second, in the posttest, Google form will be used as a tool that consists of
questionnaires and essays. After students read the story, google Forms will be
given to compare their initial predictions with their final reading and write a
summary of the story.
First Cycle:
In the first cycle, the researcher will create a lesson plan taught on
September 1. The length of the lesson will be 70 minutes. The lesson plan will be
given to Cooperating teacher, Ms. Rachel, and receive feedback from her. The
whole class will be taught using PowerPoint via Team. The learning objectives for
students for the pretest will be; arrange words on the template based on the
elements of the story, explain the meaning of the unknown words, and predict
their own words. The learning objectives for the posttest would be: students will
11
be able to compare and contrast their initial prediction with final reading and write
a summary.
There will be 24 participants from grade 5c, but the researcher will focus
on ten students to collect the data and analyze the problem. For the pretest, the
analyst will use Google Site, where students can explain the Vocab-O-Gram and
the template. They will read the instructions, fill the template with respective
words from the “Samson story," and make predictions. For the posttest, students
will use google form, where they have to write an essay. See the Appendix 2.
The researcher will observe and focus primarily on those students whose
reading comprehension is weak and need support. There will be two ways to
monitor students. The First will be by using the Vocab-O-Gram template. After
students submit the work, the researcher will carefully examine each career and
grade them using a rubric. For posttests, the researcher's mentor encouraged us to
use the rubric to grade the google form. According to Ms. Rachel, using a rubric
to grade essays is more accessible and accurate.
Since each cycle has pretest and posttest, the researcher will reflect the
effectiveness of Vocab-O-Gram in making proper predictions and writing an
essay with all the story elements. The researcher will also reflect on the
similarities and differences of students' initial predictions with their final readings.
Second Cycle:
In the second cycle, the researcher will create an activity for pretest
(September 20) and posttest (September 27) and upload it directly on the file
section of class material on the Team app. Pretest activity will include Vocab-OGram template. For the posttest, the activity will be in google form. Since the
12
researcher wants to know how helpful Vocab-O-Gram is, students will be asked to
rate 1-10. The choice of the story will be “Sky Woman and the big Turtle” by
Anita Yasuda.
The researcher will still focus on the same ten students from cycle one
while collecting data from 14 other students. For the pretest, students will have to
complete the Vocab-O-Gram template and submit the work on the same day
before 6 pm. Students need to read the words from the story of “Sky Woman and
the big Turtle” from the lower box in the template and fill in the respective
elements. For the posttest, students will do a google form.
For the pretest activity, the researchers will observe how familiar students
are with the Vocab-O-Gram template and how accurate they predict the story.
Student's work completion will be graded using rubric. For posttests, three things
will be observed: how helpful Vocab-O-Gram is, compare with initial prediction,
and finally, how well students write a summary of the story.
Just as in cycle one, the focuses will be more on pretest and posttest
activities as they give the result of the experiment. For the pretest, the researcher
will reflect on how well students categorize words according to the story elements
and how accurately they make a prediction of the story. In the posttest, the
researcher will reflect or evaluate how well students compare their initial
prediction with their final reading and how well they write a summary of the
story.
Third Cycle:
The third cycle will be very similar to the first and the second cycle. This
cycle will also be into two parts: pretest and posttest. The pretest will be done on
13
October 4, and the posttest will be done on October 12. The story will be sent to
Ms. Rachel and get her permission to teach. The report will be "Passover."
Similarly, the materials for the posttest will be google form and the story of
Passover.
There will be 24 participants, but only the same ten will be observed
closely in this cycle. For the pretest, students will receive Asynchronous activity
on Vocab-O-Gram. For posttests, students will do an activity using google form
and submit it within two days.
The researcher will observe the student who mostly struggled in cycle two
and try to have a one-to-one private chat in the Team app. In this cycle also, there
will be two aspects on which the observation operates. The first aspect will be
how well students do in categorizing the words according to the elements of the
Passover story and how well they make predictions of that story. Similarly, the
second aspect will focus on four questions from google form. Those questions
will also tell if the Vocab-O-Gram strategy is fun to apply in the class or not.
The researcher will reflect on whether the Vocab-O-Gram strategy is
effective in developing reading comprehension skills or not. He will also
remember whether the students recommend this strategy to their friends or not.
All the data will be collected by pretest and posttest. The researcher will
use two perspectives to ensure the test is practical. The first one is validity.
According to Zalukhu (2015), "Validity concerns the extent to which the scale
measures the attitude construct" (p. 38). Therefore, the researcher will first give
the pretest and posttest templates and questions to the cooperation teacher (Ms.
14
Rachel) to analyze and give feedback. She will then provide points on each
question such as:
More Valid 10: The test can be applied to grade 5c.
Less valid 6: Need to revise a few questions before applying to grade 5c.
Invalid 1: Better not to use these questions for the test.
The second one is reliable.
The researcher will see the difference in average when the pretest and
posttest are done. If the results in all three cycles are very different then, the test is
not reliable. The data will be organized into three groups: Average of pretest of
process 1-3 and Average of posttest of cycle 1-3
The purpose of the data analysis is to see if the Vocab-O-Gram strategy
effectively enhances reading comprehension skills in reading stories. Here, the
data of each student will be collected separately in an excel form for pretest and
posttest of each cycle by using the rubric. See Appendix (3 & 4). The average
points of each cycle are evaluated in both pretest and posttest to compare with
each other. The evaluation is done using the moderate effectiveness of the pretest
of three cycles and finding the differences between them. Similarly, the same
process will be applied for posttests.
DATA ANALYSIS, RESUTLS, AND DISCUSSIONS
First Cycle
The researcher started the first cycle on September 1, 2021. For the
pretest, he got approved with the story from cooperating teacher. After that, he
chose a few essential words from the "Samson story" and put them in the Vocab-
15
O-Gram template. The template was then uploaded to the google site with
instructions. For the posttest, he planned to use a google form that contained two
questions. The cooperating teacher also approved the questions.
For the research, there were 24 participants, but only 10 of them were
mainly focused. In focused groups, there were five girls and five boys. After
students filled in the words according to the elements of the story, they made a
prediction and submitted the work before 6 pm on the same day. For the posttest,
the teacher gave the "Samson story" to read for a week and gave them a google
form.
The researcher found that two students were not interested in finishing
their pretest activity and 1 for posttest activity. He also found that most of the
students were still confused with the elements of the story. He also observed that
two students plagiarized in their summary. They directly copied and pasted. The
cooperating teacher encouraged the researcher to explain the elements again to the
whole class, paraphrase the sentences, and write a summary.
The researcher followed Harry Wong's idea of starting class with
questions to save attendance time. When students tried to talk simultaneously, he
managed by saying, please use the hand sign in the TEAM, and you will get the
chance to speak. On the negative side, he talked a bit faster with his students. He
should have been given more time to discuss in the breakout room.
Second Cycle
The story “Sky Woman and the big Turtle” by Anita Yasuda was approved
by the cooperating teacher several days before the pretest. The pretest was done
on September 20 using the Vocab-O-Gram template. It was directly uploaded in
16
the class materials in Team. The posttest was done on September 27 using a
google form that contained a few questions and a short essay. The cooperating
teacher also approves all the questions in the google form. Out of 24 participants,
only 10 of them were focused more on the experiment. The researcher gave two
tests to the students after receiving approval from the cooperating teacher. First, a
pretest was given to students that contained a Vocab-O-Gram template. All the
instructions were in the template, so students directly read and submitted their
work. For the posttest, students were asked to do a google form activity.
For the pretest, only 21 participants submitted the Vocab-O-Gram activity.
The mentor encouraged the researcher to allow students to send their work either
in a personal email or in Team private chat. Six students were still struggling with
the elements of the story, and two other students were struggling with making
predictions. For the posttest, he observed that two of the students copied the story
directly from the internet, so the researcher had to ask that student to redo it.
The second cycle was far better than the first cycle. The researcher was
able to explain and demonstrate the instructions. However, the researcher found
that he could have given more time to students to work on their pretest activity
and lower the talking speed as students are second language learners. In the next
cycle, the researcher will ask students to submit their work either in a personal
email or private chat in Team and slower down the speaking speed.
Third Cycle
For the pretest, the researcher chose a few essential words from the
“Passover” story and prepared the Vocab-O-Gram template. The pretest was done
on October 4. Similarly, the posttest was done on October 12. Google form was
17
used with short questions and an essay. The learning objective for both tests was
to develop reading comprehension skills by learning about the elements of the
story, making predictions, and writing the summary.
There were 24 participants, and 10 focused more on generalizing the
whole grade 5c in their reading comprehension. When the pretest was given to the
students, everyone did well and submitted on time. For the posttest, students were
asked to write a summary, rate the strategy and compare their initial predictions
with their final reading on a google form. For this test also, everyone did well.
For the final cycle, the researcher used the same instruments for both
pretest and posttest as in cycles one and two. The researcher used a rubric to grade
on a pretest and for posttest. Here, he found slightly different results that students
exhibited. Nobody asked a single question on the pretest because they were
already familiar with the Vocab-O-Gram template. He also did not have hard
times asking to submit their work on time as they had ample time to work and
submit.
Cycle three cycles were the smoothest in terms of instructions, students’
responses, and collecting their assignments on pretest and posttest. All
participants did their work on time. The researcher was happy to see students'
progress in making predictions and writing story summaries more depth. The
whole process was fun.
Data analysis:
All the pretest and posttest data of cycles 1,2, and 3 are collected in excel
form to analyze how effective the Vocab-O-Gram is for grade 5 Indonesian
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students. (See appendix 6) The researcher inputs all the data of ten students to find
the average score in each cycle. He planned to analyze the data in two ways:
analysis on the change of pretest of cycles 1,2 & 3 and analysis of the posttest of
cycles 1,2 & 3. The pretest was calculated by the students' total points from the
rubric and divided by two, but the posttest was divided by 3. (See the rubric for
pretest and posttest in Appendix 3 & 4). When the researchers compared the
changes in the pretest of all three cycles, they found a significant change or
improvement in progress. Cycle 2: pretest (C2: p1) was increased by 3.95 points
when compared to cycle 1: pretest (C1: p1), and cycle 3: pretest (C3: p1) was
raised by two more points than cycle 2: pretest.
Similarly, the posttest also showed very similar results to the pretest.
Cycle 2: posttest (C2: p2) was increased by 0.46 points when compared to cycle
1: posttest (C1: p2), and cycle 3: posttest (C3: p2) was increased by 2.51 more
points than cycle 2: posttest.
Results and Discussion:
The researcher noticed that the more the Vocab-O-Gram strategy, the
better students do in their reading comprehension. For example, in all three
pretests, the average score of the ten students in cycle 1 was 78.15, and when
students used the same strategy for the second time, the average score became
82.2 in cycle 2. The data further showed that in cycle 3, the average score
increased and became 84.1. This pattern tells that student do better when they use
pretest before reading the story. Similarly, the average score of posttests also
19
increased in all three cycles from 84.396 to 84.853 to 87.363. The following are
the implications of the research:
1. Students did much better in their posttest of all three cycles. This shows
that Vocab-O-Gram is effective when used many times in the classroom.
2. He also concluded that the pretest is very helpful for posttests as it helps
and prepares students to connect with their prior knowledge and make
predictions of the story.
3. When students were asked to rate the Vocab-O-Gram strategy, the average
rating was eight, which indicates that they prefer using it.
4. Vocab-O-Gram motivates students to read the story as it allows them to
make predictions and learn difficult words.
5. Vocab-O-Gram gives opportunities to the students to dissect the story
elements for a closer view to understand the story.
There were a few limitations while doing this research. For example, the
study was done online, and it was challenging to observe students' problems or
their excitement on the screen
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
a. CONCLUSION
The objective of the research was to see if the Vocab-O-Gram strategy was
helpful to improve students reading compression or not. First, we tried to see the
topic through a Biblical worldview. God used language at first to communicate
and bless Adam and Eve, but people used language to hurt and give false
testimonies of Neighbors because of sin. Once there was only one language, but
20
after the sin, there were many languages. Due to which students now must study
hard and learn them. Even in such low sides of humans, God turned terrible to
good. Through God's wisdom, teachers can teach students how to enhance their
reading skills to communicate and live life fully. The researcher found many of
the students struggled to read, which demotivated them to share their opinions
confidently and openly.
Educational scholars say that when students are helped with their reading
comprehension, they will also improve in many aspects of life. For example, they
say that students will be more open to sharing as they can speak confidently in
English using both simple and complex words. Not only that, but students will
also find it easy to adjust to all kinds of cultural backgrounds. The researcher
planned to use the Vocab-O-Gram strategy to enhance students' reading skills
with that hope in mind.
The researcher used two kinds of tests, pretest and posttest, in three cycles
to help students to develop an understanding of story elements, prediction skills,
and knowledge of vocabulary from the stories. Vocab-O-Gram tool and google
form were used in all three cycles. The rubrics were used to grade them. The
Vocab-O-Gram tool was used in the pretest. Students had to fill the words into the
box that contained the elements of the story, mainly: setting, characters,
problem/goal, Action, and resolution. After the pretest, students did a posttest.
The goal of the posttest was to find out students’ progress on making predictions
of the story and how well they write summaries using the elements of the story.
After the experiment, the researchers found positive results in using the
Vocab-O-Gram strategy. He found that when students use more Vocab-0-Gram
21
strategies, they will do better in their readings each time. Lally & ValentineFrench (2019) supports this finding, “Once children become more adept at using
the strategy, their memory performance will improve” (p. 173). The researcher
found that cycle two pretest was higher than that first cycle and the third cycle
was more remarkable than cycle two pretest and likewise in the posttest. VocabO-Gram motivated students to read carefully as they were already curious about
the story in the pretest before they read it. When students were asked to rate the
posttest strategy, the average was eight out of ten. Lastly, this strategy helped
students to dig deeper into the story and connect to their prior knowledge. When
students were asked to compare and contrast their predictions with their final
readings, the average students said that they could make predictions of the story
well and connect to their life experiences. Due to it, they were interested to know
more about the story and eventually, it led them to know all the elements of the
story. Students further said they want to recommend their friends to use this
strategy to enhance their reading comprehension.
However, there were some limitations due to several factors. First, it was
difficult for students to work in groups due to the online class. It was hard to
observe whether students read the story or used online resources to find
summaries. Several students directly copied and pasted the posttest. Lastly,
students faced some difficulties reading English stories as they were second
language learners. Knowing the limitations and the results of the research, the
researcher will take several actions for future research. First, the researcher will
try to do experiments in offline classes. It will be much easier and more authentic
to collect data by observing students’ group work and individual work. Next, the
22
researcher will teach how to paraphrase or summarize a text or a story. Lastly, he
will give more time for students to read the story.
b. RECOMMENDATION
After the careful research on “improving grade 5 student’s English reading
skills using Vocab-O-Gram strategy”, the researcher wants to present some
valuable insights to teachers, schools, and all educators in general for helping
students in future.
1. Teachers should use the Vocab-O-Gram strategy to enhance students'
reading comprehension. The result shows the more students use this
strategy, the better they get in reading comprehension.
2. Teachers should allow students to connect the story to their prior
knowledge to make predictions. It will help them to see one thing from
many perspectives.
3. Teachers should focus on how they can help students to read and
understand the story well by meeting their differences using various
teaching strategies. One of them is by dissecting the story’s elements and
explaining them one by one. The focus should be on how to help students
to understand but not the completion of the content of the lesson.
4. It is highly recommended to research in a physical classroom to get more
accurate results. It will be easier to observe how students work to improve
their reading skills.
5. Teachers should give time to teach vocabulary because the understanding
of the story heavily relies on it.
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6. Teachers should always choose stories that are interesting to kids. It is
always good to do forehand research about students’ interests and their
backgrounds.
Lastly, teachers should create an atmosphere for students to share their
ideas and opinions freely. English reading skills improve when they can build
student-teacher and student-student relationships. It is also highly recommended
that teachers be patient and gracious to poor students whose English level is low.
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APPENDICES
Appendix 1: Sample of Vocab-O-Gram template
Appendix 2: Sample of Google form with questions
27
Appendix 3: Rubric for pretest
Categor Excellent (4) Good (3)
Sufficient (2)
Insufficient (1)
y
Elemen All the words 1-3 words are
4-5 words are
Six or more words
ts of
are
placed in the
placed in the
are placed in the
the
placed in the wrong table and wrong table and wrong box and have
story correct tables. have a
have a
many spellings mista
There are no sp few spellings mist few spellings mis kes
elling errors
akes
takes
Predicti The story
The story is well The
The
on of is accurately
predicted, has mo prediction makes prediction is inaccur
the
predicted using re than 6sense to the
ate and has 1story all the elements 7 sentences,
reader and has 4- 3 sentences
from the table and has 35 sentences
with more than eight
in more
5 grammatical mi with 6-7
grammatical
than eight
stakes in writing. grammatical
mistakes in writing.
sentences.
mistakes in
There are no
writing.
grammatical
errors.
Scales: 4=100, 3= 87, 2= 75, 1= 62
28
Appendix 4: Rubric for posttest
Category Excellent (4) Good (3)
Sufficient (2)
Insufficient (1)
Perdition The initial
The initial
The initial
The initial
comparation prediction
prediction is prediction is
prediction is
is compared and well compare fairly compared
poorly compared
contrasted with d and
and contrasted with and
the final reading contrasted wit the final reading contrasted with
with no
h the final
with 6the final reading
grammatical
reading with 7 grammatical
with more
mistakes.
3mistakes.
than eight
5 grammatical
grammatical
mistakes.
mistakes.
Organizatio The summary The summary
n of the
contains all the contains all
summary elements of the the elements
story. There are but has 3-6
1-2 grammatical grammatical
mistakes. The mistakes. The
summary is
outline
more than seven has more than
sentences.
six sentences.
Completion
of the
google
form
The summary
The summary
misses one
misses more than
element of the
two elements of
story and has 7the story
10 grammatical
and has more than
mistakes. The
ten grammatical
outline has at
mistakes. The
least five sentences outline has less
.
than five
sentences.
All the
The student Students fail to
Students fail to
questions are fails to answer answer 1 question answer one or
answered
1 question and and submit 3 hours more questions an
and submitted o is submitted late.
d submit more
n time.
2 hours late.
than 4 hours late.
Scales: 4=100, 3= 87, 2= 75, 1= 62
Appendix 6: Data analysis
29
30