Teaching Reading Comprehension and Small Group Discussion

Talking about teaching reading comprehension by using small group discussion remaining me about my experience when conducting field practice program. All of students were involve in the process of teaching and learning.

Small group itself, according to Baker (1987:159), is three or more people interacting face to face, with or without an assigned leader in such a way that each person influences, and is influenced by another person in the group. Johnson (1975:78) gives solution that students should be arranged so that each student can see all other members of his group and can be heard without shouting and disturbing the other groups.

Two opposite tendencies exist with regard to the number of people in a group. The larger the group, the greater is the pool of talent and experience available for solving problems or sharing the effort. On the other hand, as the size increases, fewer members have the chance to participate, and indeed the differences in relative participation increase to the point where one or two members begin to dominate.

Barker (1987:159) proposes that the best size in terms of total interaction and greatest efficiency is somewhere between five and seven members. Nevertheless, the writer used the teams of four in the experimental class.

Based on the explanation above, I am sure that small group discussion is one of strategy that suitable for teaching reading comprehension. How about your experience?