CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the Study In teaching and learning process at an institute of education which should be paid attention by teacher is an evaluation. It is considered that between teaching and evaluation is like two sides of a coin, which cannot be separated. Obviously, it contributes some information to the teaching and learning process, especially for a teacher. Norman. E Gronlund said that evaluation is a systematic process of determining the extent to which instructional objectives are achieved by pupil1. There are two important aspects of this definition. The first is that evaluation implies a systematic process, which omits casual uncontrolled observation of pupils. The second is that evaluation assumes that instructional objectives have been previously identified. Without previously determined objectives, it is difficult to judge clearly the nature and extent of pupil learning.1 Evaluation plays an important role in education activities. It is because education has goals that need to be reached. By giving evaluation, teachers can know whether the students reach the educations goal or not. Moreover, evaluation draws how well students achieve the materials after teaching learning process. The information of evaluation will be very useful to make judgments of the students either about their progress in teaching the goals or about their overall achievement. While the test is a tool or procedure used to measure and appraise. By testing, teacher can get important information related to students achievement or the effectiveness of their performance in teaching. In other word, the teacher can get information about how well students have mastered the courses, which they have just learned.
1

Norman E. Gronlund, Measurement and Evaluation in Teaching, Fourth Edition, (New York: McMillan Publishing co., 1981), p.6

There are numerous types of test. Arthur Hughes said there are four types of test; placement test, proficiency test, diagnostic test, and placement test. Placement test provides information that will help to place students at the stage (or in the part) of the teaching program most appropriate to their abilities Proficiency test used to measure peoples ability in the language. Diagnostic test uesd to identify learners strengths and weaknesses, and achievement test, to establish how successful individual students, groups of students, or the courses themselves have been in achieving objectives of language courses. The test which is usually used by teachers to know how far students have mastered the lessons is the achievement test.2 There are two kinds of achievement test: progress achievement tests and final achievement tests or summative tests. Progress achievement tests are intended to measure the progress that students are making, and final achievement tests or summative tests are intended to measure the students achievement at the end of a course of study.3 In order to measure accurately, the teachers should use a good test. It is not an easy work for them to make it because there are some characteristics or requirements that must be fulfilled. David P Harris said The characteristics of good test include validity, reliability, and practicality.4 In this research the writer only focuses on the validity. The writer opinions that the test that made by teachers basically has to line with the syllabus, and the content of the test must measure the language skill that taught by teachers. William Wiersma said The validity of a test is the extent to which a test measures what it is intended to measure. Without validity, there can be no confidence in the inferences and conclusions made from the results.5

Athur Hughes, Testing for Language Teacher, (Great Britain: Cambridge Univercity Press.,1995), p.11 3 Ibid., p.13. 4 David P.Harris, testing English as a Second Language, ( New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1974) p. 183 5 William Wiersma and Stephent G Juts, Educational Measurement and Testing , (Boston:Allyn and Bacon, 1990), p.183

Mary and Sake stated, Test validity is the most critical factor to be judge in the total program of foreign language testing. A test is valid when it measures effectively what it is intended to measure, whether it is achievement, aptitude, or proficiency in the language.6 William Wiersma said The validity has four specifications, those are face, content, construct, and criterion related validity. A test may be valid if it covers all of the four specifications, but the most important and the primary concern of test used in the classroom instruction is content validity.7 Content validity is concerned with the materials that the students have learned. The test should cover samples of the teaching materials given. To fulfill this, the teacher should refer his consideration to the teaching syllabus. JB. Heaton said Content validity depends on careful analysis of the language being tested and of the particular course objectives. The test should be so constructed as to contain a representative sample of the course.8 Most of the items that written by teachers for summative test inappropriate with the characteristic of a good test, there are the items which is inconformity with the rules of good writing, beside that there are some tests which disagree with a characteristic of a good text, and then there are some the item contents which disagree with syllabus. Sistematically, to construct a good test must follow the rules below: a. The test must describe the level of validity, reliability, and practicality 9 b. The items which written must appropriate with the rules of good writing ( sentence pattern, usage, diction, tenses, word form, word order, part of speech, spelling and punctuation, logical thinking, and culture) c. Text that written must appropriate with the characteristic of a good text, that include; bibliography, publisher, pages, and address
6 7

Mary Finocchiaro and Sydney Sake, Foreign Language Testing, p. 24 William Wiersma and Stephent G Juts, Educational Measurement and Testing, p. 183 8 JB. Heaton, Writing English Language test, (London and New York:Longman, 1998), p.160 9 David P.Harris, testing English as a Second Language, ( New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1974) p. 183

d. The item content must appropriate with the syllabus that described in the indicator. Because of the importance of content validity in a test, the writer tried to know whether the test items are in line with the syllabus or not. The English syllabus that is used here is the latest one recommended by National Education Department. The summative test which will be studied is taken from Senior High School of Nurul Falaah for the second grade students, academic year 2011 2012. The summative test is named: Ulangan Akhir Semester Ganjil Tahun Pelajaran 2011 2012. Therefore based on that problem, that is the items that written for summative test is inappropriate with the good characteristic test and there are some the items content which disagree with syllabus, the writer tries to analyze and interpret it under the title: AN ANALYSIS ON THE CONTENT VALIDITY OF ENGLISH FINAL TEST ITEMS AT THE ODD SEMESTER OF THE SECOND GRADE OF SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL B. Formulation of the Problem To make the study easy to understand, the writer formulated the problem whether each test items of the summative test for the Second grade students of Senior High School of Nurul Falaah represent the indicators as suggested its syllabus as an indicator of the content validity. Based on the preliminary study, the writer broke down into four formulates: 1. How many tests that written appropriate with a good characteristic test? 2. How many indicators represent by test items? C. Scope and Limitation of the Study To make this writing easier to understand, the writer limit the study as follow: a. The research focused only on the content validity of English summative test of the odd semester at the second grade academic year of 2011/2012

b. The research focused only on reading and writing skills because the summative test consists of multiple choice and essay items. c. The test to be analyzed is the English summative test for the second grade students at Senior High School of Nurul falaah d. The syllabus to be used is the syllabus which was made by the teacher referenced to the latest curriculum. D. Purpose of the Study The purpose of the research is to describe whether each test items of the summative test for the second grade students of Senior High School of Nurul Falaah represent the indicators as suggested its syllabus as an indicator of the content validity. And the result of this study is expected to give a description for the readers about an analysis of the content validity toward the summative test. It also can be used as an input for the readers; especially for the English teachers, the headmaster, and all people who are involved and responsible in developing quality of education. In other word, it is useful for all people to know the characteristics of a good test and for the researchers as the basic for conducting further research. E. Organization of the Study The content of this research will be organized into five chapters. The first chapter is an introduction. The second chapter is a theoretical framework. The third chapter is the research methodology. The fourth chapter is research finding and discussion. And the last chapter is conclusion and suggestion. In the first chapter, the writer would like to introduce this research, by explaining the background of the study, the formulation of the problem, the scope and limitation of the study, the purpose of the research, and the organization of the study. In the second chapter, the writer provided some theories related to the research problem, to support in doing this research.

In the third chapter, the writer explained the research methodology, it covers where and when the research is done, the method in this study, the research instrument, the technique of data collecting and analyzing. And in the fourth chapter, the writer explained the research finding and the interpretation of the data. And in the last chapter, the writer provided conclusion and suggestion of the research.