he objective of this research is to find out whether SQ4R as a teaching method is effective or not to improve students’ ability in reading narrative text. The researcher took 64 students as the sample; there were experimental group and control group. For the experimental group, the researcher used class X.2, which consist of 32 students. Meanwhile, as the control group, the researcher took 32 students of class X.1. then, the researcher gave pre-test and post-test to both clases. The researcher taught narrative text by using SQ4R method to the experimental group and using conventional method to the control group. The researcher then statiscally analyzed the data by using t-test polled variance.
After analyzing the data, the researcher concludes that teaching narrative text by using SQ4R method is effective to improve students’ ability in reading narrative text. As the fact, the result of t-value is 4.017. based on the 0.05 significant level, the value of t-table 2.000. the result of computation shows that t-value is higher that t-table. That is 4.017 > 2.000. Another fact shows that the method used is effective is shown by the mean of experimental group that is higher than the mean of control group. In the experimental group, the mean is 86.38. On the contrary, the mean of control group is 78.13. Based on the result finding, it can be seen that the students’ abilty in reading narrative text increased.