THE EFFECT OF SITUATIONAL LANGUAGE TEACHING ON SPEAKING SKILLS AT SEVENTH GRADE STUDENTS OF SMP NEGERI 10 TARAKAN
Speaking is a productive skill that the students should master but in practice the researcher found that seventh-grade students at SMPN 10 Tarakan still struggled with English speaking skills due to limited opportunities to practice in meaningful contexts. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of Situational Language Teaching (SLT) on students' speaking skills using a Quasi-Experimental pre-test-post-test Control and Experiment group design at SMPN 10 Tarakan, involving 26 students in the Experimental class and 27 in the Control class. The Experimental class was taught using SLT over four sessions (introducing oneself and others, hobbies, describing people, and daily activities), while the Control class received Teacher-Centered Instruction. Speaking skills were measured through pre-tests and post-tests covering pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, fluency, and comprehension, and it was analysed using descriptive statistics, normality and homogeneity tests, independent and paired samples t-tests, N-Gain, and Cohen's d. Both classes had equivalent initial proficiency ( t = 1.097 df = 51 p = 0.278 ) and showed significant improvement from pre-test to post-test (p 0.001) The Experimental class demonstrated greater improvement (31.08 Gain = 0.45) compared to the Control class (23.26 points; N-Gain = 0.35), with both falling into the moderate category. Following the intervention, the Experimental class achieved significantly higher scores ( t = 3.197 ; df = 51 P = 0.002 ) with a large effect size (d = 0.88) These findings indicated that the students which were taught using SLT experienced greater improvement in speaking skills compared to those taught using Teacher-Centered Instruction. English teachers are encouraged to optimize time allocation and utilize engaging instructional media by integrating technology.