The Use of Contextual Teaching and Learning to Teach Reading Comprehension Viewed from Students’ Locus of Control

The aims of this study are to investigate: (1) if CTL is more effective than grammar-translation method to teach reading comprehension; (2) if the students having high locus of control have better reading mastery than those having low locus of control; and (3) if interaction between methods used and students’ locus of control is availavle. The research was conducted at University of Muhammadiyah Kalimantan Timur. The samples were from two classes, cluster random sampling technique was used. Each class was divided into two groups (the students who have high and low locus of control) in experiment and control class. The techniques used to collect the data were questionnaire and reading comprehension test. The two instruments were tried out to get valid and reliable items. The data were analyzed by using multifactor analysis of ANOVA 2x2 and Tuckey test. The research findings: (1) CTL is more effective than GTM to teach reading comprehension, the result from ANOVA shows that Fo is higher than Ft or Fo > Ft; (2) the reading comprehension of the students who have high locus of control is better than that of those who have low locus of control, the result from ANOVA shows that Fo is higher than Ft or F o > Ft.; and (3) there is an interaction between teaching methods and Locus of control for teaching reading. It’s concluded that teaching methods had a strong influence on students’ reading comprehension.