IMPROVING THE STUDENTS’ RECOUNT TEXT WRITING ACHIEVEMENT BY USING SPIDERGRAM TECHNIQUE AT SMP NEGERI 2 TANGGUL

Abstract

Improving the Students’ Recount Text Writing Achievement by Using Spidergram Technique at SMP Negeri 2 Tanggul; Melinda Pratiwi, 100210401086; 2014; 73 pages; English Language Education Study Program, Language and Arts Department, The Faculty of Teacher Training and Education,, Jember University. Language as a means of communication takes an important role in our life. It helps human to communicate and understand each other. English is considered as an effective means of communication in social activities and became the most often used language in the world. Thus, English as international language is being taught in Indonesia from the seventh grade junior high schools up to the twelfth grade of senior high schools. There are four basic skills that being taught in learning English. They are listening, reading, speaking and writing skill. Writing is considered as the complex one among the other three skills of English. As one of the ways to communicate, writing is realized as a complex process that needs skill, practice, and some inspirations by the writer. In constructing a good piece of writing, the writer should pay attention on the aspects of writing such as vocabulary, organization, grammar, mechanic and content. Besides, a writer should consider the steps to create a good writing such as prewriting, drafting, editing and revising, also final work. If a writer ignores those writing aspects and steps, his/her writing may not be able to understand easily by the reader. Therefore, it has been a must for the English teacher to think about a certain technique or media to help his/her students able in constructing a good piece of writing. The English teacher may use a certain technique in the writing teaching and learning activity. It can help to arouse and gain the students’ interest in learning writing. If the students’ interest and willingness increase, they will enjoy the learning activity process and improve their writing achievement. In this case, Spidergram technique was chosen to help the students improve their participation in the learning activity and achievement in writing. It helps them in gathering, generating, and keeping their ideas about what to write better.

xii

The design of this research was Classroom Action Research. It was intended to improve the students’ recount text writing achievement by using Spidergram technique. This research subject was the students of VIII-D class at SMP Negeri 2 Tanggul in the 2013/2014 academic year. The improvement of the students’ active participation and their writing achievement was analyzed quantitatively. The writing achievement test to get the score of students’ writing achievement was used in this research to get the primary data, while observation was done to get the supporting data. This research was done out in two cycles. Each cycle was conducted in three meetings including the writing test. It covered four stages namely planning of the action, implementation of the action, observation and evaluation, and data analysis and reflection. Based on the writing achievement test, it was found that the percentage of the students who passed the target criteria in Cycle 1 was 40% or 14 of 35 students. It means that the students’ writing achievement score had not achieved the target criteria yet that was 60% students should get score > 60. Thus, the action was continued to the Cycle 2. In Cycle 2, the students’ writing score was 70.27% or 26 of 37 students. In other words, their writing achievement score increased from 40% in the Cycle 1 to 70.27% in the Cycle 2. It proved that the use of Spidergram technique could help the students to improve their score of writing achievement test. Furthermore, from the observation, it was found that the average percentage result of students’ active participation in the Cycle 1 was 54.05%. It had not achieved the target criteria of students’ active participation in this research that was 60%. Because of that, the observation was continued to the Cycle 2. In Cycle 2, it showed that the average percentage result of students’ active participation increased from 54.05% in the Cycle 1 to 70.26% in the Cycle 2. Therefore, it can be said that the use of Spidergram technique could improve the students’ active participation in the teaching and learning process. Thus, it is suggested for English teacher to use this kind of technique as the variation in teaching activity and help improve his/her students’ achievement especially in writing.