DEVELOPING TASK-BASED SUPPLEMENTARY ENGLISH READING MATERIALS FOR GRADE VII STUDENTS OF JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL

Abstract

The objective of this study was to develop a set of task-based supplementary English reading materials focusing on descriptive texts for Grade VII students of Junior High School. This study was a Research and Development (R & D). The subjects were students of SMPN 8 Yogyakarta Class VII D. Questionnaires were used to obtain the data of the needs analysis and the expert judgment. The data were analyzed quantitatively. This research was conducted by following Masuhara’s research design (in Tomlinson, 1998) with several modifications. The research stages were conducting needs analysis, writing a course grid, designing the first draft, getting expert judgment, and revisions. In the first stage, the questionnaire was used to gain the data of the learners’ needs.  In the next stage, the data gained from the needs analysis was used to write the course grid. This course grid was used as a guide in designing the first draft of the materials. Then, the first draft was evaluated and validated by the expert in the expert judgment stage. The results of the expert judgment then was used as the basis to revise the first draft which then became the final draft of the developed materials.The results of this research showed that the supplementary reading materials that they need were the materials dealing with their real life and contained the structure and function of the texts, vocabulary and grammar lesson and interesting reading activities which allowed them to interact with the teacher and other students. The product of this study was a set of task-based supplementary English reading materials for Grade VII students of Junior High School entitled “Practice in Reading”. It consisted of three units. Each unit consisted of 20-25 reading activities. Based on the data from the expert judgment, the mean value of all aspects of the three developed units fell into the range of 3.25 ≤ x ≤ 4. It means that the developed materials were categorized as “Very Good”. Thus, it can be concluded that the task-based supplementary English reading materials fitted for Grade VII students of junior high school.