IMPROVING STUDENTS’ SPEAKING SKILL THROUGH DEBATE TECHNIQUE AT SMK SWASTA DHARMA BAKTI MEDAN

Speaking is important to be learnt because speaking is the way to communicate with otherpeople in order to deliver opinion and express idea. That means there must be at least two people in speaking, otherwise it is not called speaking. Speaking is the primary aspect of learning a language because the final goal of language learning is communication. This study is Classroom Action Research in which the writer employs debate technique in teaching speaking. The teaching process was carried out in two cycles. The data consist of observation sheet and test. The data from the observation that have been taken from every cycle are analyzed descriptively, while the data from test are analyzed quantitatively. The result of this study shows that using debate technique can improve students’ speaking skill. This is proven by students’ test score that improved in each test. In the pre-test, the students’ average score is 66.2. While in the formative test cycle I, the students’ average score is 67.6, and in the post-test cycle II, the students’ average score is 76.3. That means the debate technique can improve the students’ speaking skill significantly