Improving the VIII Grade Students’ Descriptive Text Writing Achievement by Using Roundtable Technique at SMPN 1 Sumberasih-Probolinggo

Abstract

This research was focusing on improving the VIII grade students’ descriptive text writing achievement by using roundtable technique at SMPN 1 Sumberasih, Probolinggo. This class room action research was selected by the researcher because based on the result of the interview with the English teacher; it was known that the students faced difficulties in writing a descriptive text especially in developing the ideas, choosing appropriate words, using correct tenses, and using correct mechanics. Therefore, the researcher tried to use Roundatble technique to solve those problems because Roundtable technique is kind of cooperative learning that allows the students to take turn in generating ideas related to the topic of writing. It is useful for brainstorming, reviewing, and practicing a skill. This classroom action research was applied in 1 cycle. It consisted of Meeting 1 and Meeting 2 which consisted of teaching and learning process activities of descriptive text writing by using roundtable technique based on Lesson Plan 1 and 2. Then, it was continued by administering a writing test to measure the students’ descriptive text writing achievement. During the teaching and learning process, the researcher collaboratively with the English teacher also did an observation and collected the artifacts in the form of students’ group worksheet to know how roundtable technique helped the students in generating ideas and making outline to make a good descriptive text writing. After implementing roundtable technique in teaching descriptive text writing to the VIII grade students ant SMPN 1 Sumberasih, it was known that this technique could facilitate the students to generate ideas in writing a descriptive text such as writing the characteristics of their favorite English teacher as many as possible. Then, by using guided activities in the worksheet, the students could make an outline which helped them to organize the ideas by following the generic structure of descriptive text. Next step, they could make a draft based on the outline and check the grammatical errors. After revising the errors, they could make the final descriptive text. Thus, the result of descriptive text writing achievement test also showed that the students’ score were improved. Based on the analysis, it was known that 83,3% of the students could pass the passing grade. It means that 25 students of 30 students could get score at least 75 or more. Whereas before applying roundtable technique, there were only 11 students of 30 students (36,67%) that could get score at least 75 or more. Guided writing task in the discussion of roundtable technique could facilitate the students to produce many ideas relevant to the topic and help them make outline useful for writing a well organized descriptive text. In conclusion, Roundtable technique does not only make the students be able to work cooperatively well but also individually well.