Difficulties in Reading Comprehension Faced by The Eighth Grade Students

Abstract

This research was aimed to find out difficulties in reading comprehension faced by the eighth grade students of SMP Negeri 1 Parigi Tengah. This research applied a qualitative research method design. The subjects of this research were twenty one students of class VIII SMP Negeri 1 Parigi Tengah. The techniques of collecting data were interview and a reading test. The students were assign to answer the essay test and after that three of them were interviewed. The results of the research shows that there are 35.71% of students had difficulty in making inference, there are 9.09%  students who had difficulty in finding main idea, 36.36% students had difficulty in understanding detail information, and there are 18.83% students who had difficulty in understanding vocabulary. The factors causing students difficulties in understanding reading comprehension were internal factors and external factors. The internal factors were understanding long sentences in the texts, difficult to concentrate and in understanding vocabulary.  The external factors were inadecuate intructions by the teacher and students’ unsupport environment. In this research, researcher hope to help teachers adapt teaching strategies according to students needs.