This study is aimed at finding out the ability of students to use English collocation and its correlation with their academic achievements. The samples of this study are the 5th semester students of English education study program, UniversitasSriwijaya. Data were gathered by means of ability test using English collocation and academic achievements, GPA. The analysis results showed that there was a positive correlation between the ability of students to use English collocation and their academic achievements

Jaya, Hariswan Putera

Kurniawan, Dedi

Wijaya, Alhenri

English

JURNAL POLITEKNIK NEGERI SRIWIJAYA

HOLISTICS JOURNAL, Volume 11, Number 2,  December  2019, p-ISSN 2085-4021 │e-ISSN 2657-1897  1  CORRELATION BETWEEN THE ABILITY OF USING ENGLISH COLLOCATION AND ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENTS OF STUDENTS OF FACULTY OF TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION  UNIVERSITAS SRIWIJAYA     Hariswan Putera Jaya1, Alhenri Wijaya2, Dedi Kurniawan3 1,2,3 English Department  Faculty of Teacher Training and Education Sriwijaya University  ABSTRACT: This study is aimed at finding out the ability of students to use English collocation and its correlation with their academic achievements. The samples of this study are the 5th semester students of English education study program, Universitas Sriwijaya. Data were gathered by means of ability test using English collocation and academic achievements, GPA. The analysis results showed that there was a positive correlation between the ability of students to use English collocation and their academic achievements.  Keywords: Collocation, academic achievements, correlation    Vocabulary is one component of language consisting of words. To be able to understand and speak in one language, one must have vocabulary knowledge. Word mastery involves the ability to pronounce (pronunciation), write (spelling), identify the form or type (parts of speech), use it correctly in combination with other words (structural function), and master its meaning (meaning). This set of knowledge can be classified as grammatical competence. In addition, knowledge about its use in the context of sociolinguistic competence is also part of being able to use a word so that someone can have communicative competence. The word is a unit of speech. In structural linguistics, the language unit starts from the smallest phoneme. Phonemes consist of vowels, consonants, and diphthongs. These units combine to form morphemes. Free morphemes are identical with basic words such as write, table, take, hurt, and so on. Bound morphemes cannot stand alone because their existence always depends on free morphemes such as –an in tulisan, ter- in terinjak, and -er- in gerigi. Bound morphemes are prefixes, suffixes, and infixes. Vocabulary is a very important language element since most of the meanings are expressed through vocabularies. Vocabulary knowledge is closely related to academic success because students who have a lot of vocabularies can understand and express more ideas or concepts. Sadhegi & Sharifi (2013: 65) emphasizes that vocabulary is an important component of language and limitation of vocabulary mastery has a negative impact on communication skills. Every learner of English as a foreign language can have the ability to use English like native speakers. To achieve this ability, the ability of collocation — juxtaposing words that are appropriate, common, and acceptable — is a crucial aspect. Nation (2001: 106) states, "knowing what words can occur with other words contributes to the fluency which with language can be used". However, the ability to pair words correctly is a problem for foreign language learners or it often frustrates them. Barfield and Gyllstad (2010: 1) quoted by Said (2010: 204) suggest, "for everyone learning or teaching a second language, collocation is undoubtedly one of the most fascinating (and at times frustrating) challenges that they face".  HOLISTICS JOURNAL, Volume 11, Number 2,  December  2019, p-ISSN 2085-4021 │e-ISSN 2657-1897  2  Larger units of words are phrases; groups of words whose proximity are in accordance with the rules making them have meanings. Groups of words such as on the table, food purchases, writing letters, and pleased to meet you are examples of phrases. Phrases have meaning but do not have elements of subject and predicate. A unit that has a subject and a predicate is a sentence. When this unit can stand alone as a complete sentence, it is a sentence and also as an independent clause. Units "before they get home" cannot stand alone and are referred to as dependent clauses while units of "it starts to rain" can stand alone as a sentence. These clauses and sentences can form a complex sentence: "It starts to rain before they get home." The group of words in the form of phrases whose existence of certain elements is in accordance with the prevalence of their use is called collocation. If the elements are not paired according to their usage, the unit or phrase is wrong. The "do mistakes" unit is wrong but the correct one is the "make mistakes" unit. "Make homework" is not a true collocation. The right one is "do homework". Learning or memorizing whole units like this seems easier to master in learning vocabulary than learning them word per word if it has a special collocation.  Lewis (2000: 53) states that collocation is a fairly dominant unit of speech or expression in the language as illustrated in the following statement, "collocations, which are assumed to make up 70% of everything we say, hear, read or write in real life .... "In recent years, there has been increasing attention to vocabulary teaching in its form which is incorporated automatically called collocation and awareness of the importance of collocation as an important category of lexical patterning (Alfahadi et al. 2014: 390). Collocations are “...words which are statistically much more likely to appear together than random chance suggests” (Lewis, 2000: 29). Eskicirak (2011) quoted from Lewis (2000) defines collocation as words that appear naturally side by side in accordance with the use of language by native speakers. The following is Eskicirak's statement, "Collocations are words that co-occur naturally in daily used language (Lewis 2000). Examples range from two word combinations such as 'difficult decision' (adj. + Noun), 'submit a report' (verb + noun) 'problem child' (noun + noun) to extended combinations such as 'He is recovering from a major operation'". Collocation as a lexical unit, as with words, has an important role in communication using language. Without grammar knowledge there is still something that can be communicated but without vocabulary nothing can be communicated through language. "Without grammar, little can be conveyed, without vocabulary nothing can be conveyed" Wilkins D. (1972, 11). Presenting collocation in learning English is seen as important to accelerate the ability to communicate in the language and therefore, as confirmed by Alfahadi et al. (2014: 390), it should start as early as possible with collocations that are appropriate for the age level of learners. McCarthy (1990) also provides an explanation of the importance of mastering collocation correctly and appropriately so that the language used sounds more appropriate and natural as speakers of the language speak, and the statement can be read as follows, "... knowledge of collocation appropriation is part of the native speaker's competence and can be problematic for learners in cases where collocability is language specific and does not seem solely determined by universal semantic constraints." Based on the above thought, the writers want to analyze the correlation between the ability to use English collocation and the GPA of the 5th semester students of English Education Study Program, FKIP, Sriwijaya University. HOLISTICS JOURNAL, Volume 11, Number 2,  December  2019, p-ISSN 2085-4021 │e-ISSN 2657-1897  3   METHOD OF RESEARCH  The quantitative research method used in this study is a quantitative descriptive correlation research method using a research instrument in the form of a vocabulary test (collocation). The process of analyzing research instruments namely vocabulary tests is done by testing the validity of the instrument by using inter-item consistency analysis and instrument reliability testing by using a two-test technique (test-retest). A qualitative approach is used when analyzing collocation errors by comparing them with the correct collocation which will then be classified whether in the grammatical or lexical collocation group. The results are analyzed using the Correlation Research Design of Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient to find out the correlation between the collocation value and the Grade Point Average (GPA).  The population in this study was all students of English Education Study Program (364 students), Language and Art Department, FKIP, Universitas Sriwijaya and the samples were the 5th semester students taken using a purposive sampling technique.  RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS  The results of this study were reported in the form of scores and then correlated using Pearson Product Moment. The mean, median, and mode of the collocation test and GPA results can be seen in the following table: Table 1 Mean, Median, Mode, and GPA No Mean Median Mode Collocation 35.9 37 37 GPA 3.3 3.3 3.4  Table 2  Collocation Test Results  Grade Score Range  Category  Frequency  Percentage  A 86 – 100 Excellent 0 0% B 71 – 85 Good 0 0% C 56 – 70 Sufficient 0 0% D 41 – 55 Poor 25 33% E 0 – 40 Fail 52 67%          HOLISTICS JOURNAL, Volume 11, Number 2,  December  2019, p-ISSN 2085-4021 │e-ISSN 2657-1897  4       Table 3 Collocation Graph   The results of the collocation test above shows that no students get A, B, or C, 25 students get D with poor category, and 52 students get E with fail category. It was concluded that the dominant value was fail category. The failure was due to the lack of students' understanding of word collocations and this became the task as educators to be more intense in delivering material on word collocation in order to have a significant correlation. Table 4  GPA of 5th Semester Students Grade Point Average (GPA) Category Frequency Persentage 3.50 – 4.00 Excellent 13 17% 3.00 – 3.49 Good 57 74% 2.50 – 2.99 Sufficient 6 8% 2.00 – 2.49 Poor 1 1% 0.00 – 1.99 Fail 0 0%  Table 5 Grade Point Average (GPA) Graph 01020304050601 4 7 10 13 16 19 22 25 28 31 34 37 40 43 46 49 52 55 58 61 64 67 70 73 76COLLOCATION SCORES HOLISTICS JOURNAL, Volume 11, Number 2,  December  2019, p-ISSN 2085-4021 │e-ISSN 2657-1897  5    GPA graph of the 5th semester students above shows that 13 students are excellent, 57 students are good, 6 students are sufficient, and only 1 student is poor. It can be concluded that the GPA of of the 5th semester students tends to be in the good category and this is a pretty good achievement. The fewer students with smaller GPA, the better the learning outcomes are.           Normality is applied to determine whether data is normally distributed or not. To analyze data normality, the Kolmogorov-Smirnov Z test is used if the value is more than 0.05, the distribution of the data is normal. The result of normality showed that the p value was 0.200 and 0.029 the p value of the collocation score (0.200) was greater than (0.05), while the collocation score data was normally distributed. In addition, the GPA data (0.029) was not normal because the p value was smaller than (0.05). Ghasemi and Zahediasl (2012) emphasized that "the non-normal data or the data which were not normally distributed still can be used with sample sizes > 30 or 40 and it should not cause major problems". So the conclusion of the affirmation was that the sample data could still be used even if the data did not indicate normally distributed.  From the results of the output data above, the significant value = (0.210) obtained was greater than (0.05) meaning that there was a significantly linear correlation between the collocation score variables and the GPA.  Table 6 Correlations  Collocation_Score IPK collocation_score Pearson Correlation 1 .296** Sig. (2-tailed)  .009 N 77 77 Ipk Pearson Correlation .296** 1 Sig. (2-tailed) .009  N 77 77 **. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).  After analyzing the data, the r-obtained correlation coefficient of the collocation score and GPA is 0.296 (see the table above). The correlation index number does not produce a symbol (-) meaning that the result of the correlation is positive.   00.511.522.533.541 4 7 10 13 16 19 22 25 28 31 34 37 40 43 46 49 52 55 58 61 64 67 70 73 76GPA HOLISTICS JOURNAL, Volume 11, Number 2,  December  2019, p-ISSN 2085-4021 │e-ISSN 2657-1897  6  Discussions The discussion was formulated based on the study results and the formulation of the problem. The data analysis results of the ability test using English collocation showed that 67% of students got grades in the range of 0 - 40 based on the range of values in the FKIP handbook and classified as FAIL category. Then, 33% of students received scores between 41 and 55 which were still classified as D-grade category. This showed that the ability of students to use collocation was still very low. The low ability to juxtapose words or collocation accurately reflects that collocation is difficult for students. Barfield and Gyllstad (2010: 1) quoted by Said (2010: 204) suggest, "for everyone learning or teaching a second language, collocation is undoubtedly one of the most fascinating (and at times frustrating) challenges that they face". Furthermore Lewis (2000: 53) states that collocation is a unit of utterance or expression which is quite dominant in a language as illustrated in the following statement, "collocations, which are assumed to make up 70% of everything we say, hear, read or write in real life. The limited ability of students of English education study program, FKIP, Unsri in using collocation is probably caused by two main factors. First, students are independently less exposed to collocation. The skills to use collocation are generally obtained through learning experiences such as reading activities, listening to English songs, watching movies or television programs in English.  Second, the curriculum in this case the substance of some subjects related to vocabulary development still does not accommodate optimal learning collocation which causes knowledge about the use of the right combination of words or collocation in accordance with the English language rules of students is still very low so that massive and immediate awareness is needed to all parties that the vocabulary in this case knowledge collocation is a very important language element because most of the meanings are expressed through vocabulary. Sadhegi & Sharifi (2013: 65) emphasizes that vocabulary is an important component of language and the limitation of vocabulary mastery has a negative impact on communication skill as one of the skills that must be mastered by students both as prospective teachers and other professions that use language skills.  Every learner of English as a foreign language especially students of English education study program should have the ability to use English the same or similar to the native speaker. To achieve this ability, the ability of collocation — juxtaposing words that are appropriate, common, and acceptable — is a crucial aspect. Nation (2001: 106) states, "knowing what words can occur with other words contributes to the fluency which with language can be used". The data analysis results of GPA showed that 91% of students belonged to the range of GPA between 3.00 - 4.00 categorized as GOOD GPA and CUMLAUDE. It showed that students were able to independently follow the process of teaching and learning activities well. Although the results of the ability test using student collocation were still low, the data analysis results obtained showed that the value of r-obtained correlation coefficient of the collocation score and GPA was 0.296. The correlation index number did not produce a symbol (-). That showed that the results of the correlation were positive. Correlation values of these two variables are categorized as weak correlation (see the table for the level of correlation coefficient). However, If the two variables show a significant correlation, the r-obtained value should be greater than the critical value of the Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient and the p value (probability) is smaller than 0.01. Conversely, if HOLISTICS JOURNAL, Volume 11, Number 2,  December  2019, p-ISSN 2085-4021 │e-ISSN 2657-1897  7  the r-obtained value is lower than the critical value of the Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient and the value of p (probability) is higher than 0.01, it means that there is no significant correlation. The above results show the r-obtained value (0.296) is higher than the critical value of the Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient (0.286) and p-value (0.009) is smaller than (0.05). This means that there is a significant correlation between collocation scores and GPA. Vocabulary is a very important language element because most of the meanings are expressed through the vocabulary. Vocabulary knowledge is closely related to academic success because students who have a lot of vocabulary can understand and express more ideas or concepts. Sadhegi & Sharifi (2013: 65), emphasized that vocabulary is an important component of language and limitations in vocabulary mastery have a negative impact on communication skills. CONCLUSIONS It was concluded that the ability to use English collocation by students of English education study program, Faculty of Teacher Training and Education, Universitas Sriwijaya was still very low, but from the aspect of the GPA it showed that 91% got a GPA of above 3.00. From the correlation analysis, there was a correlation between the ability to use collocation and GPA.  REFERENCES Alfahadi, et.al. (2014). ‘Promoting awareness of teaching collocations techniques to beginner (Adjective-Noun Collocations).” European Scientific Journal (10)  Cresswell, John. W. (2010). Research design – Quantitative and qualitative approaches. California.Sage Publications.   Eskicirak, F.U. (2011). ‘Humanising language teaching’. Ideas from The Corpora, 13 (6)  Harris, David P. (1974).Testing English as a Second Language. McGraw-Hill Publishing Company: New Delhi.  Joklova, K. (2009). Using pictures in teaching vocabulary. Brno: Masaryk University.  Lado R. (1957). Linguistics across cultures. University of Michigan Press: Ann Arbor  Lewis, M. (2000). Teaching collocations. London: Language Teaching Publications.  McCarthy, M. (1990). Vocabulary. Oxford: Oxford University Press.  Nation, I.S.P. (2001). Learning vocabularyin another language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.  Sadeghi, K., & Sharifi, F. (2013). The effect of post-teaching activity type on vocabulary learning of elementary efl learners. English Language Teaching, 6(11), 65-76. Retrived from http://dx.doi.org/10.5539/elt.v6n11p65 HOLISTICS JOURNAL, Volume 11, Number 2,  December  2019, p-ISSN 2085-4021 │e-ISSN 2657-1897  8   Said, Mashadi. (2010). “Ketidaklaziman kolokasi pembelajar BIPA dan implikasinya terhadap pembelajaran bahasa” Cakrawala Pendidikan, 21 (2)  Shen, Z. (2008). The roles of depth and breadth of vocabulary knowledge in efl reading performance. Asian Social Science,4(12), Retrieved from www.ccsenet.org/journal,html.  Sugiyono. (2008). Metode penelitian administrasi. Bandung: CV Alfabeta.  Wilkins, David A. (1972). Linguistics in language teaching. Cambridge,MA: MIT Press. 

CORRELATION BETWEEN THE ABILITY OF USING ENGLISH COLLOCATION AND ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENTS OF STUDENTS OF FACULTY OF TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION UNIVERSITAS SRIWIJAYA

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CORRELATION BETWEEN THE ABILITY OF USING ENGLISH COLLOCATION AND ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENTS OF STUDENTS OF FACULTY OF TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION UNIVERSITAS SRIWIJAYA

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