Analysis of Eighth-Grade Students' Difficulties in Learning Reading Skills of Arabic Texts in Class

Abstract

Reading skills are one of the skills that play an important role in increasing students' insight, especially those related to Arabic insight. In learning reading skills, students experience various kinds of difficulties. In general, these difficulties are influenced by two main factors, namely internal factors and external factors. Difficulties in learning reading skills are problems that must be found solutions because they hinder learning to achieve their goals. This study aims to analyze the difficulties of grade VIII students of Insan Mulia Batanghari Integrated Islamic Junior High School in learning Arabic text reading skills, analyze factors both internal and external that affect student difficulties, and provide suggestions and input to teachers to solve these problems.  This study used a descriptive qualitative approach with data collection through interviews and observations. The results of this study showed that the eighth-grade students of Insan Mulia Batanghari Integrated Islamic Junior High School experienced some difficulties in learning reading skills. Among these difficulties are: difficulty in distinguishing the pronunciation of hijaiyah letters, difficulty in distinguishing the pronunciation of harakat, difficulty in managing the short length of reading, difficulty reading Arabic text fluently, and difficulty in understanding the meaning of Arabic text. These difficulties are generally caused by two main factors, namely internal factors and external factors. Internal factors include a lack of student interest, a lack of mastery of hijaiyah letters, a lack of vocabulary mastery as well a lack of grammatical understanding of Arabic. External factors include educational background, teachers, learning media, and curriculum. The solutions suggested by researchers to overcome these problems are as follows: collecting data on students who have difficulty reading, conducting special training, increasing student motivation to learn Arabic, providing and completing learning media, improving learning design and study time management, and repeating learning materials.