IMPROVING STUDENTS’ RECOUNT TEXT WRITING ACHIEVEMENT BY USING STORY MAPPING TECHNIQUE

Abstract

This classroom action research was intended to improve the tenth IPS 4 grade students‟ writing achievement by using Story Mapping technique at MAN 1 Jember. Based on the preliminary study, it was found that the tenth IPS 4 grade students had problem in writing skill. It happened because the teacher taught writing by lecturing the students and directly asked the students to start their writing. However, this technique did not seem to be effective to be implemented during writing activity. It made it difficult for the students to start their writing because they did not know how to organize their ideas and develop their writing into coherent text. It was proved by looking at their mean score of writing (63.9) which was the lowest among the other tenth grade classes. It also did not achieve the minimum of standard score (75) for the English subject. The data collection methods used was writing test and observation in the form of checklist. The study was done in two cycles to check the consistency of the research result. Each cycle covered two meetings of the action implementation and one meeting for administering the test. Besides, the observational checklist consisted of 5 indicators, namely 1) Completing the setting; (2) Completing the characters; (3) Completing the events; (4) Completing the conclusion; (5) Writing a recount text individually. The students were categorized as active students if at least 3 indicators were fulfilled. The observation result in Cycle 1 showed that there was 75.75% students were actively involved during the teaching and learning process. It means that it improved 40.75% from 35% in pre-Cycle. Besides, the percentage of the students who achieved the minimum of standard score (75) significantly increased into 76.06% from the pre-Cycle 6.24% to Cycle 1 82.3%. In other words, Cycle 1 fulfilled the criteria of success because 75% of students achieved the research criteria. Then, the action was still continued to Cycle 2 to check the consistency of the students‟ writing achievement and their participation. The result of Cycle 2 showed much better result. It was reported that 81.6% of the students participated actively during the learning process. It means that there was 5.85% improvement from Cycle 1 which was 75.75%. Furthermore, the increasing also happened to the students‟ writing achievement test that showed 88.2% of the students passed the standard minimum score. Based on the result above, it can be concluded that the action in Cycle 2 had achieved the criteria of success of the research. The result of Cycle 1 to Cycle 2 showed an improvement as well as achieved the criteria of success. Finally, it can be summarized that the implementation of Story Mapping technique could improve the tenth IPS 4 grade students‟ writing achievement.