Using Shadow Puppets in Storytelling to Improve the Listening Skills of the Five Graders at SDN Ardimulyo 3 Singosari.

ABSTRAK Listening is a basic building block of language and communication, particularly in the early years of education. Therefore, teaching listening for elementary school students is really important because they are still informed the basic knowledge of English. It is expected that the students are ready to study at Junior High School when English is formally taught to them. Based on the preliminary study, the students in SDN Ardimulyo 3 Singosari Malang are found to have problems with listening to simple texts due to the lack of their vocabulary and there are no facilities from the school to learn listening.Thus the aim of this research is to know how shadow puppets in storytelling can improve the fifth graders’ listening skills at SDN Ardimulyo 3 Singosari Malang. The design of this research was collaborative classroom action research which consisted of four stages: planning, implementing, observing and reflecting. The instruments used for gathering the data were vocabulary test, observation sheet, field notes, interview guide, and questionnaire. The subjects of this research were 46 students of fifth graders at SDN Ardimulyo 3 Singosari.In this research, the researcher found that shadow puppets used in storytelling can improve the students’ listening skill through the following procedure: (1) the implementation of the three stage procedures in teaching listening (pre, while and post listening) helped the students to learn step by step, (2) the use of the worksheet which helped students to engage their vocabulary, and (3) the use of media while telling the story were really motivate them to listen ad learned the word..Based on the result of data analysis, the students met the criteria of success as indicated by: (1) more than 90% of the students reached the minimum score of 75 in their final test and gained five-point improvement, and (2) the students’ performance increase in each meeting and the average score was 81.9 which is of very good classification. Based on the conclusions, some suggestions are given to the English teachers for young learners and further researchers. Firstly, the English teachers for young learners have to teach in fun ways such as using interesting media and interacting with the students. Then it is suggested that further researchers conduct similar research with different media, skills and materials. They are also suggested to see my problems, such as the size of the class, the number of the students and also the learning resources from the school