THE EFFECTIVENESS OF USING ANIMAL CARTOON PICTURES TO IMPROVE STUDENTS’ ENGLISH NARRATIVE TEXTS WRITING

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1  Background of the study

Human beings always need to interact with others to fulfill their needs. To achieve that, they use a means called language. Language is a system of choices by which people can communicate certain functions, allowing us to express their experiences of the world, to interact with others, and to create coherent messages (Hyland, 2004: 25).  Ronald Wardraugh (1992: 1) says that a language is what the members of particular society speak. The language in the world must be understood and appreciated. Without having language, people are isolated and helpless. They never stop learning language-from the babbling of babies to the voracious  preschool years (Derewianka, 1990: 3). It is now widely recognized that people learn through language-that language is absolutely central in the learning process.

The perception of the world is constructed through language, and it is through language that people are able to interact with others in their world. In schools, people could virtually say  that “language is the curriculum” (Derewianka, 1990: 3). It means that students are constantly learning language, learning through language,  and learning about language. So, language is as a main part. Without language, teaching – learning process can not be done because when a teacher and students want to say something of course they need language both written or spoken language.  

Language has a central role in a development of students’ intellectual, social and emotional and also as a factor of the students’ success in learning all the lessons (School Based Curriculum, 2000: 277). As Chomsky (1979: ix) states that language plays as an essential role in thinking and interacting. It has an important role in the intellectual, social, and students’ emotional development.  It is a decisive factor of getting success in learning lessons. Language is not only used to express human mind but also to explain human imagination then to arrange and to distribute to the others. The learning of language hopefully helps the students to understand themselves, their culture and other culture. Beside it, the learning of language also helps them capable of showing their ideas and feeling, take part in a society and even finding and  using their analytic and imaginative ability (School Based Curriculum, 2000: 402). 

English is one of the  international languages. English used as a means of communication both oral and written in order to cooperate among people in the world. English is taught all over the world, by all sorts of teachers to all sorts of learners (Hadfield, 1999: ix). Since years ago, English has been an important role in Indonesia. It is the first foreign language. 

In educational context, English has functions as a means of communication in order to fulfill the  needs of daily conversation, getting knowledge, a means of keeping the relation to others, giving and receiving information and as a means of enjoying language ethics in English culture context. In Indonesia, English is taught as a compulsory subject for students from the first grade of junior high school up to third grade of senior high school.

Teaching English as a foreign language is not an easy task. Teaching and learning a mother language and  foreign language would also need \different approaches and methods. As Finochiaro (1974: 12) states that learning a foreign language is different from learning a native language because the students’ environment in achieving their first language and?????