FOSTERING STUDENTS ’ GRAMMATICAL COMPETENCE THROUGH FLIPPED CLASSROOM

This study aims to identify whether Flipped Classroom strategy can enhance students‟ grammatical competence. EFL students still found difficulties in understanding and mastering grammar despite its central role in learning a new language. As we are living in the digital era, we can optimize digital tools in teaching and learning to assist students and teachers. Furthermore, students nowadays are tech-savvy, so it would not be very difficult to integrate technology into classroom. The participants of this research were the tenth grade students at SMAN 4 Tangerang Selatan. Classroom Action Research (CAR) was implemented as the research design with two cycles which comprised three meetings in each cycle. The cycle consisted of planning, acting, observing, and reflecting. The instruments used were test, questionnaire, observation, and researcher‟s field note. The results showed that 77.14% of students passed the minimum criterion score; further, the results among pre-test, post-test 1, and post-test 2 significantly increased. These findings indicate that Flipped Classroom have the potential to improve students‟ grammatical competence.


INTRODUCTION
Grammar is a set of rules in which every language must have. Languages will be meaningless if they do not have grammar. Thus, grammar makes languages meaningful and comprehensible whenever people speak, write, read, and listen. Kerr (1996, cited in Lin 2010 states that grammar is the core of the heart in language as well as a tool to assist learners to comprehend the target language. As a result, grammar is needed in all skills of language and it cannot be separated from the four language skills. However, a number of studies claimed that English grammar is considered to be challenging for students to learn and to use it in communication. For example, Al-Hamlan and Baniabdelrahman (2015) maintain that many EFL students find some challenges in mastering grammar. In consequence, Chung (2016, cited in Songbatumis 2017) mentioned that EFL learners should struggle to comprehend the content because of their limited knowledge of grammar and vocabulary. Widianingsih and Gulo (2016) mention some grammatical difficulties encountered by English learners related to grammatical rules. Some of the mistakes are, for example, tenses and plurality which relate to nouns. Additional issues are about articles or determiners and verbs or predicates. Over and above that, Grammar is one of the most difficult components of learning a foreign language, and it should not be overlooked in language instruction (Debata 2013, cited in Elturki 2014. Consequently, non-native speakers or even native speakers will find it difficult to understand and master the rules of the language. Likewise, it is not something new for English learners to feel the same way. Besides the difficulties encountered by the learners, the time allocation to learn English at school is limited and the teacher experiences serious difficulties related to grammar instruction (Al-Mekhlafi & Nagaratman, 2011). Furthermore, teaching has always been about pattern drilling and rule acquisition, despite our limited experience as ELT instructors working with colleagues ELT instructors in Indonesia (Gianina & Wijaya, 2020). Aside from grammar teaching challenges, the students lack for the awareness to be an autonomous learner. They also tend to be passive learners at class. Similarly, Exley (2005, cited in Suryanto 2014  Previously, some researchers have researched the effectiveness of Flipped Classroom and scholars have argued that this model gave positive impacts to English learning. They are Sarah and Yousif (2016) who investigated the Flipped Classroom impact in Grammar Class on EFL Saudi secondary school students" performances and attitudes. They used the Edmodo site to get connected with the students where they could share the content through it. The research design was quasi-experimental with two non-equivalent yet cognate proportional classrooms. Furthermore, Al-Naabi (2020) have conducted a study about the impact of Flipped Classroom on EFL Students" Grammar. It was a quasi-experimental one-group research design. The findings elucidated that Flipped Classroom had a positive influence on students" comprehension and English grammar application. In addition to previous studies, in the current study of the Flipped Classroom, Basal (2015) did a study that involved the Flipped Classroom strategy in foreign language teaching. It could be concluded from the research that Flipped Classroom strategy was beneficial in advance student preparation, solving the limited time of class activity, learning at one"s own pace, and the students" participation improvement.
Those previous related research have some similarities and differences with this research. As for the similarities, the first and the second one have the two same variables which are grammar and Flipped Classroom. Another one only has one same variable which is Flipped Classroom. However, both of the research have differences with this research in terms of the methodology.
Furthermore, the research gaps between those two research are that the previous study"s participants were private secondary school in Saudi, using experimental study design, and gain English teachers" perception toward Flipped Classroom strategy implementation. Meanwhile, this current research"s participants were public high school in Indonesia, using Classroom Action Research (CAR) design, and obtaining students" perception toward the strategy implementation. Crystal (2012) said that grammar is the study on how we construct sentences, how we say what we aim, and how the various outcome that we express by changing the word order. Competence is a collection of cognitively regulated skills or abilities in some specific areas. This involves both the ability and knowledge as well 60-72 http://journal.uinjkt.ac.id/index.php/ijee | DOI: http://doi.org/10.15408/ijee.v8i1.20744 P-ISSN: 2356-1777, E-ISSN: 2443-0390 | This is an open access article under CC-BY-SA license as willingness to cope problems in that area (Lehmann, 2007). Canale & Swain (1980, cited in Lehmann 2007 said that competence can only be examined empirically by evaluating its result or performance (Lehmann, 2007, p. 4). Thus, grammatical competence is our knowledge of a language which is responsible for our capability to construct sentences (Richards, 2006). As learners have good grammatical competence, the learners will get the ability to produce the language precisely (Fikron, 2018). Therefore, having good grammatical competence is to know and to understand grammatical rules used to construct the sentences correctly that is appropriate to the situation, time, and condition when producing the language.
The term "strategy" in learning refers to a set of precise activity, behaviors, stages, or tactics used by students to improve their own leaning, such as finding out conversation patterns or giving oneself motivation to tackle a difficulty language task (Murcia, 2001). Basically, the idea of "Flipped Classroom strategy" is to flip the common classroom activities. Thus, there is a change between the old teaching strategy and the Flipped Classroom strategy. The explanations would no longer be done in class but at home and the assignment would be done in class time (Bergmann & Sams, 2012). The Flipped Classroom strategy was begun in 2006 in Colorado. This model uses video relating to the topic which is going to be learned and discussed as media to watch and learn at home (outside-class). Then the next day, in the classroom, students are ready and familiar with the topic to be discussed and to be done with the assistance from the teacher (insideclass). The outside-class component comprises watching videos and doing quizzes, or mini tests that the teacher prepares before coming to the classroom. Another outside-classroom component is using learning management systems such as online discussion groups which create a preview to in-class discussion. The inside-class component consists of inside-class discussions in small groups or as a whole class. Students" outsideclass learning can be reinforced with inside-class activities that involve critical thinking and problem-solving activities.
The study of the Flipped Classroom strategy was derived from Bloom"s revised taxonomy of cognitive domain theory that presents six levels of learning (Zainuddin & Halili, 2016). Hence, the students carry out the lower levels of cognitive work (remembering and understanding) outside-class, and concentrate on the higher stages of cognitive work (applying, analyzing,  Hence, as a response to those problems, the researcher proposed to go over a solution to cope with the problems in mastering grammar by implementing Flipped Classroom strategy. The strategy has the concept that the lectures and explanations would no longer be executed in class but at home, while the project and assignment would be executed in the class time with the integration of technology (Bergmann and Sams, 2012). Consequently, the students will have more time and are expected to be more enthusiast and interested in learning grammar both in class and outside class time and will have an opportunity to be more active in classroom activities while the teacher will be easier to give instruction with the assistance of technology. In other words, this Flipped Classroom is taken into account as fruitful strategy to improve students" grammatical competence in EFL context.

Research design
The research design employed in this study was Classroom Action Research (CAR) and the data collection used qualitative and quantitative data. Action research focuses on a particular, practical concern and attempts to gain quick fix to a problem (Creswell, 2012). Since this research combined both of qualitative and quantitative to collect the data, a detailed image of the social phenomenon could be established (Greene & Caracelli, 1997). The CAR design implemented was from Kemmis and McTaggart"s model which consisted of four phases; planning, acting, observing, and reflecting as showed below. Each cycle consisted of 3 meetings and in the first step, the researcher made some plans to be integrated to the class accordance with the goals that want to be achieved. The planning included the preparation of providing scenario of learning as well as the research instruments.
The primary instrument to measure the improvement of students" grammatical competence was test. The tests comprised pre-test and post-test that were conducted before and after the implementation of Flipped Classroom using Classroom Action Research (CAR).
Researcher"s field note was used to record and describe the situation of what was happening in the class and the students during the implementation of the classroom action research in each meeting. The field note was included an observation that used observation sheet measuring teacher and students" performance.
To support the data and to add information related to the effectiveness of Flipped Classroom strategy to foster students" grammatical competence, questionnaire was used as well. Both open and closed-ended question were employed. According to Bailey (1994, cited in Cohen, Manion, & Morrison 2007, open-ended questions are beneficial for exploratory questionnaire. While closed-ended questions are highly structured and beneficial to produce frequentness of response compliant to statistical treatment and analysis (Cohen, Manion, & Morrison, 2007).

Research site and participants
The study took place SMAN 4 Tangerang Selatan. The participants of the research were one of the tenth grade classes of that consisted of 35 students. This study purposively selected a class that has low-interest in learning English and the class" score average of English was not satisfactory. In this study, the students were taught English grammar by applying Flipped Classroom strategy.

Data collection and analysis
The data analysis was done by four stages in Classroom Action Research; planning, acting, observing, and reflecting. Before conducting the research by using classroom action research, the researcher did a preliminary observation to investigate the real situation, condition, and the problems found in the class. Thus the researcher in this study acted as an English teacher. The pre-observation used an observation sheet to collect the data. Then, the observation result was used to create a lesson plan which was 63-72 During the acting and observing stage, the researcher gathered qualitative data using researcher"s field note that would be used to support quantitative data in reflecting stage. The researcher"s field note consists of descriptive field note and reflective field note (Creswell, 2012). The quantitative data collection was done by test. Tests provide a forceful method of data collection and a stirring test array to collect numerical data instead of verbal data (Cohen, Manion, & Morrison, 2007). The data from the test would strengthen the other data if there were either some significant improvements or diminishments.
The tests consisted of pre-test and post-test that the questions were adopted and adapted from several sources; grammar books and English books which were used for the tenth grade at school. The research is categorized success if at least 75% of the subject (students) either can accomplish several enhancements scores from pretest to second post-test or can surpass the target score of the minimum criteria of learning mastery (KKM). According to Ministry of Education and Culture (MoEC) regulation, KKM is minimum learning mastery standard that is determined by school. Hence, to know the percentage of successful students, if the benchmark is fulfilled, it means that the research succeeds. Subsequently, the research will be stopped.
At the end of Classroom Action Research (CAR), questionnaire (open and closed ended questions) was shared to students to gain information from the participants" experiences unaffected by either anyone or anything (Creswell, 2012).
Observation was done using observation sheet. It was recorded on the sheet to monitor the classroom activity, students and teacher"s performance. It was filled in by an observer who was a real English teacher that used to teach them. So, the researcher who also acted as a teacher during the research collaborated with their English teacher. The observation was carried out twice; before and during the CAR implementation. Besides, the researcher also monitored and wrote the result on researcher"s field note. However, it was only a description of what was happening in the class and a reflection for the teacher on what aspects or things should be fixed so that the outcome would be maximum.
To know whether the Flipped Classroom strategy was successful or not, the teacher conducted the test which was multiple choice and included the grammar materials that had been discussed, such as Present Tense, Present Future Tense, Too, Enough, Very, Ability (can, could, be able). The materials followed the students" English materials at school.

Findings Test
After conducting pre-test, post-test 1, and post-test2, the researcher analyzed the data by calculating the students" score to obtain the percentage of the results. Herewith, the researcher concluded the description of CAR assessment in each cycle in the following table 1. Acquired from the figures and table above, there was a significant enhancement on the percentage of the students who surpassed the criterion minimum score (KKM). In the pre-test, there was only 2.9% of student or 1 student who succeeded whereas 97.1% or the 34 remains students who did not reach the KKM. There was also an improvement on post-test 1 where 25.71% of students or 9 students who reached the KKM and the rest 26 students or 74.29% were still far below the KKM. All in all, in the post-test 2, the number of the fulfilled students was high, in which 77.14% or 27 students passed the KKM. Meanwhile, the remaining 8 students or 22.86% of students did not successfully reach the KKM. Shortly, among all of the tests acquired the improvement on each test. However, the very high gap was from post-test 1 to post-test 2 which successfully reached the criterion of success of Classroom Action Research. Subsequently, the Classroom Action Research (CAR) was finished off until Cycle 2.

Researcher's Field Note
According to the teacher"s field notes written, the students showed more enthusiasm and seemed more active as the meetings passed by. They also were less shy and doubtful to ask the teacher some questions and some words they found difficult to understand or to ensure what to do with the project given. Besides, the researcher took notes on the progress of the students who studied at home by watching the videos which were shared on Google Classroom. In the first meeting, still many students who did not care and realize the importance of viewing the videos at home before the in-class activity. However, as the meeting went by for more than a month, the number of students watching the videos was increased which also showed that their attitude and motivation to learn English grammar were improved.
Furthermore, because the Flipped classroom strategy made the students have a lot of discussion at the class, the researcher discovered that at the earliest meeting, the discussion still needed to be well-organized since the class was a bit noisy. Not only that but also the researcher spent more time to walk around to answer the questions and to observe their improvement in mastering the grammar. As a result, on reflective notes, the researcher needed to be more firm and needed to wellorganized especially in time management. However, in the next meeting the researcher could solve them well. On the reflective notes, the researcher tried to find out what made the students less interested to watch the videos in the first cycle. The researcher ended up realizing that the videos given in the first cycle were mostly in English and the duration was too long. The researcher realized that it was slightly difficult to find the English grammar materials in the Indonesia language. If there so, most of them were more than 5 minutes and kind of lecturing-video which probably made them boring and less interested. Therefore, in the second cycle, the researcher created the videos by herself with some guidance from the book "Flip Your Classroom" by Bergmann and Sams (2012), to fulfill their needs and attract them to watch the videos. Additionally, the researcher also asked the teacher who acted as an observer to give some inputs toward the classroom activities as well as the researchers.

Questionnaire
Questionnaire was aimed to know about their experiences and perceptions toward English grammar learning by applying the Flipped Classroom strategy. The questions were 14 questions, which were categorized into four concerns. The concerns correlated with the communication and interaction during the English grammar teaching-learning process for the questions number 1-2 (2 items), the English grammar learning using the Flipped Classroom strategy itself for the number 3-7 (5 items), the media in the English grammar teaching and learning for the number 8-13 (6 items), and at the last concern, the researcher expected 66-72 http://journal.uinjkt.ac.id/index.php/ijee | DOI: http://doi.org/10.15408/ijee.v8i1.20744 P-ISSN: 2356-1777, E-ISSN: 2443-0390 | This is an open access article under CC-BY-SA license students to express their perspectives about their experience learning English grammar using the Flipped Classroom strategy.
The first concern was about students" interaction with the teacher and peers during the English grammar teaching-learning process. The outcome showed that most of them communicated with their peers a lot during the discussion with a percentage of 74.3% or 26 students said "yes". Meanwhile, the interaction between the students and the teacher positioned higher, with a percentage of 85.7% or 30 students. During the in-class activity, they asked a few questions as well as they discussed with their peers a lot. Thus, the Flipped Classroom strategy succeeded in creating an interactive and dynamic class. The second concern correlated with learning English grammar using the Flipped Classroom strategy. The result presented that during learning using the strategy, they learned by themselves more intense with a percentage of 68.6%. They also thought that the grammar exercises given were related to their daily lives with a percentage of 85.7%. Hence, that was one of the factors that made them felt easier to understand the materials. Because in this study the researcher used material videos for outside-class activity, the question about the video was asked as well. There were 33 students or 94.3% of them claimed that the video assisted them to understand and apply the knowledge in writing and speaking tasks. Furthermore, 57.1% of them applied their learning experience outside the class and 88.6% of them explored their ways in learning grammar. It showed that the strategy  The third concern was about the media used in the Flipped Classroom strategy. In this research, the media used were material video and Google Classroom as a learning platform to share the materials. The result unfolded that they needed a technical assistant to view the material videos on Google Classroom with a percentage of 71.4% or 25 students said so. They also thought that a technical assistant and various learning sources helped them increasing their motivation in learning, with a percentage of 85.7%. In addition, they preferred to choose other videos to be accessed for learning at home, with a percentage of 82.9%. Besides, most of them liked watching videos routinely which gained 68.6%. During the implementation of the Flipped Classroom strategy, the researcher used two kinds of material videos, the first was the videos from the internet such as Youtube and another one was the video created by the researcher. When the students were asked which video that made them understand more effortless, the result was 74.3% of them chose the video created by the researcher. The last question in this concern was about what aspects that increased their learning experience during the implantation of the Flipped Classroom strategy. There were six aspects; availability and access to online content and course materials (28.6%), evaluation and feedback (14.3%), easy to use a Web environment (Google classroom) (22.9%), in-class, group discussion (40%), group collaboration (20%), working on the assignments (watching videos) by their own at home (22.9%). As the data are shown above, in-class group discussion positioned as the highest aspect that built up their learning experience.
For the last concern, it was an open-ended question about their perspectives about their experience learning English grammar using the Flipped Classroom strategy. The answers were diverse among them. However, most of them thought that the Flipped Classroom strategy was beneficial and effective for them in learning English grammar. Some of the reasons were because of watching the video as outside-class activity and doing the discussion as an in-class

68-72
http://journal.uinjkt.ac.id/index.php/ijee | DOI: http://doi.org/10.15408/ijee.v8i1.20744 P-ISSN: 2356-1777, E-ISSN: 2443-0390 | This is an open access article under CC-BY-SA license activity. Some of them also added by viewing the video could make them more enthusiast but one of the obstacles about this was the availability of internet quota. Oftentimes, the researcher found out the main reason for not being able to watch the material videos at home was about it. Hence, based on the post-questionnaire results, it could be recapitulated that the Flipped Classroom strategy could assist the students understand and master English grammar gradually. It also helped them intensify their learning both at home and in class. Additionally, many of them liked watching video, thus the material video was impactful for them as well, especially the video created by the teacher after doing some observations to find the students" needs in learning.

Discussion
Based on the finding above, the usage of Flipped Classroom Strategy has assisted students to improve their mastery in English grammar. Not only has helped students but also teachers to be more creative and to create a better learning atmosphere. The result of first cycle, however, did not achieve the goal to pass 75% of the students and the scores were also below the researchers" expectation in the first place. It was only 9 students or 25.71 % who passed the minimum score. It could be because they still adapted with the strategy and most of the students did not watch the material video (learn outside class).
However, in the cycle 2, the outcome was satisfying and rising sharply. According to questionnaire, one of the reasons was because of the material videos given. The teacher created some material videos by herself, realizing that the material videos given to students before were too long and most of them were in full English. The teacher used TikTok (a video application) which is a viral application for youth nowadays, to help her make more attractive and concise videos about the materials.
Hence, the findings indicate that Flipped Classroom strategy had a positive impact on students" grammatical competence. It worked for them as the researcher observed that the students who watched and learned from the videos outside-classroom rocketed. These findings confirm some previous research. Al-Naabi (2020) investigated the impact of Flipped Classroom on EFL students" grammar involving 28 Oman students. Based on the explanation above, it is feasible to define that the Flipped Classroom strategy was impactful for EFL students in comprehending and using English grammar. The strategy required students learn both outside and inside class, participate in classroom"s activities, and to be independent learners. Those made students had positive attitudes towards the strategy.

CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTION
Due to the result obtained, the researchers acquired some research findings based on the result of test instruments. In classroom, the students feel more enjoyed and have more courage to ask questions and speak up their thoughts. Furthermore, discussing with their peers makes them more active and enthusiastic in learning English grammar. Those attitudes lead them to level up their performance in understanding and mastering English grammar that is proved by the test which has been done.
Besides, by implementing Flipped Classroom strategy which allows students to access technology such as material videos, reading sources, and quizzes, they are more interested in learning. It also assisted them to learn the material earlier at home before coming to the class. Thus, they get used to be independent to manage their learning before the class starts.
To put it concisely, upon the research findings, it can be inferred that the implementation of the Flipped Classroom strategy for English grammar learning at the tenth-grade students is able to assist and foster their grammatical competence.
At last, this study espouses the recommendation, especially for teachers teaching English especially teaching its structure or grammar should be carried out in more dynamic and interactive ways. Teachers are expected to be able to optimize technology as media to help them in teaching.
It is also recommended for other researchers to conduct further investigations either in more detail or in the application of Flipped Classroom strategy in other skills of language because recently education technology becomes more popular in this pandemic situation. Furthermore, the writer hopes that the research findings can be reckoned as a reference for future research to cope with the problems in English learning process.