USING SHORT STORY STRATEGY TO DEVELOP READING COMPREHENSION OF GRADE EIGHT STUDENTS

This research aims at proving if the application of the short story can develop the students’ reading comprehension. The sample of this research was grade eight students of SMP Negeri 3 Palu particularly class D and class E, namely class E as the experimental group and class D as the control group. The treatment was given to the experimental group using the short story, while the control group was not. To collect the data, the researcher used test instrument (pre-test and post-test). The finding confirmed that the mean scores of  pre-test in both groups were different. The control group had a higher score which was 57.19 while the experimental group was 44.69. This result showed that the students in the experimental group had problems in reading comprehension which needed to improve. However, after treatment, the result of the two groups showed significant distinction. The mean score of the experimental group rose to 71.80 while the control group was 64.45. Moreover, to prove the hypothesis, the process of calculating the result was continued by comparing the t-counted and t-table by applying the level of significance (df) at 62 (32+32-2). The result showed that the value of the t-counted was 8.70 which was higher than the t-table (1.670). It means that the hypothesis of the research was accepted. In conclusion, using short story can develop the students reading comprehension. Keywords: Develop, Reading Skill, Short Story