CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION 2.

Background of the Study By the time a human does the communication with others by means of speaking or writing, they will use a language. Language is an important communication tool that people can use it to express their feelings, thoughts and also share ideas so they can interact and get in contact with others easily. It is necessity to human life and civilization is certainty not possible without it. All sciences depend upon it and also all education in human life are conducted through it. Nowadays, the existences of English language are not odd anymore in the world. It has become the popular language which is learnt by most people in many areas of the globe. English is an international language. It is the worlds most widely used language by society for communication and international contact. English has become the most popular language in the world, through the long road of its historical background. The predominance of English is mainly the result of two periods of world domination by English speaking countries: British imperialism in the nineteenth century and the economic influence of the United States in the twentieth century. In another word, it may be shortly concluded that these are two dominant reasons for popularity of English as a world language and the factors which have influenced and sustained the spread of the language. In this globalization era, everyone is demanded to prepare a great resources

for his/her life particularly in science and technology. Of course, to compete against a global demanding, the people should have an adequate knowledge and good skills. Therefore, mastering English language both oral and written English actively is necessity for academic and global media communication requirement because it has become compulsory for everyone who wants to compete against the globalization era. In Indonesia, it is acknowledged that English is the first foreign language that must be learnt by students from elementary school level up to senior high school level because the government considers that mastering English is one way to absorb the sciences and technology in order to create great human resources. And, it is no doubt that great human resources are very important for national development and existences toward other nations. Besides that, English has become a medium instruction in teaching-learning activity especially for particular lesson in certain school. When students are learning English, they will learn language skills and language component. Grammar is one of English language component that it must be learnt and understood by students. It is a very basic knowledge and an important tool for students to master English. It is a science that teaches students how the way to speak, to read, and to write English correctly. Besides, by learning grammar the students will know about system of language so they will be able to combine and build words into meaningful sentence. It is as Penny Ur stated in A Course in Language Teaching Practice and Theory, Grammar is defined as words are put together to make correct sentences;s it does not only affect how the units of words are combined in order to make correct sentences but also affects their meaning. It can be concluded from the statements above, it is no doubt that by mastering grammar, the students will have a way to be able to speak, to read, and to write English correctly and understandable, so finally the students can create a good communication and interaction in English language actively both in oral or written English between each other in their lives. In English grammar, reported speech is one of many grammatical categories which is important to be learnt by students. It is needed to be learnt because it is one of three ways for students to report or share their statements or thoughts to other

people especially when they communicate between each other. It is as Marianne Celce Murcia and Diane Larsen Freeman stated in The Grammar Book An ESL/EFL Teachers Course, Grammar and rhetoric books generally recognize three ways for a speaker and writer to attribute statements or thoughts to other people: direct quotation, indirect reported speech, and paraphrase. Reported speech is commonly used to report what other people have said or thought without reporting the exact word. With indirect reported speech, one wishes to report the content of the original source without necessarily repeating sentences exactly as they were originally uttered. To report people words, thoughts, and beliefs there are two main ways: direct and indirect speech. Reported speech is also used when people are interested not in the words that someone has chosen, but in the essential information they conveyed. Reported speech is found in newspaper reports, fiction, talking or writing about conversation, reports, articles or speeches peoples have heard or read. By learning reported speech definitely students will able to quote somebodys words or thoughts, whether in direct or indirect speech and also the students will learn and understand the way to report speeches such as statements, questions and commands. Besides, It is an essential for students to learn reported speech because reported speech is one of the linguistic features which is should be mastered by students when they try to write the text of news item or report text and also it can be denied that it has important role because it is often used by people to communicate in their daily conversation. It is as Marianne Celce Murcia and Diane Larsen Freeman stated in The Grammar Book an ESL/EFL Teachers Course, Indirect reported speech plays an important role in everyday conversations. Therefore, the school has attached reported speech in syllabus as a subject matter that must be learnt by students considering to these importance that has been explained above. Learning grammar is not easy for many Indonesian students as it has already known that English and Indonesian have many different aspects in grammatical form. Of course, by this differentiation, there are many difficulties will be faced by students

when they learn grammar. As the writer found in her research, there are many students still have difficulties in learning reported speech. They notice that they often do mistake when they quote the direct into indirect form. Some students still confuse with certain grammatical changes that have to be made by them. Sometimes they feel so hard to decide what kind of tenses and pronoun that should be used when they quote the word. It can be known that Indonesian language has not a grammatical form like tenses and pronoun. It is as Martin Parrott stated in Grammar for English Language Teachers, Learners are sometimes confused by the tense and pronoun changes that can occur in reported speech, particularly if their first language doesnt involve making similar changes. In fact, there is a little different process happened when the students want to report somebodys word from direct into indirect form in English language, that the students should have made grammatical changes in their effort to reproduce the words. They should change its tense and pronoun to make it acceptable and meaningful within a language. It is as Llewelyn and Menezes in Matriculation English stated When turning the direct into indirect form certain grammatical changes have to be made. On the contrary, when the students want to report somebodys word, thoughts and ideas in Indonesia language, then, the grammatical changes wont be happened or they do not need to change the tense or pronoun like in English language. That is why students often do mistake and find difficulty when they quote direct into indirect/reported speech in English. It can be concluded from statement above, that the grammatical changes which happened when the direct form transformed into indirect form has become one of difficulties that occur when the students learn reported speech. Therefore, it is important for learner to have a good understanding on it and memorize the rule or form very well. Based on the description above, the writer would like to conduct the research on the students difficulties in learning reported speech of question sentence. The

study is done in first year students of MA Pembangunan UIN Jakarta. So, the writer would like to discuss it in her skripsi under the title: An Analysis on Students Difficulties in Learning Reported Speech of Question Sentence at the First Year Students of MA Pembangunan UIN Jakarta 3. Identification of the Problem Based on the background of the study above, there are many problems that can be identified in this research such as: (1) The students difficulties in learning reported speech of question sentence. (2) The causes of the difficulties in learning reported speech of question sentence which is faced by the first year students of MA Pembangunan UIN Jakarta. C. Limitation and Formulation of the Problem 4. Limitation of the Problem Based on the identification of problem above, it can be seen that the study is still general and abroad. There are many difficulties happened when turning direct speech into reported speech such as difficult in the change of tenses, pronoun, word order and adverb. Beside that, reported speech is divided into three kinds: statements, questions, and commands. Therefore, to make it better and more specific, of course, it is effective and efficient to limit the problem. Then, the writer is interested in the difficulties of reported question in the change of tenses and pronoun, where the object of this research is the first year students of MA Pembangunan UIN Jakarta. 5. Formulation of the Problem In line with limitation of problem above, the writer formulates the problem of the study as follows: (1)What are the difficulties faced by the first year students in learning reported speech of question sentence?(2)Why do the students face difficulties in learning reported speech of question sentence? D. Use of the Study The use of this study is expected to provide a contribution of knowledge for

students who still find problem and confuse when learning a reported speech of question sentence, so they can overcome their difficulties in their learning activity. Then, for the teacher of English language, it is also expected to be useful information, so they will know how far the students comprehend about reported speech of question sentence, the difficulties which are faced by students when they learn this subject matter, and the causes of those difficulties. Besides, the result of this study will direct the English teacher to do some evaluation and revision in their teaching-learning activity so it is expected that both teacher and students will have a good collaboration to overcome all problems that happen especially in learning reported speech of question sentence. Next, for further researchers: it can be as a reference in conducting similar study in the next time. Finally, for the writer particularly and readers broadly who are concerned with this paper, it is as one of resource which can enhance their perception and knowledge in learning reported speech of question sentence. E. Organization of the Study This skripsi systematically consists of five chapters. Here are the short description of its contain: Chapter one is introduction. It contains of background of the study, identification of the problem, limitation and formulation of the problem, use of the study and organization of the study. Chapter two is theoretical framework. It discusses about concept of grammar (definition and types of grammar), reported speech (meaning, kinds and transformational rules from direct question into reported speech of question sentence), and students common difficulties in learning reported speech of question sentence (definition of learning, learning difficulty, and difficulty in the change of tense and pronoun). Chapter three is research methodology. Research methodology consists of the purpose of research, time and place of study, population and sample of the study, Method of the study, instrument of the research, technique of collecting data, and technique of data analysis. Chapter four is research findings. They consist of data description, data

analysis, and interpretation data. Last chapter is conclusion and suggestion.