Journal of English Language Teaching 

http://ojs.ikipmataram.ac.id/index.php/joelt 

DOI: 10.33394/jo-elt.v5i2.2311 

Volume 5 Nomor 2, Desember 2018 

online: 2548-5865, print: 2355-0309 

pp.121-124  

 

121 

 

IMPROVING THE STUDENTS’ VOCABULARY  

BY USING “GO FISH” GAME 

Moh. Nurman 

Lamongan Islamic University 

mohnurman1982@gmail.com 

 Abstract  

The present study aims at explaining how to improve the students’ vocabulary mastery by 

using “Go Fish” game. The study belongs to classroom action research. The participants of 

the study are one hundred and twenty-two junior high school students of the seventh grade. 

To measure the improvement of students’ vocabulary mastery, the study used test. The 

finding showed that the mean score, 92,41 in the second Cycle had met the criteria of 

success. It means that the use of Go Fish game in teaching vocabulary can improve the 

students’ vocabulary mastery. 

 

Keywords: Go Fish Game, Vocabulary 

 

INTRODUCTION 

Vocabulary is defined as “all words 

in a particular language” (Wehmeier, et al., 

2005: 1707 cited in Cahyono &Widiati, 

2011: 107). Vocabulary is important to 

support mastery of language skills. 

Vocabulary, in addition to grammar and 

pronunciation, is one of language elements 

considered necessary for language 

mastery. Vocabulary teaching aims at 

enabling learners to understand the 

concepts unfamiliar words gain a greater 

number of words, and use words 

successfully for communicative purpose. 

Generically, vocabulary is the knowledge 

of meanings of words (Kamil, 2005: 3). 

Widiati (2011) states that good 

vocabulary mastery supports mastery of 

each of the language skills, both receptive 

(listening and reading) and productive 

(speaking and writing). Learning 

vocabulary is one of the first steps in 

learning a second language or a foreign 

language, but a learner never finishes 

vocabulary acquisition. Whether in one’s 

native language or a second language, the 

acquisition of new vocabulary is an 

ongoing process. There are many 

techniques which can help one acquire new 

vocabulary memorization.  

Most educators believe that 

vocabulary instruction is critical in any 

classroom. The issue is not whether we 

should have vocabulary instruction, but 

how to make that vocabulary instruction 

have meaning beyond assigned word lists. 

Most of us have struggled and continue to 

puzzle over how to teach vocabulary in 

meaningful and memorable ways so our 

students have access to the words in their 

reading, writing, and thinking (Allen, 

2007: 3).  

Learning strategies can play 

important role in development because 

they encourage the learner’s active 

involvement in the learning process. Hunt 

and Beglar (2002) as cited in Cahyono and 

Widiati (2011: 110) describe three 

approaches to vocabulary teaching and 

learning, those are, incidental learning, 

explicit instruction, and independent 

strategy development. Incidental learning 

is learning vocabulary by product of doing 

other language activities, for example, 



  

 

122 

 

reading and writing. As reviewed by Hunt 

and Beglar (2002), several studies gave 

confirmed that extensive reading and 

listening contribute to the incidental 

vocabulary learning. In contrast, explicit 

instruction refers to intentional learning of 

vocabulary through instruction, which is 

essential for beginning students whose lack 

of vocabulary limits their reading ability.  

To teach vocabulary, teachers should 

be creative to make the students not bored 

and feel interested in learning vocabulary 

in other that their vocabulary mastery can 

be improved. One of the strategy can be 

used to improve the students’ vocabulary 

mastery is game. Game is a contest 

between the players who interact each 

other by following certain rules to achieve 

the purpose of examination-specific 

(Sadiman, 2010: 75). According to Pribadi 

(2009: 43), game is competitive and directs 

students to be able to reach certain 

achievement or learning outcomes. The 

game should be fun for students. In 

general, the core of game is there are 

winners and losers. The winning party will 

get a reward, while the losers have to train 

harder to win the game. 

Go Fish game as a vocabulary 

learning method. According to Mukarto 

(1989) as cited in Cahyono and Widiati 

(2011: 115) “Go Fish” game proved to be 

one of the best solutions. It can help 

students overcome their poor mastery of 

vocabulary. In this game, all of the 

students have an important role in the 

English class. From this game, we can 

improve students’ vocabulary. Go Fish 

game makes students feel enjoy to follow 

vocabulary class.  The use of this method 

for teaching vocabulary is hoped to be able 

to improve the students’ ability in studying 

about vocabulary more.  

 

RESEARCH METHOD 

The primary goal of this study is to 

improve students’ vocabulary mastery of 

seventh grade atMTs Putra Putri 

Lamonganby using Go Fish game. This 

present study belongs to Classroom Action 

Research (CAR). The participants of the 

study were all of the students of seventh 

grade it about one hundred and twenty-two 

in the 2016/2017 academic year. In this 

study, the researcher acted as teacher in 

English class. This classroom action 

research will be conducted through the 

stages of planning, implementing, 

observing, and reflecting. The stages will 

be preceded by a preliminary study. In the 

preliminary study, the researcher gives test 

to know the students’ vocabulary mastery. 

The test consisted of 40 questions about 

vocabulary. The result of the test shows 

that all of students score still under KKM. 

After the preliminary study, the next 

step concerned with the planning of 

developing students’ vocabulary mastery 

by using Go Fish game method in the 

English class. This step covers preparing 

the teaching strategy that will be applied, 

preparing the lesson plan for the English 

class, designing research instruments and 

setting up the criteria of the success. To 

measure the improvement of the students’ 

vocabulary mastery, this study used test. 

Additionally, to determine whether the 

study had been successful or not, the study 

used the following criteria. The students 

are considered to be successful if they are 

able to achieve a final score 75. If ≥75% 

students of the class achieved the score 

greater than or equal to 75, it means that 

the study was successful. The 

consideration of the score 75 is based on 

minimum standard of English success as 

stated in the minimum of completion 

criteria or Kriteria Ketuntasan Minimal 



  

 

123 

 

(KKM) at the school. Meanwhile, the 

percentage of students (75%) is the 

percentage made by the researcher. The 

improvement of students’ vocabulary can 

be known from the result of the students’ 

test.   

After planning the action, the next 

step is implementing the action. In this 

step, all procedures of Go Fish game 

method designed in planning the action. In 

this research there are some steps which 

students have done in learning vocabulary 

by using Go Fish game, those are: (1) the 

students look for kinds of professions and 

the duties based on the white board, (2) the 

students find the meaning and make simple 

sentence, (3) the students fill in the blank 

with correct professions, (4) the students 

arrange the sentences into a good 

paragraph. 

 After implementing the action, the 

next step is observation. At this stage, the 

researcher will observe the whole aspects 

of the implementation of the action 

covering the teachers’ activities during the 

English class and the improvement of the 

students’ vocabulary mastery.  The term 

may also refer to any data collected during 

this activity. Reflecting is the last method 

of this study. It includes the discussion of 

how far the strategy solves the problem 

and the factors that might cause the 

strategy applied are not successful. To 

know the result of students test, the 

researcher using formula at figure 1. 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 1. Formula of Test 

 

Next, the researcher gave some tests 

to know the improvement of students’ 

ability after using Go Fish game as a 

method in each Cycle. 

 

FINDING AND DISCUSSION 

For the first time, the use of go fish 

game as a method made the students 

confused and did not make them interest 

and active in teaching learning process. 

They thought that the game was very 

difficult. This condition made the result of 

the student’s test in this Cycle was still bad 

because some students get score under the 

criteria. Therefore, it needs to revise the 

activities in the next cycle because the 

criterion of success was not achieved. In 

second cycle there are improvements of 

students’ vocabulary mastery after using 

Go Fish game method. 

To know the students’ vocabulary 

mastery achievement in the first cycle until 

the second cycle, the researcher gave test 

about vocabulary. In the preliminary test, 

the students’ scores mostly were under the 

criteria. The lowest score was 5, while the 

highest score was 75. The mean score of 

the test in preliminary study was 48,10. 

After the researcher gives “Go Fish game” 

as a method to improve their vocabulary in 

the first Cycle, there was little 

improvement of students’ vocabulary 

although some students’ still get score 

under the criteria. In this Cycle, the lowest 

score was 45, while the highest score was 

90. The mean score of the test in Cycle I 

was 65,17.  It means that the result of 

Cycle I did not met with the criteria of 

success. It happened since there were some 

problems, such as the students were very 

confused about implementation of Go Fish 

game. The students were very noisy. They 

thought that the game was not important 

for them. 

Sum of the right answer  

 

Sum of questions 

 

X 100 



  

 

124 

 

In the second Cycle, there was 

significant improvement of the students’ 

scores. The students’ lowest score was 80, 

while the highest score was 100. The mean 

score was 92,41. It means that all of the 

students’ scores were greater than the 

criteria.  In brief, it can be summed up that 

the implementation of Go Fish game can 

improve the students’ vocabulary mastery 

of the seventh grade at MTs Putra Putri 

Lamongan in the academic year of 

2016/2017. 

The findings were in line with 

Mukarto’s view (1989) that “Go Fish” 

game proved to be one of the best 

solutions. It can help students overcome 

their poor mastery of vocabulary. Go Fish 

game is a game in which students play 

cards and ask each other for cards to make 

pairs and hangman. Students then think of 

a word and write a number of lines 

indicating the number of letters of the 

words that other students should guess 

(Mukarto, 1989 as cited in Cahyono 

&Widiati, 2011: 115). In this research 

there are some steps which students have 

done in learning vocabulary by using Go 

Fish game, those are: (1) the students look 

for kinds of professions and the duties 

based on the white board, (2) the students 

find the meaning and make simple 

sentence, (3) the students fill in the blank 

with correct professions, (4) the students 

arrange the sentences into a good 

paragraph. 

 

CONCLUSION 

In conclusion, I can say that the use 

of Go Fish game can improve the students’ 

vocabulary mastery of the seventh grade at 

MTs Putra Putri Lamongan in the 

academic year of 2016/2017. The 

procedures of implementing the strategy 

are as follows. First, the students look for 

kinds of professions and the duties based 

on the white board. The second, the 

students find the meaning and make simple 

sentence. The third, the students fill in the 

blank with correct professions. The fourth, 

the students arrange the sentences into a 

good paragraph. 

 

REFERENCES 

Allen, Janet. (2007). Inside Words: Tools 

For Teaching Academic Vocabulary 

Grades 4-12. New Jersey: Stenhouse 

Publishers. 

Arikunto, Suharsimi. (2010). Prosedur 

Penelitian: Suatu Pendekatan 

Praktik. Jakarta: Rineka Cipta. 

Cahyono, Bambang. Yudi. & Widiawati, 

Utami. (2011). The Teaching of 

English as a Foreign Language in 

Indonesia. Malang: State University 

of Malang Press. 

Kamil. Michael & Hiebert, Elfrieda H. 

(2005). Teaching and Learning 

Vocabulary: Bringing Research to 

Practice (Elfrieda H. Hiebert, 

Michael L. Kamil, Eds.). Portland: 

Stanford University. 

Pribadi, Benny A. (2009). Model Desain 

Sistem Pembelajaran. Jakarta: Dian 

Rakyat. 

Sadiman, Arief S. (dkk). (2010). Media 

Pendidikan: Pengertian 

Pengembangan danPemanfaatannya. 

Jakarta: Rajawali Pers.