USING AUTHENTIC MATERIALS To INCREASE STUDENTS’ MOTIVATION In LEARNING READING SKILLS

Authentic materials provide learners with many significant advantages and promote high motivation and interest in language learning (Guariento & Morley, 2001; Wilcox et al., 1999). This study aims to investigate the perception of students on learning English with authentic materials, focusing on reading skills. Before the study, the author interviewed students about the difficulties they faced when learning reading skills as English majors. The findings revealed that as English majors, students lacked motivation and interest when learning reading in the textbooks. To overcome this hindrance, the author conducted a research on using authentic materials in a reading course with 40 English majors at pre-intermediate level. During the 9-week course, articles from the Economics and New York Times were used as supplementary materials to teach reading skills. After the course, 40 students were invited to answer the Likert-scale questionnaire on their perception of this implementation. A student interview was also carried out with 8 students focusing on how effective this implementation was. The data were quantitatively and qualitatively analyzed; and the findings revealed that students had positive attitudes toward using authentic materials. Authentic materials promoted students’ motivation and interest in learning reading skills because they provided students the following benefits, including accessing up-to-date knowledge (70%), increasing students’ vocabulary in related topics (78%), and boosting their confidence in reading authentic articles (68%). A recommendation was also suggested for further researches on using other authentic materials on other skills in EFL teaching and learning.