Journal Review : ‘Improving Students’ Reading Skill through Collaborative Learning’

Name: Anis Septianingsih

Class: 4E

NPM: 1910631060066

Journal: ‘Improving Students’ Reading Skill through Collaborative Learning’ by Arliani Gunawan Putri, Arrin Nur Octavialis, and Irma Savitri Sadikin

Journal Review

    A journal titled ‘Improving Students’ Reading Skill through Collaborative Learning’ was created by Arliani Gunawan Putri, Arrin Nur Octavialis, and Irma Savitri Sadikin. In the journal, the researchers try to explain how effective students’ reading skill is after they were instructed by using Collaborative Learning method. In collaborative learning, each member contributes ideas, information, abilities, and skills they have to improve. Besides being able to increase the students’ interest and motivation, it is believed using collaborative or group learning will also develop their thinking skill more creatively.

    To find out whether there is any significant improvement of the students’ reading skill after they were taught by using collaborative learning, the researchers conducted an experiment at SMPN 5 Cimahi by collecting thirty six students from the seventh grade as the sample. The research was conducted in eight meetings. At the first meeting the researchers administered a pre-test. From the second until the seventh meeting, the researchers conducted the treatment in two cycles by using Collaborative Learning. At the last meeting, the researchers administered post-test to find out the students’ improvement in their reading skill after they were taught by using Collaborative Learning.

    According to the result of the experiment in this journal, it was found that the application of learning Learning Together (LT) can improve students’ reading ability and their achievement in the subject matter of public buildings at SMPN 5 Cimahi. The reading skills of the seventh grade students based on the pre-test and post-test after they were taught using Collaborative Learning showed a difference. The highest improvement of students' reading skills is on aspects of understanding and reading.

    This journal does not have many advantages other than to inform the readers about a way that is believed as one of the methods that can improve students’ reading skills. Unlike other creative methods, the researchers decided to use collaborative learning, which in my opinion is very old-fashioned and outdated considering students are very familiar with this method. Students are often assigned to work in groups every now and then, and I am certain they find nothing special about it. Granted collaborative learning could ease them in solving difficult assignments with their peers, but the impact of this method would not be effective to every individual when applied. The main concern is that students can be dependent on the peers whom they consider to be smarter to work on the assignment, while the rest of the students who lack of skill are still struggling and have not improved.

Journal Review: ‘Increasing Writing Skills In Text Based Short Story Through Audio Visual Media’

Name : Anis Septianingsih

Class : 4E

NPM : 1910631060066

Journal : ‘Increasing Writing Skills In Text Based Short Story Through Audio Visual Media’ by Yuhartanti, Novia Juita, Yasnur Asri

Journal Review

            A journal by Yuhartanti, Novia Juita, Yasnur Asri called ‘Increasing Writing Skills In Text Based Short Story Through Audio Visual Media’ attempts to explain how the use of audio-visual media can be used to study the interaction of children and for them to absorb knowledge through what is seen and heard in. Audio-visual is used as one of the tools to reach a specific audience in a special role for the sake of achieving certain goals, in this case to improve students’ writing skills. Media teaching can heighten students' learning process which can in turn heighten the learning outcomes.

            To further find out whether audio-visual media can be effective in increasing students’ writing skills in text based short story, Yuhartanti, Novia Juita, and Yasnur Asri conducted an experiment at SMAN 1 Batang Anai in Padang. They chose a classroom action research as their method because it has characteristics that correspond to the research objectives, namely to increase the skill of writing short stories from the folklore texts through the application of audio visual media, and they chose a class of tenth graders majoring in social studies as their participant.

            The result of the research shows that the use of audio-visual media can increase the students’ writing skill. It also increases the activity of the students because the teacher is able to create a good atmosphere of learning so that it can result a positive attitude and self-confidence of students. At the time of learning, teachers have facilitated a series of activities that give the space for the emergence of student activity. The number of students who reach to KKM set with that achievement is 75%.

            There are not many advantages to this journal besides the audio-visual method that the researchers had proposed turned out to be successful in increasing the students’ skill in writing. Other than that, I would say that this journal was not thoroughly researched. The participants of this experiment were not that much either, with that kind of method the researchers should not have just picked one class, they could have at least picked two classes to represent the entire students. Their choice of words and diction in this journal were also very poor, they should have double checked the journal before releasing it. Otherwise, the readers will find difficulties in reading and understanding the content of the journal, and the main purpose of releasing it will be vain.