The Effectiveness of Using Communicative Approach in Teaching Speaking for SMK
A competency in English as a Second Language involve 4 major skill, they are listening, speaking, reading, and writing (Heaten, 1973: 3). All of them are the basic skills that should be learnt by the students in language teaching and learning process in the term of their education.
Education itself is aimed at providing school graduates with life skill in the sense that they are expected to achieve the competence required to obtain communication skills (The Department of National Education :2004). Since English is a language used as means of international communication, so the competence for language communication should be mastered by the students. In achieving the goals there are many kinds of method used by the teacher in their learning process, one of them is called Communicative Approach.
Communicative approach according to Brian Tomlinson in Gunning Swort, 1987 is an approach to foreign or second language teaching which empasizes that the goal of language learning is communicative competence. Widdowson, Christopher Brumfit consider the need to focus in language teaching communicative profficientcy rather than on more mastery of structures. It seems that communicative in language teaching is the important things in language teaching process.
Wilkin’s (1972) contribution is was in the form of analysis of the communicative meaning that a language learner needs to understand and express. In his model there are two kinds of meanings: notional categories and categories of communicative function. In this case we will study the categories of communicative function in the form of suggesstion in speaking at SMK.
SMK is an educational institution which prepares human resources at secondary level. To prepare graduates who are ready to work, particulary in the global era, SMK students need to be provided with sufficient English proficiency to enable them to communicate in English speaking atmosphere. Therefore the curriculum of English SMK was hoped to achieve the need sudents in order to be able to use English in the right context.
As those current issues of SMK English curricullum, the teachers try to do the best in learning process. One of the teacher approachs is by using Communicatice Approach in their teaching and learning process. it is not too different from Communicative Languge Teaching that makes use of real-life situations that neccessitate communication, the teacher sets up at situation that students are likely to encounter in real life (Aritonang: 2004).
