IMPROVING THE EIGHTH GRADE STUDENTS’ ACTIVE PARTICIPATION AND THEIR DESCRIPTIVE TEXT WRITING ACHIEVEMENT BY USING INDIVIDUAL PICTURES AT SMPN 7 PROBOLINGGO

Abstract

English as a global language is used in countries throughout the world, including Indonesia. In Indonesia, English is considered as the first foreign language that must be learnt by students beginning from Elementary School, up to University level. Considering that English is a global language, the students have to master the four language skills of English and the three language components. As an international language, English is used by most people around the world to express their ideas, thoughts and desire in spoken or in written form. The problem in this research concerned in students’ writing on the eighth grade of SMPN 7 Probolinggo that found from preliminary study by interview the English teacher. This classroom action research was intended to improve the eighth grade students’ active participation and their descriptive text writing achievement by using individual pictures at SMPN 7 Probolinggo in 2014/2015 academic year. The reason of using individual pictures was the students would focus on the materials that were taught. Based on the preliminary study that was held on 16th August 2014, the VIII E students of SMPN 7 Probolinggo faced some difficulties in mastering English, especially on writing. In addition, it was also supported by observation that had been conducted at August 18th 2014. The students were passive and they seemed less enthusiastic. This was proven by their English scores which showed that only 8 students of 25 students of class VIII E got 75 or higher and the mean score was 71.44. Whereas, the minimum requirement standard score of English at SMPN 7 Probolinggo is 75. Further, based on the xv observation, only a few students were enthusiastic in the teaching learning process. This research was done collaboratively with the English teacher of class VIII of SMPN 7 Probolinggo. It was conducted in class VIII E that consisted of 25 students. The observation of the students’ active participation, interview, documentation, and the writing test were the methods that were used in collecting the data. The descriptive qualitative analysis was used to analyze the data gathered from interview, observation, and documentation. The result of writing test in the form of the students’ score of writing test would be analyzed quantitatively. The action was implemented in two cycles in order to achieve the goal of this classroom action research. Each cycle was done in three meetings. The results of the students’ active participation in meeting I showed that 50% out of 24 students and 70.83% out of 24 students. It did not achieve the target of the research that was 75%. But in the second cycle it achieved the target. The percentage of students’ active participation was 83.33% out of 24 students in meeting I and 91.66% out of students in meeting II. Besides, the result of the writing test in Cycle 1 also did not achieve the target of the research whereas 75% of the students got 75 or higher in the writing test. The percentage of the students who got score 75 was 62.5%. It improved in the second cycle become 87.5%. There were some factors that influenced the students failed in the first cycle. The problems were the students still confused to write descriptive text, size of picture was small, and the students were still shy to discuss their work. to overcome those problems, the researcher gave some more explanation about descriptive text, prepare the picture bigger (in form of A3), giving them some verbal and nonverbal reinforcement. In summary, it could be concluded that the use of individual pictures could improve the students’ active participation and their descriptive text writing achievement in teaching learning process of writing at SMPN 7 Probolinggo.