Implementation of the Storytelling Method to Improve Early Children’s Language Skills

Language for early childhood is important as a means of thinking, listening, speaking, and reading and writing. The purpose of this study was to describe the application of an appropriate and effective storytelling method so that it can improve early childhood language skills in group B at Baitul A'la Lubuklinggau Kindergarten. This study used the Classroom Action Research (CAR) method or action classroom research using 3 cycles. Each cycle includes the stages of planning, implementing, observing, and reflecting. The subjects in this study were early childhood in group B of Baitul A'la Lubuklinggau Kindergarten, totaling 20 children. The results of the study showed that there was an increase in language skills from cycle I and cycle III seen from the class averages of (2.30), (3.00), (3.60) and an increase in mastery of learning outcomes in language skills from cycles I and cycle II by 30% increased in cycle II to 75% and cycle III to 100%. The application of an effective storytelling method to improve language skills for early childhood in group B of Baitul A'la Lubuklinggau Kindergarten, this is reflected in an increase in communication skills and social action.


Introduction
Childhood is one of the stages of human development.At this age, children tend to be eager to do what is depicted in their cognitive map (Otalora & Taborda-Osorio, 2020).Therefore, parents should be able to recognize what is needed and desired by the child.Early childhood usually does not have much reflection on its development, therefore it is the parents who must function actively in helping their child's growth.In addition, the age of preschool children is a period of growth (Sutapa et al., 2021).At this stage the role of the family and school becomes one of the important factors in development at that time.Family members such as father, mother and siblings as well as teachers at school are expected to be able to guide, supervise, correct and educate children properly as early as possible.Families need to teach children about discipline, morals, independence, religion, various abilities such as physical, language, cognitive, and social emotional abilities (Aisyah et al., 2022).Parents and teachers should pay attention to children's language development because children's language is a means of communication or link between members of the surrounding community to express a means of communication or liaison between members of the surrounding community to express ideas, and feelings, as well as children's desires (Wahidah & Latipah, 2021).
Kindergarten is a place that is very suitable for children who have not yet entered elementary school, namely in the age range 0-6 years to provide a stimulus for various skills possessed by children.Early Age (0-6 years) is the optimal age of children in the process of development and very rapid growth (Haryono et al., 2021).The development of children's language and thinking is not only related to the maturity of speech organs and thinking abilities, but the environment also contributes to influence.The social and social development of children has become increasingly widespread.Skills in the physical, motor, mental, and emotional fields are increasing (Awalya, 2012).
Preliminary observations that have been made on group B children at Baitul A'la Lubuklinggau Kindergarten, in connection with language skills problems are: the lack of children's ability to master conversation, so that children are less able to respond to conversations in these activities and are very passive, children are not optimal in express their opinions and children's participation in learning activities is not visible.This condition is caused by the child's lack of interest in participating in learning activities, because the learning activities are monotonous so it is boring, as well as the teacher does not provide stimulus by inviting them to tell stories together, the teacher is difficult in conveying stories from stories, so the teacher tends to often invite children to write (Gottschalk, 2019).
Learning media is a visual aid that can facilitate the teaching and learning process in schools so that it can run effectively.Learning media is also all efforts made to stimulate and stimulate abilities in children's ways of thinking, children's attention in learning (Putri et al., 2023).Each media has its own characteristics, as well as audiovisual media.Audio visual media is a combination of audio and visual media combined with audio tapes that have elements of sound and images that are commonly seen, for example video recordings, various sizes of films, sound slides and so on (Setyawan, 2017).
Language ability is one of the important things that every child must have.In fact there are so many problems regarding language development, schools should optimize their role in supporting children's needs in the process of their growth and development (Kusmawati et al., 2021).Furthermore, language is a sign or symbol of an object and refers to certain purposes, such as words, sentences so that new meanings arise, in connection with symbolic meanings, language is also used as a means of oral communication between humans in spoken, written or sign forms (Risnawati & Nuraeni, 2019).Language ability is one of the basic abilities that children must have in order to be successful in school or even in their future life (Darlin,et al, 2021).This is because language skills are abilities, the richness of speech, thoughts and Sri Yanti et al./ Implementation of the Storytelling Method to Improve Early Children's Language Skills feelings of humans through arbitrary sounds, used to cooperate, interact, and identify themselves in good conversation (Setyawan, 2017).In addition, language skills are the ability to speak and understand what the other person is saying, which includes symbols, images, expressions, and so on (Malik et al., 2018).One way to improve children's language skills is to talk to them frequently and provide opportunities for children to speak.
The development of children's language skills in kindergarten is very important and necessary, so the teacher's efforts in improving children's language skills are to create a conducive and communicative learning atmosphere.Language development for kindergarten children based on Education Ministry Regulation No. 58, 2009, there are three aspects in language development, namely receiving language, expressing language, and literacy.The scope of development in receiving language is receptive language skills, consisting of developing listening to other people's words, understanding two commands given simultaneously, understanding the story being read, knowing vocabulary about adjectives, understanding some commands, repeating more complex sentences, and understanding rules in a game.The second scope of development is the ability to express language.This ability is included in expressive language skills.This ability can appear in the form of speaking and writing abilities.The third scope of development is literacy, initial literacy skills.This ability includes the ability to name familiar letter symbols, recognize the sound of the initial letters of the names of objects around them, name groups of images that have the same initial sound/letter, understand the relationship between sound and letter shape, read one's own name, and write your own name.
Therefore, the three aspects mentioned above greatly influence the development of children's language skills.Children's language development can be said to develop optimally if children can receive and express language properly and can recognize and understand literacy as well.Language skills are learned and acquired by early childhood scientifically to adapt to their environment, as a tool for language socialization is a way of responding to other people (Hanipah & Siagian, 2023).Children who have good language skills generally have the ability to express thoughts, feelings and actions with their environment, good language skills in children will make it easier for them to communicate with their surroundings.Bromley, states that there are four kinds of language forms namely listening, speaking, reading and writing, there is language that is receptive or expressive (Hanipah & Siagian, 2023).
Bromley states that there are five kinds of language functions, namely 1) Language explains individual wants or needs, 2) Language can change and control behavior, 3) Language helps cognitive development, 4) Language helps strengthen interactions with other people, 5) Language expresses individual uniqueness (Hanipah & Siagian, 2023).The five functions of language can provide positive stimulation to the emergence of various child language potentials, so games and various tools play an important role.As a teacher, express a lot of language that is receptive or easy to understand, accepted by children because in general children accept and express language in various ways, teachers must master vocabulary that is easy for children to understand so that children do not get bored when listening to the teacher (Fitriani et al., 2020).One of the activities that teachers can use in developing children's language skills is by storytelling.This is in accordance with the curriculum guidelines based on that the method for developing children's abilities in language is the storytelling method.This is based on the opinion of the Ministry of National Education that a competency-based curriculum is material used to develop basic communication competencies in storytelling fluency and vocabulary mastery using stories.The competency-based curriculum utilizes appropriate and contextual methods which in the implementation of learning are integrated with three areas of development, namely the development of religious and moral values, social emotional, and basic abilities (language, physical, cognitive, and academic) is the storytelling method.
The ability to tell experiences for children aged 3-4 years is not obtained directly, but requires gradual stimulation.Children should have enough vocabulary to help them convey their experiences through simple stories.In general, having just a vocabulary can support children in telling experiences, but not all children can directly convey ideas or experiences that children have because this relates to children's thinking abilities.So, it requires continuous practice and habituation.Difficulties in telling experiences can also have an impact on a child's ability to express ideas/ideas to others.This can be said as a barrier to communication (Apriliyana, 2020).
According to Bachri (2005) the benefit of storytelling is that it can broaden children's horizons and ways of thinking, because in telling stories children get additional experiences that could be new things for them.Storytelling is a form of communication in which there is an exchange of thoughts or opinions about a problem that is carried out regularly and directed to achieve certain goals.The storytelling method will create impressions and messages that can be absorbed by children because through an interesting storytelling method, conveying the moral message contained will be more easily embedded in the minds of children (M. A. Putri & Arifin, 2020).However, adjustments are needed to the storytelling method for preschool aged children to suit their age development.In storytelling activities for preschool age, storytelling techniques are needed that use interesting media or props so that they can help children imagine and understand the contents of the story being told (Rohayati, 2014).
Telling stories is important for children for several reasons; 1) Storytelling is a moral education tool that is easiest for children to digest besides the role model that children see every day; 2) Storytelling is a method and material that can be integrated with other basic skills, namely speaking, "reading", "writing", and listening, including for Kindergarten children; 3) Storytelling provides a free space for children to develop the ability to sympathize and empathize with events that happen to other people.This underlies children to assess social sensitivity; 4) Telling stories gives an example to children how to respond to a problem well, how to have a good conversation, as well as giving "lessons" to children how to control desires that are considered negative by society; 5) Telling stories provides a social barometer for children, what values are accepted by the surrounding community, such as obeying parents' orders, giving in to younger siblings, and always being honest.6) Storytelling provides "lessons" of culture and manners that have stronger retention than "lessons" of manners given through narrative and direct orders.7) Telling stories gives space for children to move, when a value that has been captured is applied.8) Storytelling has positive psychological effects for children and teachers as storytellers, such as emotional closeness as a substitute for a parent's attached figure.9) Telling stories awakens children's sense of events or stories, plots, plots, and that way it fosters the ability to string together causal relationships from an event and provides opportunities for children to learn to examine the events around them.10) Storytelling makes children attractive to school because storytelling has a creative and imaginative effect that kindergarten-age children need.The presence of stories makes children more jou in school and have a longing for school.Because stories are fun for children, they help the formation of nerve fibers in children.Every positive response that the child raises will facilitate the connection between neurons.Indirectly, stories stimulate the brain to weave a child's intellectual network.11) Telling stories encourages children to give "meaning" to the learning process, especially regarding empathy so that children can concretize their psychological feelings about how to look at a problem from another person's point of view.In other words, children learn to understand other people's points of view more clearly based on their individual psychological development (Nurjanah & Anggraini, 2020).
The storytelling method is needed in improving children's language skills, so that in the future children do not experience language failure, therefore a teacher should be able to convey practical and fun methods in developing aspects of the language possessed by children.The storytelling method is a way of learning to convey events, knowledge, feelings, ideas or events through words, pictures or sounds which are carried out with improvisation to beautify the story line and can entertain children (Anggraeni et al., 2019).Telling stories will make children fluent in communicating and direct them in interacting and carrying themselves in a social environment (Purwandari et al., 2022).The storytelling method is an effective learning method for students, therefore based on what is stated above, although there are still many teachers who are not able to convey the contents of the story properly, there is a good alternative for the teacher in conveying the contents of the story to students, namely by using audiovisual media in the form of videos that contain stories that educate students.
Given the complexity of the problems above, researchers are trying to find a solution (problem solving) through the application of the storytelling method to improve the language skills of group B early childhood Baitul A'la Lubuklinggau Kindergarten.Although, story telling popular learning media in improving language skill, this study portrays directed improvement in how children act in social interaction and how children give responses in social problem.

Methods
The research used was action research which occurs in three cycles starting from planning, implementing, observing, and reflecting.The implementation of the action was carried out within 3 weeks.The action process included: First, initial activity, include: a)line up, greet, greet children; b)singing, making pledges and promises from TK, Pancasila; c)pray before starting the lesson; c)set the class, the child sits facing the teacher; d)the teacher prepares props to tell stories.Second, core activities, include: a)motivating children to listen to stories; b)children are given the opportunity to give the title of the story in the video; c)children listen to the title of the story in the video that will be displayed.Then the researcher mentions the names of the characters in the story; d)the child listens to the teacher's story while paying attention to what the teacher shows in the story video; e)after finishing telling the story, the child concludes the contents of the story in the video; f)the researcher reviewed the children's activities during the storytelling process.The researcher conducted questions and answers and observed the children who were assisted by the teacher.Third, rest activities, include: a)washing hands before and after eating; b)read the prayer before and after eating, c)eat together; d)playing outside the classroom.Fourth, closing activities, include: a)the teacher completes the conclusions about the contents of the story from the children; b)questions and answers about today's activities then information on tomorrow morning's activities; c)sing according to the theme of the story; c)read the prayer before going home; d)messages/advice and greetings home.
Observation plays a role in efforts to improve professional practice through better understanding and more critical action planning.At this stage, the researcher made observations and recorded all the things that were needed and happened during the action.The aspects observed in our children's language skills: listening and listening to stories, children's expressions in telling stories, commenting on opinions about problems that arise in the story, listening and retelling the contents of the story in sequence, answering questions about the contents of the story that has been presented.
Reflection in action is intended to thoroughly review the actions that have been taken, based on the data that has been collected, then an evaluation is carried out in order to perfect the next action.Reflection includes analysis, synthesis, and assessment of the results of observations of actions taken.If there are problems in the reflection process, a review process is carried out through the next cycle.This reflection activity is carried out at the end of story learning using audiovisual media in the form of films.The films used in storytelling activities are the animated films Nussa and Rara.
The sample of this study was group B at Baitul A'la Lubuklinggau Kindergarten with a total of 20 children, with details of 14 boys and 6 girls.Data was collected using techniques in the form of observation and documentation.The observation or observation technique used is to find out the application of the storytelling method in improving children's language skills, directly by referring to the observation guidelines that have been made for each child which contains indicators of group B children's language skills through storytelling activities.In order for the observations made by the researcher to obtain maximum results, it is necessary to include a format or observation blank as an instrument.In carrying out observations, researchers do not just record but also have to make considerations and then make an assessment into a multilevel scale.
Documentation techniques used to obtain data directly from research sites such as activity reports, photographs, activity records, and other relevant data.The main instrument used in data collection was the researcher himself, by carrying out activities: making action designs, planning and implementing learning to tell stories, and observing the increase in children's language skills.the instruments developed by the researchers consisted of The research instrument would be carried out by observing the process of teaching and learning activities in group B. The instruments for teachers and early childhood abilities included: form of teacher observation sheets and an assessment rubric.Each data that has been collected is then analyzed using quantitative data.
The observation rating scale uses a rating scale according to the Likert scale.Column 1 Very less Column 2 Not enough Column 3 Good Column 4 Very good The formula for finding the average learning outcomes

Mastery learning
To master learning, learning mastery is divided into two categories, namely individual learning and classical learning.By looking at the percentage of student learning completeness scores, a descriptive analysis was carried out on student learning outcomes data.This test is used to see the significance before and after the action is carried out, so that a comparison between cycles can be seen.

. Cycle Observation Results
It is expected that the results of observing the learning process based on the class observation sheet will increase, but because the teacher has not fully mastered the steps of the storytelling method, the results are not yet optimal, where in terms of lining up, greeting, greeting children, the teacher is not enthusiastic and watches, as well as in singing, saying Kindergarten pledges, and mentioning the Pancasila teachers just stand and clap their hands and are not focused on paying attention to children who don't speak and don't follow the teacher.As for preparing teaching tools for storytelling, the teacher only brings a laptop and video stories, while the sound system forgot to bring it so that the children were not clear in listening and paying attention to stories so that very few children can provide conclusions about the contents of the story and many children cannot answer the teacher's story questions.The results of observations in the first cycle as seen from Figure 1.

Figure 1. The average value of teacher activities in cycle I
Based on Figure 1, the results of the teacher's activities in applying the storytelling method were obtained where there were 6 indicators with good value, 13 indicators with less value, and 1 indicator with very less value.After taking the average value, it was found that 1.75 was in the less category.The results of observing language skills show that the implementation of learning is expected to improve children's language skills even though it is not in accordance with expectations, because not all planned actions can be implemented.
During storytelling activities or during discussion about stories that children have heard, very few can answer them, likewise there are still many children who do not want to listen or are not interested in the stories being broadcast, children also cannot express themselves in telling stories, children are still shy in giving comments on opinions about the problems that arise in the story so that at the end of the lesson the children are less able to retell the story and conclude the story.The results of observations in the first cycle as seen in Figure 2. Based on the average value graph above, it can be seen that the child's language ability for the first cycle is 2.30, meaning it is included in the "Less" category.The child's language ability for the first cycle is on average still lacking and has not reached the desired level of achievement because there are several students who have not yet completed, namely there are 14 students while only 6 have completed it, therefore for this first cycle around 30% of children's language abilities are has grown and developed.

Cycle Observation Results
In terms of providing motivation to children, the teacher is still not good because the motivation given is not interesting and lacks enthusiasm so that when concluding the contents of the story the child still needs guidance from the teacher because the child is less focused and enjoys the story, as well as in terms of questions and answers from the children children just point their hands when asked they are silent and some laugh because they don't know the answer.The results of observations in the second cycle can be seen in Figure 3.  3, the teacher's activities for the second cycle were 2.90, meaning it was included in the "Good" category.The teacher's activities for the second cycle were on average good and had reached the desired level of achievement.There are 3 indicators that have been very well implemented, 12 indicators that are already good and 5 indicators that are still lacking so that the teacher still needs improvement.The results of observing language skills show that the implementation of learning is expected to improve children's language skills in line with expectations, because already some of the planned actions can be implemented.

Cycle 1
Cycle II During the storytelling activity, some of the children were already able to express their feelings in telling stories, some children started to comment on the problems that arose in the story, some of the children focused on listening to the story, and some already wanted to ask questions, answer and conclude the contents of the story, although they still there is little guidance from the teacher to get started.However, Ananda was still not clear and understood when concluding the contents of the story and Ananda was also unable to ask questions to the teacher about the story.The results of observations in the second cycle as seen in Figure 4.
Based on the average value chart figure 4, it can be seen that the child's language ability for the second cycle is 3.00, meaning it is included in the "Good" category.Children's language skills for the second cycle are on average good and have reached the desired level of achievement.There are only 5 children who have not completed it, while those who have completed it have reached 15 people so that 75% of children's language skills have developed.

Cycle Observation Results
The results of the observation of the learning process show that the implementation of learning can be expected, and all planned actions can be carried out properly.For example, children already want to follow the lesson very well, everyone pays attention to the teacher during storytelling activities, without guidance from the teacher the child wants to carry out the teacher's orders, the teacher no longer dominates learning but the children are more active, media and learning resources are fully utilized by the teacher in learning.In this cycle time use is very efficient, during storytelling activities or during question and answer lessons about stories that have been heard.When telling stories, all the children listened and were very interested, so at the end of the lesson the children understood what they had to do.Based on the results of the average class observation, it can be seen that the results of cycle III, namely 3.60, are very good categories, where indicators that have very good value consist of 12 indicators and there are 8 indicators that have good value, there is not even one indicator that has less value and is very lacking so that the implementation The storytelling method can be said to be very successful.The observation results of children's language skills in cycle III were very good where children were able to listen and listen to stories, children's expressions in telling stories, commenting on opinions about problems that arose in the story, hearing and retelling the contents of the story in sequence and answer questions about the content of the story that has been presented properly.Observation results in the third cycle as seen in Figure 6.
Based on the average value chart figure 6, it can be seen that the child's language ability for the third cycle is 3.60, meaning it is included in the "Very good" category.Children's language skills for the third cycle are on average very good and have reached the desired level of achievement.Where there are no more children who are incomplete, everything is completed 100%, the development of children's language skills has increased and developed very well.With the t test there is a significant difference.Where Tcount of Cycle I and Cycle II of language skills = 6.432 and Cycle II and Cycle III = 5.338 is greater than Ttable = 1.729.Figure 6.The average value of language skills in cycle III

Discussion
The implementation of learning with the storytelling method is the core of the learning activities carried out by the teacher, which in practice is adjusted to the lesson plans or designs that have been planned beforehand.At this stage it is expected to be able to see the shortcomings or advantages of the design that has been prepared, therefore the teacher's ability to apply them is needed, because the focus in this study is how the teacher's ability to implement the learning methods that have been planed and in accordance with the good teaching methods affects child learning outcome and the implications of application of these learning methods on improving children's ability, because the storytelling method is closely related to children's activities.
Based on the results of the implementation that has been condutes, it is known that the level of success of the teacher in applying the storytelling method depends on the level of understanding and ability to the concept of storytelling itself.While the observations on the application of the storytelling method in the first cycle showed that the teacher still had difficulties in applying the storytelling method to children and the teacher was not careful in preparing teaching aids and paying attention to children as well as there were several learning steps that were missed and caused learning to be less than optimal.
The findings obtained in the application of the first cycle were then discussed together with the teacher through a reflection process and from the reflection results it was found that the difficulties or shortcomings of the teacher applying the storytelling method were due to Cycle III the broad outline that the problem was that the teacher concerned had limited abilities in terms of combining storytelling and audiovisual methods.Teachers do need storytelling experience to build these skills (Katoningsih, 2021).Teachers can evaluate the implementation of activities or the use of media that is not optimal.Warsita (2008) said that one of the requirements in accelerated learning is having the ability or skill to utilize instructional media.The use of appropriate media for teachers and students makes the delivery of story content easier to understand and can be implemented by students so that learning objectives can be said to be successful.
Along with the implementation of the application of the storytelling method, the teacher's ability in cycle II experienced a significant increase, this occurred in line with the increase in the teacher's understanding of the application of the storytelling method so that children's language skills could improve properly.Student activity in cycle III has increased, this can be seen from the inactive student have started to want to express their opinions and began to dare to appear in front of the class and also conclude the contents of the story.Learning outcomes are the abilities possessed by students after they receive their learning experience (Sudjana, 2002).Teachers have a very important role in children's language development and should find out the best way for children to develop their language (Arifin & Pauweni, 2019).The teacher can act as a feedback provider so that the child can continue to try to develop the conversation (Widayati, 2019).Teacher had to observe the children language skill then make a learning lesson that can improve their language skill.
In the next learning procees, teacher can ask the children to tell a story in fornt of class.The children can tell their experience so they can improve their expressive language, although children are still often shy (Supriatna, 2022).Children can practice their expressive language by telling their feeling or opinion and the teacher can support by giving them the opportunities.

Conclusion
Applying the right storytelling method can improve language skills.The application of the storytelling method to group B of Baitul A'la Lubuklinggau Kindergarten consists of four activities, namely the initial activity where the child is able to listen and listen to stories with high concentration and enthusiasm, the core activity where the child is able to express himself, giving comments on opinions about problems those who are there and can hear and retell the contents of the story, take a break for children to communicate with their friends and closing activities where children can answer questions about the contents of the story that has been presented.The application of the storytelling method is very effective for improving language and social emotional skills.It is proven that language skills are very effective with differences in the increase in the average value of children and the percentage for each cycle which is always increasing and also proven by the t test that there is a significant difference.Where Tcount of Cycle I and Cycle II = 6.432 and Cycle II and Cycle III = 5.338 which is greater than ttable = 1.729.

P
of students who have finished studying N= Total number of students Test Difference Between Cycles Cycle 1

Figure 2 .
Figure 2. The average value of language skills in cycle I

Figure 4 .Figure 5 .
Figure 4.The average value of language skills in cycle 2