Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, Vol. 4 No.2, November 2016

55

THE EFFECT OF TRIANGLE GAME TOWARDS STUDENTS’
MOTIVATION IN LEARNING GRAMMAR

Baiq Reni Agustina
MA Darul Husaini Sanggeng, Lombok Tengah, NTB

agustina11@yahoo.com

Abstract
This research was aimed to find out the effect of Triangle Game towards students’
motivation in learning grammar and to find out the correlation between students’
motivation and grammar at MA Darul Husaini Sanggeng. The kind of this research is
experimental research (quantitative approach). This research design was applied
pretest-posttest design. The population of this research was all of the second grade
students of MA Darul Husaini Sanggeng. The sample of this research was consist of
two classes namely XI-A as experimental class consist of 17 students and XI-B as
control class consist of 17 students. The sample technique used in this research was
saturated sampling technique. The technique which was used to analysis the data was t-
test and r-test formula. From the research data found that the t-test score is higher than
t-table (2,635>2, 021). Based on the result of this research, it can be conclude that the
Triangle Game has positive effect towards students’ motivation in learning grammar.
From the research data found that r-test is higher than r-table (0,990>0,482). It can be
conclude that there is correlation between students’ motivation and grammar.

Key Word: Triangle Game, Students’ motivation, grammar

Abstrak
Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui pengaruh Triangle Game terhadap motivasi
belajar siswa dalam belajar Grammar dan untuk mengetahui hubungan antara motivasi
siswa dan grammar siswa di MA Darul Husaini Sanggeng. Jenis penelitian ini adalah
penelitian eksperimental (pendekatan kuantitatif). Desain penelitian ini menggunakan
desain pretest-posttest. Populasi penelitian ini terdiri dari seluruh siswa kelas dua di
MA Darul Husaini Sanggeng. Sampel penelitian ini terdiri dari dua kelas yaitu XI-A
sebagai kelas eksperimen yang terdiri dari 17 siswa dan kelas XI-B sebagai kontrol
yang terdiri dari 17 siswa. Teknik pengambilan sampel yang digunakan dalam
penelitian ini adalah teknik sampling jenuh. Teknik yang digunakan untuk analisis data
adalah uji t dan uji r. Dari data penelitian diketahui bahwa nilai t-test lebih tinggi dari t
table (2,635> 2, 021). Berdasarkan hasil penelitian ini, dapat disimpulkan bahwa
Triangle Game berpengaruh positif terhadap motivasi belajar siswa dalam belajar
Grammar. Dari data penelitian didapatkan bahwa r-test lebih tinggi dari r-table (0,990>
0,482). Dapat disimpulkan bahwa ada korelasi antara motivasi dan grammar.

Kata Kunci: Triangle Game, Motivasi Siswa, Tata Bahasa

INTRODUCTION
Grammar is one of languages aspects

that have a very important role in learning
English language. It is the main component
particularly needed in making well
sentences. According to Brown (2000:
362) grammar is the system of rules
governing the convention arrangement and
relationship of words in a sentence.

The rules of English grammar have
become an integral part of learners’
knowledge. It is the basic knowledge to
understand a language perfectly. Without
understanding grammar, it is impossible
for the learners to speak English
grammatically. The people who have a
good grammar would be able to understand
utterances/sentences produced by the other
people and to produce grammatical



Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, Vol. 4 No.2, November 2016

56

utterances/sentences understood by the
other people.

Beside in education mainly in
teaching learning process, the success of
teaching learning is not only influenced by
the intellectual factor, but the
nonintellectual factor is important too
towards the result of the study. One of the
factors nonintellectual is the ability of
students to motivate ourselves. Motivation
drives someone to do thing in order to
achieve something.

Students which are very motivated in
learning will do something more than the
others and it will affect their achievement.
Students which are very motivated will
spend more attention to understanding
instruction and solving the task, diligent in
learning, not be easy to discourage and
confident in learning. Meanwhile the
students who have low motivation is more
passive in the classroom, even they do not
have high expectations to achieve what
they want. So, in teaching learning
process, motivation also becomes the
determinant factor that helps the success
and the failure of teaching learning
process.

Based on the result of observation
that was conducted by the researcher at
second grade students of MA Darul
Husaini Sanggeng, the researcher found
some problems faced by the students in
learning grammar. The students were
confused to make the different meaning of
how to use preposition when the students
arranged a sentences. The difficulty of
using preposition was caused by there were
many words that also the same meaning.
Besides, the students had low motivation
in teaching learning process. The students
had low motivation was caused by the
students did not interested in learning
English Grammar, beside the students
assume that English language is not
important in their life.

To solve the problems in order that
the students are easier to use preposition,
the researcher intends to apply a game
namely Triangle Game in learning

Grammar. The Triangle Game is a method
that makes the students more active in
teaching learning process. In this game, the
students are divided into some groups. The
researcher believes that Triangle Game
will be more appropriate than the previous
method used by the teacher beforehand.
The games namely Jumbled Sentence
Game.

Based on the situation above, the
researcher interested to investigate the
effect of Triangle Game towards students’
motivation in learning grammar at the
second grade students of MA Darul
Husaini Sanggeng in academic years
2017/2018.

Riview of Related Literature

Grammar
According to Greenbaum and Nelson

(2002: 1) grammar is the set of rules that
allow us to combine words in our language
into larger units. In other hands (Spratt,
Pulverness and Williams, 2005:5)
grammar is the describe how to combine,
organize and change words and pats of
words to make meaning. According to
Brown (2000: 362) grammar is the system
of rules governing the convention
arrangement and relationship of words in a
sentence. It is the rules for the sentences.

Thus, it was conclude that grammar
is a rule how to arrange the words to make
well sentences, grammar rule also describe
grammatical structures, because the
structures of grammar was very important
to how sentences were formed and the
meaning of sentences.

According to Eastwood (2002: 2)
there are four units of grammatical in
English are these: word, phrase, clause and
sentence. (1) Word is a combine of some
letter that have meaning. Word are
separated from one another by space. The
main word classes are these: verb, noun,
adjective, adverb, preposition, determiner,
pronoun and conjunction. (2) Phrase is any
group of words which grammatically like a
single word and which does not have
subject and predicate. There are these



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57

kinds of phrase: verb phrase, noun phrase,
adjective phrase, adverb phrase and
prepositional phrase. (3) Clause is a group
of words that have subject and predicate.
We use phrase to build a clause. (4)
Sentence is a group of words at least
contain of subject, predicate and object or
complement.

Punctuation is the system of sign of
symbols given to the readers to show how
the sentence is constructed and how the
sentences sould be read. According to
Eastwood (1999: 372) There are some kind
of functuation such as Full stop (.),
Question mark (?), Exclamation mark (!),
Semi-colon (;), Colon (:), Dash (-),
Comma (,), Quotation marks ("). Hyphen
(-), Apostrophe (') and Capital letters.
Spelling is knowing how to write words
correctly (Kress, 2000: 1). Spelling is
important for exactly the same reason that
grammar and punctuation are important:
poor spelling make poor communication.
According to Radford (2009: 39) sentence
structure is how words are combined
together to form phrases and sentences.
phrases and sentences are built up by a
series of merger operations, each
of which combines a pair of constituents
together to form a larger constituent.
According to Eastwood (1999: 3) the parts
of a sentence are the subject, verb, object,
complement and adverbial.

Motivation
Harmer (2001: 51) states that

motivation is some kind of internal drive
which phuses someone to do thing in order
to achieve something. It means that the
strength motivation will depend on how
much value the individual places on the
outcomes which the students wish to
achieve. In other hands (Brown, 2000: 72)
motivation is the extent to which you make
choices about (a) goals to pursue and (b)
the effort you will devote to that pursuit.
Motivation is probably the most frequently
used cath-all term for explaining the
success or failure of virtually any complex
task. It is easy to assume that success in
any task is due simply to the fact that

someone is “motivated”. It is easy in
second language learning to claim that a
learner will be successfully with the proper
motivation.

From the definition above, the
researcher concludes that motivation is
inner drive of someone which can make
their more enthusiasm to do something in
order their can achieve what their want.
According to Killer (1987) ARCS is an
approach problem solving to motivational
design aspect and supplement the learning
process. The model is consist of four main
areas: Attention, Relevance, Confidance,
and Satisfaction.

The attention is refers to the interest
displayed by learners in taking in the
concepts/ideas being taught. This
component is split into three categories:
perceptual arousal, using surprise or
uncertain situations; inquiry arousal,
offering challenging questions and/or
problems to answer/solve; and variability,
using a variety of resources and methods
of teaching.

The teachers have to be established
by using language and examples that the
learners are familiar with. It is will have
the students find relevance while learning
can be daunting task for some subjects.
Linking what is being taught to the
material is familiar and relevant to the
students. Motivation amounts to
persuasion for knowledge based on the
subject that provides the basic for learning
future concept. The confidence aspect is
focuses on establishing positive
expectations for achieving success among
learners. The confidence level of learners
is often correlated with motivation and the
amount of effort put forth in reaching a
performance objective. For this reason, it’s
important that learning design provides
students with a method for estimating their
probability of success. This can be
achieved in the form of a syllabus and
grading policy, rubrics, or a time estimate
to complete tasks. Additionally, confidence
is built when positive reinforcement for
personal achievements is given through



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timely, relevant feedback.Satisfaction can
be from a sense of achievement, praise
from a higher-up, or mere entertainment.
Feedback and reinforcement are important
elements and when learners appreciate the
results, they will be motivated to learn.
Satisfaction is based upon motivation,
which can be intrinsic or extrinsic.

Triangle Game
According to Mario Rinvolucri

(1984: 32) triangle game is one of a
method of competitive game that makes
the students more active in classroom; the
technique is use one large card triangle and
three strips of paper per nine students.
Sung Je Cho (2015: 43) states that we
present an interactive game to train the
classification of triangles based on the
corner of an angle.

There are procedures to using
triangle game in learning grammar.
According to Rinvolucri and Davis (1985:
32): (1) Preparation: Cut out one large card
triangle and three strips of paper for each
group of nine students. (2) Dictate this list
of adverbs and prepositions: on foot,
during, by, by bus, opposite, across, for,
through, until, in and out, around,
downtown, overseas, high up, beyond,
among, near, between,  next door, aboard,
next to,  on top of, past, on, into, in, at. Ask
students to check with their neighbors that
they haven't missed or miss pelt any words
and check unknown words. Help them if
necessary. (3) Arrange the students into
groups of approximately nine people round
tables and give each group one of the card
triangles and three strips of paper. Ask
them to write these words on the strips of
paper and place them in the angles of the
triangle: place, time and movement. (4)
Within each group of nine, three sit near
the place angle, three near the time angle
and three near the movement angle. (5)
Tell them how the game works: The first
team chooses one of the dictated words
which they think won't fit in their corner.
They write it on a slip of paper and place it
in the most appropriate corner. The team in
that corner has 25 seconds to produce a

correct sentence showing the word used in
their corner's meaning.;' If they manage to
do this they get a point. If they can't they
may challenge the first team to give them a
sentence with that meaning. If the first
team can't do so then they lose a point
(they get minus one). The team who have
just played lay down a new word, but not
in their own corner. Get the students
playing simultaneously in their tables of
nine. However between the tables and act
as referee for the correctness of the
sentences produced. Draw the game to a
close just before the energy begins to flag
and handle any language problems arising.

RESEARCH METHOD

Research Design
According to Khotari (2004: 31)

research design is the conceptual structure
whithin which research is conducted; it
constitutes the blueprint for the collection,
measurement and analysis of data. The
approach used in this research is
quantitative approach because used
statistical analysis.

In this research, the researcher used
experimental method. Experimental is
characterized by much greater control over
the research environment and this case
some variables are manipulated to observe
the effect on other variables (Khotari,
2004: 5).

This research categorized as quasi
experimental with pretest and posttest
design which used two groups:
experimental group was treated by using
Triangle Game and control group was
treated by using Jumbled Sentence Game.

Population and Sample
According To Sugiyono (2014: 80)

population is a generalization area which
consists of subject or object that has
certain quality and characteristic
determined by the researcher to be learned
and then concluded. The population of this
study was entire second grade (A and B) of
MA Darul Huasaini Sanggeng. Each class
were consists of 17 students. So the totals
were 34 students.



Journal of Languages and Language Teaching, Vol. 4 No.2, November 2016

59

According to Sugiyono (2014: 81)
sample is part of number and characteristic
of the population. In the sample, a
subgroup of the target population that the
researcher study for the purpose of make
the generalizations about the target
population. To determined the sample of
this research, the researcher used the
saturated sampling technique because all
of the population as a sample (sugiyono,
2014: 85).

Instrument
The instruments that used in this

study were multiple choices and matching
words. The students was answer 15
number items of multiple choices
questions and 5 number items of matching
words test about Grammar. Besides, the
researcher use questionnaire. The
questionnaire was use to measure students’
motivation. The researcher provided some
questionnaire that consist of 20 items use
Likert’s Scale.

FINDING AND DISCUSSION
In this chapter, the researcher shows

the data which has find out by using
descriptive and inferential analysis of the
effect of Triangle Game towards students’
motivation in learning grammar at second
grade students of MA Darul Huasaini
Sanggeng. After doing the descriptive
analysis, the researcher continued to the
inferential analysis to find out the t-value,
in which this t-value was used to inferred
the result of the research. The aimed of t-
test is to find out the comparison between
the result of t-test and the t-table. Based on
the result of t-test, the researcher found
that the t-value was 2,635 and the t-table of
significant level of 0,05 with degree
freedom 40 was 2,021. The result of t-test
was (2,635>2,021). It means that the result
of t-test was higher than the t-table. So, the
researcher was concluded that the triangle
game has effect toward students’
motivation in learning grammar at second
grade students of MA Darul Husaini
Sanggeng.

After the researcher found that the
Ha was accepted and H0 was rejected, the
researcher tried to find out the correlation
between students’ motivation and
grammar. Based on the result of the
correlation analysis where coefficient of
the two variables is 0,990. The r-table of
17 subjects as the sample is 0,482 for
confidence level of 5%. This figure that
result of r-test is 0,990 was higher than r-
table is 0,482 (0,990 >0,482). Therefore, it
was conclude that there is positive
correlation between students’ motivation
and grammar learning achievement at
second grade students of MA Darul
Husaini Sanggeng.

Based on those result, the Triangle
game has positive effect towards students’
motivation in learning grammar. The
students’ motivation can be increased and
make the students feel exciting to learn in
group. Exciting learning process is
learning system that makes the students
interested (Dave Meier, 2011). Generally,
when the researcher use Triangle Game,
the students able to cooperative learning.
Cooperative learning exists when students
work together to accomplish shared
learning goals (Johnson & Johnson, 1999).

The researcher found that the result
of this research have relevance with the
research was done by Indri Mutiarsih
(2013). The result of this study indicate
that the implementation model of Broken
Triangle/Square/Heart collaborated with
the distribution of handouts, discussion
class, and a quiz with prizes can enhance
the students active. There are several
advantages, including can increase
students’ activity in the teaching of history,
students take pleasure in learning while
preparing pieces of material, the students
become more confident in speaking in
front of their friends, and the students
realize that studying history is simple,
because only by putting together the
materials will be easy to understand the
materials.

Beside, the research was done by
Hajar Khonmohammad (2013). The results



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60

showed that the participants motivated to
learn grammar. Implications of the study
for teaching grammar are that learners’
motivation in learning grammar could be
enhanced through enjoyment and fun.

The statement of the problems about
is there any correlation between students’
motivation and grammar has been
answered also. The researcher found that
there is correlation between students’
motivation and grammar in teaching
learning process. The students who have
high motivation in learning were more
active and spirit in learning process,
besides the students more seriously in
class. According to Prayitno (1989:3)
Students who have high motivation in
learning will perform more and faster
activities than students who have low
motivation in learning. Achievements will
be better if the students have high
motivation. Therefore, the researcher
concluded that the important of motivation
in learning process be able to changes how
the way to be good learning process.

CONCLUSION
Based on the statistical analysis of t-

test formula, it has found that the t-value is
2,635 and the t-table of significant level of
0,05 is 2,021 (2,764>2,021). It is clear that
t-test is higher than t-table. So, the
researcher concludes that Triangle Game
has positive effect towards students’
motivation in learning grammar at second
grade of MA Darul Husaini Sanggeng.

Based on the Pearson’s Product
Moment formula, the researcher has found
that there is positive correlation between
students’ motivation and their grammar at
second grade of MA Darul Husaini
Sanggeng.

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