THE USE OF SONGS TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ MOTIVATION IN LEARNING ENGLISH

THE USE OF SONGS TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ MOTIVATION IN LEARNING ENGLISH
(A Classroom Action Research at the Eleventh Grade Students
Of SMK NU Ungaran in Academic Year of 2009/2010)

CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION


A. Background of the Study
Language is a means of communication used by human in order to be able to communicate with each other. There are millions of languages used in millions countries. Each country has its native language, but many of them have also one or more languages used as their second or foreign languages. However, there is a language that can be used in any countries, and that is English and it is therefore English is regarded an international language.
English is one of languages in the world that is very important. It has become clear that English plays an important role in communication among various or parts of the world.
As an international language, English has been used in many countries around the world. Some countries use English as their native language, some other apply it as a foreign language. Whatever the position is, English has been a compulsory lesson for students all over the world, even the native country itself.
English is taught in many countries in the world as a second or foreign language, such as Japan, Malaysia, China, Singapore and Indonesia. In those countries, many schools make students study English from time to time. Many educational experts always make many efforts to make the teaching of English as a second or foreign language better and better. Those who turn their attention to English language teaching do not only come from educators, but also from the society considering the urgent role of English in the worlds’ communication.
As a foreign language, most of learners of English in Indonesia get difficulties to study English. Most learning problems are caused by different element found between the two languages when students learn a foreign language they will get difficulties. The degree of difficulty is determined by the degree of differences between the two languages that is their first language and the target language. At a relatively old age, they will have a lot of more habit interference when they will start learning it at much younger age. Some the same teaching styles make students bored. Learning a foreign language is different from learning native language because the students’ environments in achieving their first languages are different. In Indonesia, learning English shows worse result than some other subject.
The students often find problems with English when they speak, read, listen and write to English words. It may be caused some factors. Learning English is very complex since there are many factors that determine the success or failure of learners in learning. There are two kinds of factors, which affect someone in learning English. Those are internal and external factors. Internal factors come from the learners themselves, such as motivation, interest, aptitude, and intelligence. While the external factors come from outside of the learners, such as situation and condition of the environment, learning materials, and learning program.
The duty of English teachers is to make the students enjoy learning English. Therefore, the teachers should have special trick to make their students motivated in learning English. The students can be interested in learning English if we can motivate them by using some interesting media and enjoyable activities and we can adjust them to their ages and grades so that they can integrate themselves into English, for example singing an English song. It is assumed that it can contribute many things to improve students’ motivation and students’ capabilities, especially in their skill elements, such as vocabulary enrichment, listening, and speaking. Singing an English song is believed to have direct influence on the pronunciation skills.
Songs can provide attractive and instructional media in learning activities. It is attractive because the students will have more fun in learning processes. The pleasant, relaxed atmosphere fostered by songs has proven to be highly conductive to efficient learning. Songs have been designed to motivate students to participate the English teaching and learning. This research tries to find out the effectiveness of using songs to improve students’ motivation in learning English.

B. Reasons for Choosing the Topic
The writer chooses this topic to be her study because of some reasons, they are:
1. Many students are generally poor in their mastery of English. This might be caused by the lack of motivation in studying the foreign language. Motivation is probably the most often used catch all term for explaining the success or failure of virtually any complex task. It is easy to figure out that success in a task is because learning is related to motivation. It is easy in learning to claim that a learner will be successful with the proper motivation.
2. In teaching learning process, teachers also play a more important role than parents do. They should be creative to select teaching media and technique to draw students’ interest and motivation in learning English. The teachers are demanded to choose the appropriate ones to make the class fresh and interesting. Hopefully, that the students will be happy and will not get bored learning English.

These reasons above encourage the writer to help the students to solve their problems. In this study, the writer wants to improve the students’ motivation in learning English by using songs as the media. Using English songs is an easy way to practice English in students’ learning. The reason is that most teenagers like Senior High School students love to sing and listen to music. In many cases, they are able to sing the whole lyric of the English songs. It means that they can memorize some English phrases or sentences and the have already learned English unconsciously. By listening to music, students can understand certain great message behind songs. Listening English songs is an enjoyable undertaking to be done. This can be argued for the following reasons:
1) Lyrics found in English songs usually can represent our feeling,
2) If we love the song, it will be easy to remember the lyrics of that songs because they just consist of several words or sentences,
3) Song usually led students to get pleasure.

From what has been stated above, the writer is interested in conducting the research. In this case, the writer plans to get information about the tenth year students of SMK NU Ungaran, with respect to their ability to use songs as a good way to study English and to improve their motivation in learning English.







C. Questions of the Study
Trough this study, the writer wants to find out the answer to these following questions:
1. How is the use of songs to improve students’ motivation in learning English?
2. How is the improvement of the students’ motivation in learning English after being taught using songs?

D. Objectives of the Study
Based on the questions of the study above, there are two objectives of this study. They are:
1. To describe the use of songs to improve students’ motivation in learning English,
2. To find out the improvement of the students’ motivation in learning English after being taught using songs.

E. Action Hypothesis
Hypothesis of this study is that the use of song is an effective way to improve student’s motivation in learning English.

F. Significances of the Study
The result of this study might be useful for the students and the English teachers at SMK NU Ungaran as well as the writer.
1) For the Students
The result of this study can help the students to improve their motivation in learning English and help the students to find out the interesting way to learn English.


2) For the English Teachers
English teachers may be able to apply the result of this study on their activities, improve their methods or technique in teaching, so that the students are motivated to learn.
3) For the writer
The result of this study is expected to be useful knowledge for the writer when she starts her profession as a teacher in the future time.

G. Definition of Key Term
1. Song
Song is a short piece of music with words that are sung.
In this study song is a media which is used in the teaching English in order to improve the students’ motivation in learning English.
2. Motivation
Motivation is the thoughts and feelings we have which make us want to do something, continue to want to do it and turn our wishes into action.
Motivation is the most important factor in language learning. Therefore, in this study the writer wants to try to improve students’ motivation in learning English.
3. Learning English
Learning English is a learning process to develop communication skill in English orally and written, to cover four basic skills (listening, speaking, reading, and writing).

H. Scope of the Study
In order to make the study easier and more appropriate, the writer should decide the scope of the study:
1. The study is limited to the description of the use of songs to improve students’ motivation in learning English.
2. The Senior High School students generally like popular songs. Therefore, the writer limits the songs’ scope to English pop songs.
3. The subject of the study is the eleventh grade students of SMK NU Ungaran. Therefore, the generalization of the research finding is applied only to the population in questions.

I. Outline Of Thesis
The study will consist of five chapters:
The First chapter presents the introduction of the research concerning it is background, reasons for choosing the topic, questions of the study, objectives of the study, significance of the study, and limitations of the study.
The second chapter presents the review of related literature to the topic of the study concerning theoretical review and preview research, teaching and learning English as foreign language, teaching English at the senior high school, song and the usage in teaching English, motivation in learning English, and song to improve students’ motivation.
The third chapter present method of investigation concerning, setting and participant, instrument of the study, technique of collecting and analyzing data and action hypothesis.
The fourth chapter presents the finding of the research concerning analyzed the result of the questioner.
The fifth chapter presents the conclusion and suggestions.