IMPROVING THE EIGHTH YEAR S TUDENTS’ ACHIEVEMENT IN WRITING NARRATIVE TEXT BY USING VIDEO AT SMPN 1 GUMUKMAS IN THE 2012/2013 ACADEMIC YEAR

Abstract

Based on the preliminary study that was held on 1 st October 2012, most classes of the VIII students of SMPN 1 Gumukmas especially class A faced some difficulties in writing a text. This was proven by their writing scores. The document showed that 22 students or 57% of the total number of students got scores <65 and most of them also had low motivation in learning writing. Only few of the students were enthusiastic in the teaching learning process of writing. The classroom action research with cycle model was applied in this research because this research was intended to improve class VIII-A students’ writing achievement. This research was done collaboratively with the English teacher of class VIII of SMPN 1 Gumukmas. It was conducted in class VIII-A of SMPN 1 Gumukmas that consisted of 38 students. The observation and the writing test were the methods that were used in collecting the data. The data from observation was analyzed by using percentage; therefore, all of the research data were analyzed quantitatively. The action was implemented in two cycles in achieving the goal of this classroom action research. The first cycle was done in three meetings. The results of the classroom observation showed that in meeting 1, 55.88% of the students were actively involved in the teaching learning process and in meeting 2, 67.56% of the students were actively involved in the teaching learning process. This finding showed that there was an improvement of the students’ participation from meeting 1 to meeting 2, but it did not achieve the objective of the research that was 65%. Besides, the result of the writing in the first cycle also did not achieve the target of the research that was 65% of the students got 65 or more in the writing test. The percentage of the students who got score ≥ 65 was only 56% of the students. For those reasons, the second cycle was necessary to be conducted to solve the problems found in the first cycle. There were some points that were revised in Cycle 1 to make the results of Cycle 2 meet the target of the research. In cycle 2, the researcher reduce the speed and used mother tongue more frequently in the explanation. The teacher also guided the students in writing narrative text. The process and product evaluation in the second cycle showed an improvement. The observation of the students’ participation revealed that 75.67% in meeting 1 and 89.18% in meeting 2 of the students actively involved in the teaching learning process. So, the results of the observation both in meeting 1 and meeting 2 had achieved the goal of this research. In the product evaluation, the percentage of the students who got score ≥ 65 in the writing test was 83%of the students. Based on those results, it could be concluded that the action in the second cycle was success ful because the results of process and product evaluation achieved the objective of the research. Finally, it could be summarized that the use of video could improve the students’ participation in teaching learning process and their achievement in writing narrative text at SMPN 1 Gumukmas in the 2012/2013 academic year.