APPLYING KEYWORD METHOD IN IMPROVING VOCABULARY

MASTERY

AHMAD MUSTAMIR WARIS

English Departement,FTK UIN
Abstact
This study presents about using keyword method in improving the students’ vocabulary of the first
year students of English department
The problem statements of the research are: (1) what is the ability of the first year students of
English department in learning English vocabulary before using keyword method?, (2) What is the
ability of the first year students of English department in learning English vocabulary after using
keyword method? and (3) Is teaching vocabulary by using keyword method effective in improving the
student’s vocabulary mastery?
The objectives of the research are reflected from the problems are: (1) The ability of the first year
students of English department in English vocabulary before using keyword method, (2) The ability of
the first year students of English department in English vocabulary after using keyword method and (3)
The effectiveness of keyword method in increasing the students vocabulary mastery.
The population of the research is the first year students of English department of UIN Alauddin
Makassar, which consist of two groups namely class PBI 3 and PBI 4 consists of 40 students.
Furthermore, in collecting the data, the researcher used test, they were pre-test and post-test. The pre-
test was used before the treatment and post-test was used after the treatment.
The result analysis of the research shows that, using keyword method is effective in increasing the
students’ vocabulary mastery. It can be seen from the mean score between pre-test and post-test. The
ability of the students in English vocabulary is higher after they got the treatment than before they got
the treatment (8.57>5.39), and the significance difference of the t-test and t-table is 18.71>2.042.

Keyword: keyword method, vocabulary mastery

I. INTRODUCTION
As one of the international language, the rule of English becomes crucial
nowadays. It plays a main role in information transformation from a nation to others.
In Indonesia it has been taught in Elementary School untill University. English is
devided into four skills that should be mastered by the students of every level of
Schools and Universities.
Learning a language especially English means we will talk about the basic
element of it, namely vocabulary. It is the most important one because language
consists of sequence of words. People cannot learn a language without learning
words. As Allen in Nurhayati (2003) says that vocabulary is an important factor in all
language teaching and it influences the achievement of the four language skill.
In addition, vocabulary is a foundation in learning English without vocabulary the
students cannot access the knowledge from what they read, the students do not
understand what people say because lack of vocabulary, etc. Nirwana (1996:3) states
that in learning a foreign language there are two things we really need to know there
are: word and how to put them together. Stressing its importance in language teaching
and reassessing some ways in which it is thought and learnt. The language
methodologists and linguists have increasingly paid their attention to the teaching of
vocabulary. Numerous competing methods of vocabulary acquisition have received a
great deal of attention, including the keyword method and the learning of word roots.
According to Atkinson in Susan R. Old (2001), “keyword method is mnemonic
technique in which a new word is associated with a similar sounding familiar word,
or keyword. A mental image is then formed linking the unfamiliar word to the
keyword. For example, if the new word is “celerity”, meaning “speed,” the keyword
could be “celery.” A mental image of a piece of celery flying through the air could
then be formed”.
Several studies have investigated the characteristics of the keyword method. For
example Hall, Wilson, and Patterson in Susan R. Old (2001) suggest that the keyword
method is most useful to less experienced learners, such as the young. They also
found that keywords provided by the experimenter yielded better recall than when
participants were required to create their own keywords. Further, recognizing word
roots is an important process in vocabulary learning and teaching roots to students
enhances their ability to infer meaning of certain vocabulary, the students who
learned roots through the keyword method were just as able, if not more so, to infer
meanings from roots as were students in free study and semantic conditions.

II. REVIEW OF RELATED RESEARCH

There are many researches have found that vocabulary is a crucial part of English
and shows how important vocabulary is.
The results of the researchers are cited below.
- Mukrim (2003:4) made a research application mnemonic device in
English vocabulary subject taught to the first semester of English
department state Makassar University found, It that was a good way to
teach vocabulary subject to the student.
- Rahimi Hamzah (2006:51) conducted a research. Improving the
vocabulary mastery of second year student of SMU IMMIM Makassar
through discovery language learning. And result of it is better than
conventional technique in learning teaching vocabulary.
- Hasmawaty (2002:24) in her research about the mastery of English
vocabulary of the second year student of SLTP 5 Makassar, found that
the second year students of SLTP 5 Makassar had low mastery of
English vocabulary.
The research finding above show that many ways can help the students to learning
vocabulary. In this occasion, the researcher wants to introduce keyword method to
students’ vocabulary learning.
B. Some Pertinent Ideas
1. Vocabulary
Hornby (1974) in oxford dictionary says, vocabulary is:
- Total numbers of words that makes a language.
- Body of words known to a person or used in particular book, subject.
- List of words with their meaning, especially one that accompanies a
textbook in a foreign language.
According to Victoria N and David B (1995:1494) vocabulary is a list of words
and often, phrases, abbreviation, inflectional forms, and all the words used by a
particular person, socioeconomic group.
Good (1959:642) in dictionary of education state that vocabulary is the content
and the function words of language which re learn to thoroughly they become part of
child’s understanding, speaking, later reading and writing vocabulary. He also defines
vocabulary as the words having meaning when heard or seen even though not
produced by individuals him self to communicate with other.
From statement above the writer concludes that vocabulary is the words of a
language, which have meaning and function. In some definition, even though they are
different sound from each other, but the important point is that vocabulary of words
influence people to make up a language.Some classifications of vocabulary are given
in the following:
1. Harmer (1991:159) divided vocabulary into two kinds. There are:
a. Active vocabulary refers to vocabulary that the students have
learned. They are expected to be used by the student.
b. Passive vocabulary refers to what which students will recognize
when they meet them, but they will probably not be able to
produce.
2. Scail (1967:57) state that every persons has three types of vocabulary as
follows:
a. Active vocabulary: the words we customarily use in speaking and
probably run from 5000 to 1000 words.
b. Reserve vocabulary: the words we know but we rarely use in
speaking, we use them in writing.
c. Passive vocabulary: the words we recognize vaguely, but are not
sure of the meaning, whenever use them in either speaking or
writing.
One way to attract the students in introducing the words is by giving a procedure
to guess the meaning of the words and also Wallace (1989:30) adds five steps to learn
or to achieve vocabulary in mother tongue and the target language as follows:
- There is a felt need.
- The learner is exposed to an enormous quantity of his own language with
tremendous scope for repetition of what he learns.
 - The learner controls his own rate of learning.
- The target language is nearly always encountered in appropriated
situation and appropriate context.
- Since the words are learned as they arise out of a felt need in particular
situation they usually a clear denotation
.
2. The keyword method
Atkinson in Susan r. old (2001) says the keyword method is a mnemonic
technique in which a new word is associated with a similar sounding familiar sound,
or keyword. A mental image is then formed linking the unfamiliar word to the
keyword. For example, if the new word is “celerity” meaning “speed,” the keyword
could be “celery.” A mental image of a piece of celery flying through the air could
then be formed.
Mastropieri (1988) Keyword is a mnemonic device that uses both auditory and
visual cues to enhance the learning of information about the word meanings. From
the definition above the writer, conclude that keyword is learning vocabulary through
the root of word.
Levin in Robert j (1990:222) says the keyword method is a mnemonic strategy
that helps students to learn new information by associating it to interactive visual
images for later recall.
The purpose of keyword method is to improve college students` ability to learn a
foreign language and helping the less able students to memorize or learn word easily
by using similar sounding words in their mother tongue. Hall, Wilson, and Patterson
in Susan R. Old (2001) suggest that the keyword method is most useful to less
experienced learners, such as the young. They also found that keywords provided by
the experimenter yielded better recall than when participants were required to create
their own keywords.
In teaching keyword method the teacher has two options to apply it in the class,
they are:
- unrelated keyword
Each new word is accompanied by a more familiar word, or
“keyword” and a sentence but the keyword does not have related root
meaning with the word.
- root related keyword
Each new word is accompanied by a more familiar word, or
“keyword” that has related root meaning and a sentence with the word.

III. METHOD OF THE RESEARCH

In this research the writer will use pre-experimental design. Pre-experimental
method involved one group pre-test design. the design is formulated as follow:
X1 -------------- O ------------------X2
Notation: X1: Pre-Test
O: Treatment
 X2: Post-Test

The object of the research is the first year student of English Department of
Tarbiyah and Teaching faculty UIN Alauddin Makassar. It consists of teen groups,
which were classified into five classes, PBI 1, PBI 2, are fused in one class and PBI 3,
PBI 4 are fused in one class, ect The sample of the research is the first year students
of English Department of Tarbiyah and Teaching Faculty UIN Alauddin Makassar,
where the researcher took one of the classes as sample, namely class PBI 3 and PBI 4
which consist of 40 students; in implement the method just 34 students were present.
In this research the researcher used purposive sampling technique, because this
research was just an experiment, which was to apply the keyword method in order to
know the effectiveness of it in teaching vocabulary. The location of the research was
at English Department of Tarbiyah and Teaching Faculty UIN Alauddin Makassar. It
is on Jl. Sultan Alauddin Makassar No. 63 Makassar, South Sulawesi. The research
was held on April 2007.
The instruments of the research that had been used were divided into three
activities, they are 1) Pre-Test, The pre-test was given to find out the initial ability of
the students before presenting the materials in the keyword method. 2)Treatment,
Treatment was given before the students do the post-test.. 3) Post-Test, Post-test was
given to find out the improvement of the students after presenting the materials
through the application of keyword method, the students do the post-test after getting
the treatment.
In collecting data, the writer followed the steps below: First, the writer gave pre-
test to know the students vocabulary ability before giving the treatment, by using
keyword method. Second, the writer gave post-test, but before giving post-test, the
writer gave treatments fourth meetings. In the treatment, the writer taught the students
using keyword method, the writer explained, what keyword method is?
In analyzing the data collected through the pre-test and post test, the researcher
used the procedure as follows:
1. The data collected through test is analyzed by using the classification as
follow:
a. 9,6 to 10 classified as excellent`
b. 8,6 to 9,5 classified as very good
c. 7,6 to 8,5 classified as good
d. 6,6 to 7,5 classified as fairly good
e. 5,6 to 6,5 classified as very fair
f. 3,6 to 5,5 is classified as poor
g. 0 to 3,5 is classified as very poor (Depdikbud, 1985:6)
2. Rate percentage of students` score
F
P= x 100 %
N
Notation: P = the percentage of the student respond
F = the frequency of the student respond
 N = the total number of sample
3. Discover the mean score, the writer applied the formula:
X =
∑X
N

Notation: X = Mean score

∑X = the sum of all score
N = the total number of sample
4. Finding out mean of difference score by using the following formula:
D =
∑D
N
Notation: D = The differences of mean score
N = The total number of sample
∑ = The sum of all scores
(Gay, 1981 : 332).
5. Finding out the significant difference between the students pre-test and post-test by
using the following formula:
D
t=
(∑ D}2
∑D 2
−
n
n(n − 1)
Notation: D = the mean of the difference score
∑D = the sum of all score
N = the total number of sample
t = test of signification difference (Gay, 1981: 331)
The formula is explained about the significant between pre-test and post-test. The
aim of the formula is to answer the question of problem statement, to know whether
the keyword method effective or not in improving the memorizing ability of the first
year students of English department of Tarbiyah Faculty UIN Aladdin Makassar.

IV. FINDING AND DISCUSSION

A. Finding
The data were collected by test. The test was done twice. The first is pre-test
before the treatment was given and the second was post-test after the treatment was
given.
1. The classification of the students’ score before the treatment is presented in
table I bellow:
 Table I
The rate percentage of the students’ score before the treatment was given
(Pre-test)
No Classification Frequency Percentage
1. Excellent 0 0
2. Very Good 0 0
3. Good 0 0
4. Fairly Good 8 23.53
5. Fair 8 23.53
6. Poor 12 35.29
7. Very Poor 6 17.65
Total 34 100%
The table I shows that before the treatment was given, there were 8 (23.53%) out
of 34 students in fairly good classification, 8 (23.53%) of them were in fair
classification, 12 (35.29%) of the students were in poor classification, and 6 (17.65%)
of the students were in very poor classification. It can be conclude that before the
treatment, the students’ knowledge was still low about vocabulary.
2. The classification of the students’ score after the treatment was given.
The result of the post-test as follow:
Table II
The rate percentage of the students’ score after the treatment was given
(Post-test)
No Classification Frequency Percentage
1. Excellent 3 8.82%
2. Very Good 15 44.11%
3. Good 14 41.18%
4. Fairly Good 2 5.89%
5. Fair 0 0
6. Poor 0 0
7. Very Poor 0 0

Total 34 100%
Table II shows that, after the treatment was given there were 3 (8.82%) out of 34
students in excellent classification, 15 (44.11%) of them were in very good
classification, 14 (41.18%) of the pupil were in good classification, and 2(5.89%) of
the students were in fairly good classification. It can be conclude that after the
treatment the students’ knowledge about vocabulary was in very good classification.
Table I and II indicated that, there were different score of pre-test and post-test. In
the pre-test the students’ knowledge was poor in vocabulary and after the treatment
the students’ knowledge was very good in vocabulary.
 3. The students’ mean score of tests (pre-test and post test) is presented as
follow:
Table III
The mean score of the students’ tests (pre-test and post-test)
Type Of Test Mean Score
Pre-Test 5.39
Post-Test 8.57

Table III shows that the mean score of the students’ pre-test was 5.39 and the
mean score of the students’ post-test was 8.57. It describes that the mean score of the
students pre-test and post-test were different.
To know whether or not the difference of the mean score is statically difference at
the level of significance. The statically analysis of pre-test and post-test is presented
as follow:
Table IV
The t-test of the students’ knowledge
Variable T-Test Value T-Table
1 __ 2
X X 18.71 2.042

Based on the table above, the value of t-test was higher (18.71) than the value of
t-table (2.042). It means that the there is a significance between the result of the
students pre-test and post-test.

B. Discussion
Apropriate with the analysis of the data obtained from the students’ pre-test, the
means score is 5.39. It can be concluded that the students’ vocabulary is still low.
While, the students’ vocabulary based on post-test is 8.57. It means that the students’
post-test is higher that students’ pre-test.
Relating to the result above, it indicates that after giving the treatment by using
keyword method, the students had better achievement of vocabulary. This can be seen
through their score of pre-test and post-test (8.57>5.39).
The result of t-test showed that the value of the t-test (18.71) is higher than the
value of the t-table (2.042). It means that keyword method is effective in improving
the students’ vocabulary.according to the result the researcher concludes that the first
year students of English Department of Islamic state university of Alauddin Makassar
have better ability on vocabulary after having treatment through keyword method.

V. CONCLUSSION AND SUGESTION

Agreeing with the result presentation of the research and the discussion of the
data analysis, the writer concludes that Before the treatment was given the students’
knowledge was still low about vocabulary, it shows by the result of the rate
percentage of students` score in pre-test (table I). After the treatment was given their
knowledge about vocabulary improve by seeing students` score in post-test (table
II).The mean score of the students’ pre-test was 5.39 and the mean score of the
students’ post-test was 8.57 (table III) and the result of t-test showed that the value of
the t-test 18.71 is higher than the value of the t-table 2.042 (table IV), It means that
keyword method is effective in improving the students’ vocabulary.
By seeing that result, the research should give some suggestions for the English
teachers, the students themselves, and the next researchers.For the English teachers,
they should implement keyword method in teaching process and give more the
material of vocabulary to the students in order to intensify the students’ achievement
in English vocabulary. The teacher also should ask the students to keep memorizing
vocabulary and stimulate the students to memorize vocabulary. For the students, The
students should implement keyword method in learning process and keep memorizing
vocabulary. For the next researchers, They are expected to make a thesis of English
vocabulary with other forms and the researcher can develop keyword with other kinds
of techniques.
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