A Study on the Ability of the Second Year Students of SMPN 2 Simandolak in Comprehending Recount Texts

This research was designed to describe the students' ability in comprehending recount texts. The aim was to find out the second year students' ability in comprehending recount texts. This descriptive research took place in SMPN2 Simandolak from April to May 2016. The total population of SMPN 2 Simandolak is 60 students. Thirty students were taken for try out and thirty students were taken for sample of the research by using total sampling. In collecting the data, the writer used 28 questions in the test. The time allotment for doing the test was 60 minutes. The data was analyzed by calculating the students' individual scores and finding out the mean score. The students' scores were classified into five levels; they are: excellent, good, mediocre, poor, and very poor. The data was presented by using graphic. Based on the result finding of this research, the second year students' ability in comprehending Recount texts at SMPN 2 Simandolak was in good level. The mean score of the whole students was 61.4

A Study on the Second Year Students' Ability of SMP As-shofa Pekanbaru in Constructing Yes/no Questions

This research was about the ability of the students in constructing yes/no questions. The aim of this research was to find out the ability of the second year students of SMP As-Shofa Pekanbaru in constructing yes/no questions. The population was 138 students. The sample was chosen through cluster random sampling and lottery technique. The analysis was based on giving test to the students. It was found that 20 out of 138 students were 1 student (5%) in excellent level, 5 students (25%)in good level, 10 students (50%) in mediocre level, 2 students (10%) in poor level and 2 students (10%) in very poor level. The mean score of the students was 51,81. It implies that the students' ability falls into mediocre ability level. Based on the result, it is recommended that teachers should pay attention more on material yes/no questions escpecially in using did

The Use of Information Gap Activity to Improve Speaking Ability of the Second Year of SMPN 34 Pekanbaru in Making Information Questions

The research is a classroom research that was conducted based on the problem occurred at the eighth grade students of SMP 34 Pekanbaru at studying the improvement on the ability of the eighth grade students of SMP 34 Pekanbaru in speaking in making information questions. Besides, knowledge in making information questions is mostly improved after being taught by information gap activity method. The participants were 34 students from VIII 2 of SMP 34 Pekanbaru. This research was conducted in two cycles. The data collection technique was obtained through (1) observation sheet which was applied to know the students and teacher performance during the teaching and learning process, (2) test was done to measure students' achievement, and (3) field note was obtain information about teacher, the students activities and performance in the teaching and learning process during the implementation of picture series. The research finding can briefly explain as follow: first the student's students speaking ability could be improved by using information gap activity method. Before the research was done, the average score of students was only 35.92 in pretest. After the research was done for cycle 1, it improved to77.19. Then, In cycle 2 increased up to 85.5. The observation sheet and field note result showed that the used of information gap activity make the teaching process more effective and it also helped students' improve their speaking ability and more active in learning process. This improvement happened because this information gap activity method is appropriate to be applied to the class

Dynamic of Sea Level Anomaly of Indonesian Waters

A trend in sea level rise as a result of global warming could be a threat to small islands and coastal areas in Indonesia. The objective of this study was to determine the trend and variability of mean sea level anomaly (MSLA) in Indonesian waters during the 20 years of observation. The data used in this study were monthly MSLA data obtained from the AVISO website (ftp://ftp.aviso.oceanobs.com). Supporting data were the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) (http://www.gom.gov.au/climate/enso), Dipole Indian Mode (DIM) index (http://gcmd.nasa.gov/records/GCMD_Indian_Ocean_Dipole.html), and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) index (http://research.jisao.washington.edu/pdo/). Eigth stations of Indonesian waters were selected to study the variability of MSLA. In general, MSLA variabilities of Indonesian waters had a seasonal pattern, positively correlated with the SOI index, and negatively correlated with DIM and PDO indexes. The partial correlation of DIM was more dominant in west of Sumatra (r=-0.52) and south of Java (r=-0.44), PDO was more dominant in the northern waters of Papua (r=-0.37) and Makassar Strait (r=-0.33), and SOI was more dominant in northern Papua (r=0.52) and less toward the west of Indonesian waters. Overall, the MSLA variability of Indonesian waters can be explained by the variabilities of SOI, DIM, and PDO indexes with the lowest value in Natuna waters by 12% (R2=0.12) and the highest value in the northern waters of Papua by 54% (R2=0.54). Interannual variabilities were observed during ENSO events (SOI<-10) along with the maximum value of DIM index resulted in the lowest value of MSLA. Meanwhile, the highest value of MSLA was found during La Nina events (SOI>10) in conjunction with a minimum value of DIM and PDO indexes. The average rate of sea level rise in Indonesian waters was 5.84 mm/yr, almost two times higher than the average rate of global sea level rise (3.2 mm/yr)

The Acceptability of Religious Terms Translation in the Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Islam

This research aimed to find out the used translation's techniques and the acceptability of the translation. This was a descriptive qualitative research and an embedded-case study. Based on semantic and relevance theory, the researcher determined good translation. This research was conducted by listing the religious terms found in The Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Islam. Then, the researchers compared the source language and target language to identify the translation techniques. Finally, the researchers and raters assessed the acceptability of the translation by conducting Focus Group Discussion (FGD). The result shows that the translator uses established equivalent, borrowing, literal, particularization, generalization, transposition, reduction, addition, explication, and discursive creation. Besides, the average rate for the acceptability of the translation is 2,8 out of 3. It means that the translation is mostly in accordance with the norm and rule of language in the target text

Waveform classification and retracking of jason-2 and jason-3 in halmahera sea

The accuracy of sea surface heights (SSHs) estimation from satellite altimeters is strongly influenced by the microwave reflected signals (or waveforms). Waveforms in open oceans generally have ideal shapes following the Brown (1977) model. However, in coastal and shallow waters, the signals are disturbed by lands, thus resulting in complicated waveforms (non-Brown). Non-Brown waveforms produce inaccurate SSH estimations; therefore, specialized protocols such as waveform classification and retracking are crucial when attempting to produce accurate estimations. In this study, waveforms of Jason-2 and Jason-3 satellite altimeters in the Halmahera were classified and retracked using several algorithms, such as Offset Centre of Gravity (OCOG), Ice, Threshold, and Improved Threshold. The results showed that waveforms in the Halmahera Sea had ten generic classes with dominant class of the Browns. The validation results showed that all retrackers (except OCOG) had the value of correlations exceeding 0.75, and Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) smaller than 25 cm at a distance of 5-20 km from the land. The Threshold 10% was the most common retracker that appeared with the highest improvement percentage (IMP), meanwhile the Ice retracker consistently produced the best correlation (0.86) and the lowest RMSE (16cm). The retracking results showed that waveform retracking generally can improve SSH estimation accuracy from ocean (standard) retracker

Will REDD+ safeguards mitigate corruption? Qualitative evidence from Southeast Asia

High levels of faith and finance are being invested in REDD+ as a promising global climate change mitigation policy. Since its inception in 2007, corruption has been viewed as a potential impediment to the achievement of REDD+ goals, partly motivating ‘safeguards’ rolled out as part of national REDD+ readiness activities. We compare corruption mitigation measures adopted as part of REDD+ safeguards, drawing on qualitative case evidence from three Southeast Asian countries that have recently piloted the scheme: Indonesia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. We find that while REDD+ safeguards adopt a conventional principal-agent approach to tackling corruption in the schemes, our case evidence confirms our theoretical expectation that REDD+ corruption risks are perceived to arise not only from principal-agent type problems: they are also linked to embedded pro-corruption social norms. This implies that REDD+ safeguards are likely to be at best partially effective against corruption, and at worst will not mitigate corruption at all