IMPROVING THE ELEVENTH GRADE STUDENTS’ WRITING ACHIEVEMENT THROUGH THE USE OF CLUSTERING TECHNIQUE AT SMAN 1 PAITON IN THE ACADEMIC YEAR OF 2012/2013

Abstract

This classroom action research was intended to improve the eleventh grade students’ writing achievement by using clustering technique at SMAN 1 Paiton in the academic year of 2012/2013. Based on the preliminary study by interviewing the English teacher at SMAN 1 Paiton that was conducted on 22 vii nd July 2012, most of the eleventh grade students of SMAN 1 Paiton, especially class XI IPA 3 had some difficulties in writing a text in terms generating their ideas, choosing the appropriate words related to the topic, constructing sentences based on the structure correctly, and organizing their writing in sequence. This was proven by their writing scores which showed that only 38.70% of students who got score ≥70. Clustering was chosen as a technique that could help the students solving their problems in writing. It was suitable technique for the students in learning writing because it allows them to see the visual relationship between sub point and ideas. The research was done collaboratively with the English teacher of SMAN 1 Paiton. It was conducted in class XI IPA 3 of SMAN 1 Paiton consisting of 31 students. The results of observation were used as process evaluation and the result of writing test was used as product evaluation. The data were analyzed quantitatively. The action was done in two cycles with three meetings of each cycle. The first cycle was done in two meetings and followed by writing test. The results of the classroom observation showed that 61.29% in meeting 1 and 70.97% in meeting 2 of the students who were active during the teaching learning process. It showed that there was improvement of the students’ participation from meeting 1 to meeting 2, but it had not achieved the objective the success criteria of the research that was 70%. In addition, the result of the writing test in the first cycle had not achieved the success criteria of the research that was 65% of the students got ≥ 70 in the writing test. The percentage of the students who got score ≥ 70 was only 58.06% or 18 students of 31 students. Based on the results of the first cycle above, the second cycle was necessary to be conducted. Some revisions had been made to solve the problems found in the first cycle. The classroom observation and writing test in the second cycle showed an improvement. In the classroom observation, the students’ participation showed that 77.42% in meeting 1 and 87.10% in meeting 2 of the students who actively participated in the teaching learning process. It could be said, the results of the observation in meeting 1 and meeting 2 had achieved the success criteria of the research. Meanwhile, the percentage of the writing test of the students who got score ≥ 70 in the second cycle was 74.19% or 23 students of the total number of students. Based on those results, it could be concluded that the actions in the second cycle were successful because the results of classroom observation and writing test achieved the success criteria of the research. Finally, it was concluded that the use of clustering technique could improve the XI IPA 3 students’ writing achievement and their participation in the teaching learning process of writing a narrative text at SMAN 1 Paiton. Therefore, the English teacher was suggested to use clustering technique as an alternative technique in teaching writing not only for narrative text but also other genres of text. The students are suggested to practice writing by using clustering technique to make it easier for them in constructing writing especially narrative text. For the future researchers who have similar problems with writing are suggested to use clustering technique in the teaching learning process by conducting the same design in different school and different text types such as recount, analytical and hortatory exposition.