CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
This Chapter deals with background, problem statement, objective, significance , and scope of the research.

A. BACKGROUND
Vocabulary is one of the important things in learning English. Learning vocabulary for young learners is fundamental because the ability of the students to learn English especially to read as well as to comprehend the subject is determined by vocabulary competence. If the learners have no or lack of vocabulary, the ability to communicate and to convey their need could not be established.
Beside that, vocabulary is one of the important elements in building up English. It is impossible to express our ideas, emotion, feeling, and desire without vocabulary. The mastery of vocabulary becomes very essential for the students to learn a language as a foreign language.
In reading textbook, sometimes the students cannot transfer their skill and when they find unfamiliar English words they become frustrated. They find themselves immensely frustrated since they may encounter several words in single sentences whose meaning they are unsure of they stop at each unfamiliar word, afraid to go on for fear of missing something.

It is quite impossible to know the exact meaning of all the words in English. Of course, we can look up unfamiliar words in the dictionary, but it is time consuming to do so. Every time students stumble up on a difficult word. Another way to find out the meaning of the words is by asking a fluent English speaker what a word means. However, probably they might not be at hand when needed. In addition, sometimes students cannot even guarantee that the person they asked knows the meaning of unfamiliar words.
A good reader who is eager to get information from the passage he reads can use the available context clues to determine the meaning of unfamiliar words that may block his comprehension. It is best to try to figure out the meaning of unknown word from the words around it, called as context in a sentence, paragraph or passage. That is an effective way to develop the students’ vocabulary and increase their comprehension by using context clues to deduce the meaning of unfamiliar words.
Some Students read without any specific method for remembering new words. They do not pay particular attention to the difficult words and structure, but they just skip over the words that they cannot understand.
Based on the statement above, the writer conduct a research under the tittle “The Ability of the Third Year Students of SMAN 1 TANRALILI MAROS to Comprehend the Meaning of Unfamilliar Words through Context Clues”.

B. Problem Statement
Based on the background above, the writer formulates a research question:
1. What is the students’ ability to comprehend the meaning of unfamiliar words through context clues?
2. What factors influence the ability of the students to comprehend the meaning of unfamiliar words through context clues?
C. Objective of the Research
Based on the problem statement above, the objective of this research is to find out the ability of the third year students to comprehend the meaning of unfamilliar words through context clues and the factors influence it.
D. Significance of the Research
The result of this research is expected to be useful information and reference to the teachers and students in learning English, especially in learning reading and vocabulary .It is expected to display the use of context clue in determining the meaning of unfamiliar words, especially the meaning of difficult words can be an effective way to develop their vocabulary and increase their reading mastery. And also it is hope to be a very helpful information for reader and translator in general.
E. Scope of the Research
The discipline of this research is under applied linguistics that is vocabulary instruction toward the students by using context clues.This research will use four kinds of context clues, namely synonym clue ,antonym clue ,example clue and punctuation clue.It investigates the students’ vocabulary mastery in terms of nouns,verbs, and adjectives.