The Use of Comics to Allow Creativity
and Promote Higher
Order Thinking Skills
(A Case Study
in a Senior High School in Cianjur, West Java)
Badriah
SMAN 2 Cianjur
Abstract
The
study aimed to find out the effect of the use of comics on 11th
elective program graders of SMAN 2 Cianjur in their Narrative text
understanding performance as well as their attitudes towards it. The results
show that visual images in form of student-generated comic strips allow for
creativity where students can express ideas by images combined with text, and
promote higher order thinking skills (analyzing, evaluating, creating) through
student-centered work. From its findings, the study concluded that comics are:
1) effective for constructive activities such as writing and speaking and 2)
benefitted slow learners as they can take advantage of the visual guide to practice
target-language use.
Keywords: Comics, Narrative, higher order thinking skills
Introduction
Bringing
something students familiar with into the language class may turn the lesson
into extraordinary outcomes and provide a new learning atmosphere. At the same
time, students are demanded to apply their intellectual skills which are
grounded in lower order thinking skills.
In other words, fun learning linked with prior knowledge of subject
matter content facilitates room for students to develop their creative
tendencies and divergent thinking skills. One of the familiar things to
students is comics. Using comics for a methodological purpose not only amuse and
interest students but also they can be stored and recalled easily as they are
episodically organized (Csabay,
2006). As Eisner (1985) wrote that comics are the arrangement of
pictures or images and words to narrate a story or dramatize idea, and they act
as visual medium that combine the written word with visual concept (Tiemensma, 2009).
Comics in education is not something
new. Many scholars have subscribed to the study of them. First, in 1940’s, Sones (1994) conducted a
series of studies of using comic books and mentioned their usefulness.
Then, it was reported that in 1970’s teachers used comics in the classroom and
in other areas as well. As an example, the comic strip formats was also reported
that they were used by the armed forces to present instructional material (Trent & Kinlaw, 1975). Since
then, many studies conducted in this area. For example, in 1990, Stanulewizs reported that stories in pictures not only
make writing more attractive and simulate discussion, they also bring an air of
something unusual when boredom is about to knock at the door of the classroom. Even in
2001, Art Spiegelman won Pulitzer Prize for his book entitled “Maus” which
proving that comics can be artistically mature and literate work. Seeing the
vast use of comics, this study focuses on the use of comics in the classroom
activities, more specifically in engaging students with Narrative text.
Comics as media of instruction create joyful
learning. Yet, it is suggested that learning also, at the same time, allow
student to comprehend the material and their cognitive competence improve. For
these reasons, in this study the students were challenged to involve in
creative thinking such as converting Narrative text into student-generated comics.
Creative thinking in this study refers to the activity demanded ‘cognitive
skills and abilities for coming up with solution to problem situation’ (Arends & Kilcher, 2010). In this study, the
students unpacked the text into parts, then put them together to form a
coherent comics which has a different appearance from its original text. They
also developed character profiles, imagined the words of characters, built a
set of captions, used inking and coloring.
The purpose of the present study is to evaluate the
utilization of student-generated comics, in the format of comic strips as
contextualized strategies in language instruction as alternative methods at the senior high school where English as a foreign language. This study is relevant
for the teacher who is posted at senior high school who concern about students'
reluctance and their boredom learning Narrative text that always appears in form
of long passages. This study is designed to evaluate the effects of presenting
with the comic strips used in the instructional and investigate whether the
students’ cognitive competence level improve.
Methods
The use of comics are designed to evaluate their
effects on students’ competence in using English as foreign language at grade
11 of Elective Program of SMAN 2 Cianjur in Academic Year 2014/2015. The sample
was taken from the Elective Program (English-2). The instructional material was
Narrative text to facilitate them to gain listening, speaking, reading, and
writing skills. The end of the lesson was hoped that students were able to
analyze the social function of the text, to use the generic structure and
language features of the text. When they enrolled in grade 11, their test results that
were stated in the report card for their English cognitive and performance
competence is on a score 70 to 82. As a reference for students’ competence, the
minimum ‘criterion-referenced grading’ (a set standard and indicate to what
degree students have achieved mastery of particular standard) for the students
is 78. Based on the score the students
gained, in this study they were categorized into three levels, namely basic,
proficient, and advanced. The basic level was given to students who failed to reach
the mastery or who scored 70-75, the proficient level was for students who score
76-85; and advanced level for students who score 86-100. Classroom instruction
went for 2 hours per week. The study took 8 meetings.
The instruments for the study were four texts, they
were: 1) The Skeleton in the Cupboard for listening activity and helped the
students got the main idea of the text, 2) The History of Jack and the
Beanstalk for reading activity and facilitated the students to get the social
function of the text, the structure and
language features of the text, 3) The Wolf and the Crane to assist students to
comprehend language features used Narrative text especially direct and indirect
sentence and 4) Descriptive-Narrative text which created by students to escort
them to higher order thinking skills. From each text, the students demonstrated
their comprehension by presenting the text they were learning in the form of comics.
Data were collected within a a-6-week span. The
student participants were given specific task corresponding to the usage of
comics. The use of comics applied during the treatment. The students were given
texts in different forms (text 1-4) and then changed them into comics to depict
their content understanding of the text. Besides demonstrating their comprehension
in the form of comics, for text no. 1 and no. 2 the students were asked to use
comics they created to accompany them during monolog presentation. The rests were
comics as a tool to allow students to create a new text.
To analyze data collected, the students’ comics
were scored and categorized into three level of core proficiency of English
(basic, proficient, and advanced). Meanwhile, the students’ monolog was scored
based on a rubric for speaking adapted from Thornburry (2000).
Results
and Discussion
The students’ overall English productive performance, as shown by their
comics, writing and monolog level from Text 1 to Text 4, is presented in Table
1. Table 1 indicates an improvement in students’ proficiency levels. A
comparison of the students who post at a basic level or ones who fail to achieve
mastery of narrative standard is none. It can be concluded that Comics project
promoted the students’ writing and speaking proficiency. The progress is
elaborated in the subheadings below.
Table 1 Participants’ Proficiency
Text 1: Skeleton in the Cupboard
Text 1 was entitled The Skeleton in the Cupboard intended to provide listening
practice. Upon the completion of listening activity the students collected
their work in the form of comic as shown in Sample 1 as follow.
Sample 1. Visualization of Text 1
Sample 1 show two things, to say the least. First, creating Comics has
an effect on critical thinking of students. The comics were created to depict “it
was a busy day, as usual. The traffic circle began to get scorched in the
strengthening heat of that morning as a protest was taking place. People in a
long wavy line were staging outcry against the issue of Playboy magazine-Indonesian
version. They were jamming up the well-known capital city of Jakarta (Picture
1). The condition was indeed troublesome for Sinta and her friend who were
among those who were trapped in that awful situation, behind the steering wheel
(Picture 2).
Picture 1 provides information of the sun’s heat by the picture of
yellow sun at the top right corner. Besides, to show people who were
protesting, it has cars, and people who held banner with ‘say no to porn’ on
it. Meanwhile Picture 2 represents that there were two people in a car and one
of them was behind a steering wheel.
Secondly, Comics becomes a tool for building better writers. This means
that comics encourage what so-called ‘fluency before accuracy’ (Denne-Bolton, 2013) . Fluency is gained
through comics writing to communicate what the students’ understood about the
passage with the absence of pressure. Then, the experiment and play with
language that the students did during creating comics allow them to learn
independently both cognitively and linguistically. As shown in the writing upon
the completion of comic strips (Sample 2) below.
Sample 2.
Student’s writing to Communicate Comics
(It is a hectic day as usual, I and Annie were in a public cab to our Campus
University of Indonesia but unluckily, we’re trapped in a protesting about
playboy magz Indonesia Version. The people were jamming up, in a wavy-line.
They were from local community and religious group, to protest the issue)
One aspect worth noticing from Sample 2. Student’s writing above is that
the students created a new and different text, yet it had similar meaning as
expected given the original text. This condition was also found in the stage
when the students were asked to present the text in a monolog. It is safe to say
that comics empowering students since comics seem to give them a great help to
be confident in presenting the text in monolog and a room for the independence of
thought. Their experience during creating comics provide knowledge to be shared
in spoken form with almost no hesitation and comics they made acted as guidance
during the presentation.
Based on the results of text 1, it can be inferred that the use of
comics had a positive influence on students writing and speaking proficiency.
This is supported by the student’s positive point of view towards using comics
in the lesson, as shown in Sample 3 below.
Sample 3. Student’s opinion
The draw is really affected me, it make me more
creative..that is possible to make student not bored and more like art.
Text 2: The History of Jack and the Beanstalk
Text 2 facilitated students to comprehend a passage. It was carried out
by reading a passage then the students were asked to do student-generated
comics of what they have understood from the passage. The results of text 2 in
form of comic strips imply that the use of picture-text combinations give a
great help to represent reading comprehension (see Sample 4) and they scaffold
speaking skills by using comic strips as visual aid.
Sample 4. Visualization of Text #2
Sample 4
indicates that generating comic strips improve the students’ ability in writing
narrative text. The improvement is in the content which was facilitated by
generating sequence of narrative in each strip, dialogue in the bubble, caption
for each panel, and picture to reflect event(s).
In other words, student-generated comics makes the generic structure of
narrative text applied as the comics strips presented in chronological order.
Sample 4 shows that the orientation is provided in the caption of panel 1 (In
the days of King Alfred there lived a poor woman. She was a widow and had an
only child named Jack). The orientation is significant part of a narrative text
that in this sample include when, where, who, what and why.
Sample 4 also indicates that student-generated comic strips are helpful
for the student in re-writing story with appropriate generic structure of a narrative
text. This was supported by students’ opinions on using comics to comprehend the
text (Sample 5).
Sample 5.
Students’ opinion about using comics
Yes, I think drawing helping me to understand the
story, because without the image we can’t understand the story, so therefore
the image is helpful to understand the story, made like comic story line, make
us understand.
Text 3: The Wolf and the Crane
Text 3 was to help students understand the language features of
narrative text. One of the major features used in it such as direct and
indirect speech. Based on results of this study, it was found out that
student-generated comics acted as effective medium for students in applying,
analyzing, and synthesizing target language grammar as shown in Sample 6 below.
Sample 6.
Converting Direct to Indirect Speech
Sample 6 represents
the usefulness of student-generated comics that force students to concentrate
and to use their imagination as well. The students analyzed the direct speeches
which were uttered by character. Then they converted and created them into
indirect ones. As an example “Please Miss
Crane don’t fly away. I need your help. I’m in a great trouble”. The
sentence was converted into “The wolf
asked the Crane not to fly away, he needed the crane’s help because he was in a
great trouble”.
Text 4: Student-generated Text
Text 4 was dedicated to invite students to create a
text-based on comics provided. Retelling comics served students with fun,
interesting and motivating atmosphere to incorporate target language culture
and their pragmatic intelligence. The data from the students’ writing show that
the students passed the criterion-reference grading. The students-generated
text comprised of orientation, complication, and resolution. The text also
applied the appropriate language features of narrative text such as the use of
direct-indirect speech, past tense, adjective, and adverbial phrase. In short,
the use student-generated text based on comics provided facilitate
student-centered and student-directed learning.
Conclusion
The use of both student-generated comics and student-generated text
allow students to gain more understanding about the text comprehensively and
improve students’ core proficiency in narrative text. The student-generated
comics based on written and spoken narrative text aid the students to apply
generic structure and language features of the text appropriately. It also
provides room for student to experience independent thinkers and to maximize the
activity of analyzing, synthesizing, and creating text (higher order thinking
skills) as student act as illustrators or writers of comics. Meanwhile,
student-generated text based on comics gave the students chances to practice
and produce a narrative text in a personal and creative way. By using comics as
the procedure in this study show that the students who are at a basic level
eventually improve their performance and proficiency. It is assumed, there is a correlation between the ability to represent the text comprehension by
depicting it in the comic strips with the ability to present it in the form of the written and spoken form of language. Further, the use of student-generated comics
to represent reading comprehension provided the basic level students room to
gain improvement in other language skills such as writing and speaking.
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