IMPROVING READING COMPREHENSION OF THE FOURTH-SEMESTER ENGLISH STUDENTS OF MAYJEN SUNGKONO UNIVERSITY USING RECIPROCAL TEACHING

Abstrak :Metode yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah penelitian tindakan kelas. Pada prosedur dan proses pelaksanaan dilakukan satu siklus yang terdiri dari empat tindakan. Setelah dilakukan empat tindakan, Reciprocal Teaching yang dapat meningkatkan keterampilan membaca pemahaman siswa terdiri dari tiga tahap. Tiga tahap tersebut adalah (1) Kegiatan pra-membaca berfokus pada mengaktifkan pengetahuan awal siswa; (2) Kegiatan sambil membaca berfokus pada pelaksanaan Reciprocal Teaching; (3) Kegiatan pasca-membaca berfokus pada mengecek kembali pemahaman siswa tentang teks. Kegiatan terakhir adalah pemberian kuis. Siswa mengerjakan tes secara individu tanpa bantuan siswa lain atau dari guru. Hasil tes menunjukkan bahwa nilai rata-rata siswa adalah 73,75 dan nilai terendah yang diperoleh siswa adalah 50. Akhirnya dapat disimpulkan bahwa Reciprocal Teaching dapat meningkatkan kemampuan pemahaman membaca siswa. Selain itu, siswa lebih termotivasi dan aktif untuk belajar menggunakan Abstract :The method adopted in this study was classroom action research. The procedure and implementation process performed one cycle of four actions. After four actions have been performed, mutual education can improve students' reading comprehension in three stages. They are: (1) Look-ahead activities focus on activating students' prior knowledge. (2) Reading activities focus on the implementation of mutual education. (3) Post-reading activities focus on reaffirming students' understanding of the text. The final activity is managing quizzes. Students take individual tests without the help of other students or teachers. As a result of the test, the average student score was 73.75 and the lowest student score was 50. Finally, we could conclude that mutual instruction was able to improve students' reading comprehension. In addition, the students are more motivated and active to learn with the method. They learn to work together in a group with different abilities and to help each other.


INTRODUCTION
Reading is defined as a thinking process involving word recognition skills, literal comprehension skills, interpretation skills and application skills (Crawly and Mountain, 1988). In addition, reading involves finding meaning in printed text and scripts in social contexts through bottom-up and bottom-up processing and the use of strategies and skills (Gebhard, 2000). Reading belongs to the tool that opens windows to the world, opens doors to possibilities and expands our minds to new ideas.
Comprehension continues to be an area of major concern in the teaching of reading. The goal of the teaching has been unchanged, i.e., to enable students to read without help unfamiliar authentic texts, at an appropriate speed, silently and with adequate understanding (Nuttall, 1982). However, the problem associated with helping learners derive meaning from the text is still a big challenge for teachers. Therefore, teachers of EFL reading are concerned with improving the teaching of reading comprehension.
At the English Department of Mayjen Sungkono University (UNIMAS) reading is taught in a series of courses ranging from Reading I to Reading VI from the first to the sixth semester. The general purpose of this course is to improve students' reading comprehension and general reading comprehension. As the courses are offered in successive semesters, each of them is prerequisite to the higher level. The level of English, type of writing, choice of topics, and specific reading skills to be emphasized vary from one reading course to another.
From informal discussion, some of the Reading teachers at the English Department of UNIMAS informed the researcher that it was not an easy job to stimulate the undergraduate students to read since the reading courses given were insufficient to support the students in using the appropriate method to be independent readers. Teachers of reading classes also reported that although students had taken the reading courses, they still found difficulty comprehending the texts.
In addition, the number of the students enrolling in a reading course decreases in each higher level. In other words, there are always some students who fail in each level; about 70% of the students can pass the course, many of whom fulfilled just the minimum passing grade, that is 60. Also, when poor-reader students were interviewed, they said that they did not know how to read certain textbooks required for a subject effectively although they had passed the subject. Rather, they relied on studying their teacher's explanation when discussing the content of the textbooks.
Related to the reasons above, the researcher is challenged to solve the problems in the class with some adjustments, and she intends to apply a method that is expected to be able to cope with the problems in the reading class. For that reason, the researcher is inspired to conduct a study and at the same time tries to do an action to solve the problems.
Educational research seeks information on how education is done, what teachers do, and what students do in the classroom. The goal is to find good ways teachers can apply to improve the quality of education. One type of this study is Collaborative Classroom Action Research (CAR). In this study, researchers worked with classroom teachers to address students' reading comprehension issues.
There are many ways to improve the understanding of students, one of which is the application of peer education. Mutual learning is a method of reducing or minimizing the errors of students in reading, with the understanding of the text. According to Palincar (1989), mutual learning is a method of coeducation to improve the understanding of both literal and logical reading and can also be used in individual learning/learning. It is a learning method based on modelling and managed practices, in which the teacher first model a set of strategies to understand what has been read and then gradually transfers responsibility for these strategies to the pupils. The purpose of the Mutual Learning is to help students, in the presence of or without a teacher, to actively introduce meaning into the written word. Strategies have been chosen not only to promote both a literal and a intellectual understanding of what has been read, but also to enable students to assess their own understanding. The structure of group member conversations and interactions requires all students to be involved and to build new relationships between students of different ability levels..

RESEARCH METHOD
In reciprocal teaching, a teacher and a group of students take turns using the reading strategies of prediction, clarification, questioning, and summarization to discuss specific parts of a text (Palincsar & Brown, 1984). Predicting occur when students make assumptions about what the author will discuss next in the text. To do this successfully, students must activate the relevant background knowledge they already have on the subject. Students read for the purpose: to confirm or disprove their hypothesis. In addition, opportunities are created for students to connect the new knowledge they will encounter in the text with the knowledge they already have. Predictive strategies also help with text structure when students learn that headings, subheadings, and questions embedded in the text are a useful way to predict what might happen next.
Clarifying is a particularly important activity when working with students who have a difficult history to understand. When asked to clarify, the fact that the text can be difficult to understand is noted (for example, new vocabulary, obscure references, unfamiliar, and perhaps difficult). Concept etc.). Questioning occur when students are asking questions that can be answered in text. When a student generates a question, they first identify the type of information that is important enough to provide the content of the question. Then present this information in the form of a question and do a self-test to make sure you can answer your question. The types of questions they use are literal questions and speculative questions.
Summarizing makes it possible to highlight and integrate the most important information into the text. Texts can be summarized by sentence, by paragraph, and by passage as a whole. When learners first embark on peer learning, their efforts are usually concentrated at the sentence and paragraph level. As they become more experienced, they can integrate at the paragraph and passage level.
There are also some advantages to using cross-teaching. According to Hartmann (1997), the advantages of cross-teaching are: (1) students actively participate in learning, (2) reading strategies are used in an integrated and coordinated manner in a purposeful context, (3) students enjoy working together and act as "teachers" themselves, and (4) They can learn by making use of frequent teacher models and learn to take responsibility for their own learning and for each other's learning.
In addition, according to researchers such as Palincsar and Brown (1984), mutual education incorporates at least five excellent teaching ideas. These are: (1) Focus on helping students develop comprehension strategies, rather than simply asking comprehension questions, (2) Four specific strategies (prediction, clarification, questions) rather than numerous reading skills , Summary) appearing in workbooks, (3) while learning: practicing procedures while actually reading new texts, (4) students reading to get the educator's attention The idea is that students need to build a foothold and support each other in developing a strategy, (5) among the educators who draw attention, students provide support to each other within the reading group.
As a learning method, Reciprocal Teaching is profoundly helpful for students to improve the skill of understanding the text that allows learners to reduce information in text to be retained in memory. Therefore, classroom action research concerning Reciprocal Teaching is employed to improve the students' reading including literal and inferential comprehension.
In reciprocal teaching, a teacher and a group of students take turns using the reading strategies of prediction, clarification, questioning, and summarization to discuss specific parts of a text (Palincsar & Brown, 1984). Predicting occur when students make assumptions about what the author will discuss next in the text. To do this successfully, students must activate the relevant background knowledge they already have on the subject. Students read for the purpose: to confirm or disprove their hypothesis. In addition, opportunities are created for students to connect the new knowledge they will encounter in the text with the knowledge they already have. Predictive strategies also help with text structure when students learn that headings, subheadings, and questions embedded in the text are a useful way to predict what might happen next.
Clarifying is a particularly important activity when working with students who have a difficult history to understand. When asked to clarify, the fact that the text can be difficult to understand is noted (for example, new vocabulary, obscure references, unfamiliar, and perhaps difficult). Concept etc.). Questioning occur when students are asking questions that can be answered in text.
When a student generates a question, they first identify the type of information that is important enough to provide the content of the question. Then present this information in the form of a question and do a self-test to make sure you can answer your question. The types of questions they use are literal questions and speculative questions.
Summarizing makes it possible to highlight and integrate the most important information into the text. Texts can be summarized by sentence, by paragraph, and by passage as a whole. When learners first embark on peer learning, their efforts are usually concentrated at the sentence and paragraph level. As they become more experienced, they can integrate at the paragraph and passage level.
There are also some advantages to using cross-teaching. According to Hartmann (1997), the advantages of cross-teaching are: (1) students actively participate in learning, (2) reading strategies are used in an integrated and coordinated manner in a purposeful context, (3) students enjoy working together and act as "teachers" themselves, and (4) They can learn by making use of frequent teacher models and learn to take responsibility for their own learning and for each other's learning. In addition, according to researchers such as Palincsar and Brown (1984), mutual education incorporates at least five excellent teaching ideas. These are: (1) Focus on helping students develop comprehension strategies, rather than simply asking comprehension questions, (2) Four specific strategies (prediction, clarification, questions) rather than numerous reading skills , Summary) appearing in workbooks, (3) while learning: practicing procedures while actually reading new texts, (4) students reading to get the educator's attention The idea is that students need to build a foothold and support each other in developing a strategy, (5) among the educators who draw attention, students provide support to each other within the reading group.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
As a learning method, Reciprocal Teaching is profoundly helpful for students to improve the skill of understanding the text that allows learners to reduce information in text to be retained in memory. Therefore, classroom action research concerning Reciprocal Teaching is employed to improve the students' reading including literal and inferential comprehension.

CONCLUSION
Based on the research conducted, some conclusions can be drawn that can be drawn as answers to the research questions of the study. First, the implementation of peer learning can improve student performance at two levels of reading comprehension: literal and logical levels.
The improvement in student performance at the two levels of comprehension is shown by the average scores obtained, i.e. 55.83 in the pretest, 59.17 in the 1st task, 64.17 in the 2nd task, 69.96 in the 3rd task and 73. 75 in the final test.
Secondly, between the two levels of reading comprehension, the reasoning level comprehension is more difficult than the literal level comprehension for English students in the fourth semester of Meizhen Sublime University. This is because students are sometimes unable to rephrase the content of the text in their own words, especially with regard to the main idea implied by the paragraph.
Third, the implementation of the three phases of mutual education are reading, reading, and post-reading activities. Lookahead activities were conducted to help students activate and use relevant prior knowledge.
Researchers changed their activities by asking a few questions about photography. In reading activities, students were asked to anticipate the text, clarify the text, generate text questions, and summarize the text. Their activities were constantly monitored by the researcher and her collaborators, ensuring that the students understood how to perform tasks and collaborate. Next, the researchers checked the group's work. In post-reading activities, students were asked to complete a reading quiz that included literal and reasoning questions. Survey results show that students can complete this task at the first meeting.
However, some students still make mistakes when answering prepared questions, especially on reasoning questions. Meanwhile, in the second and third sessions, students can answer the prepared questions better than the last time. Improvement can be estimated from the sum of students actively participating in tasks assigned by this session. Also, they can all be improved to easily answer prepared questions.
Finally, students have shown a positive response to the implementation of mutual education. By sharing ideas with your teammates, you can learn from each other and motivate yourself to study. You can also deepen your understanding of the text with the help and help of your groupmates and researchers. In addition, when working together in groups, you can spend less time on tasks.