USING PICTURES TO IMPROVE WRITING
A DESCRIPTIVE TEXT
A RESEARCH ARTICLE
By:
HERKULANUS AKIM
NIM F1021131095
ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM LANGUAGES AND ARTS EDUCATION DEPARTMENT
TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATION FACULTY TANJUNGPURA UNIVERSITY
1
USING PICTURES TO IMPROVE WRITING
A DESCRIPTIVE TEXT
Herkulanus Akim, Albert Rufinus, Yanti Sri Rezeki
English Education Study Program FKIP Untan Pontianak Email: Herkulanus.hh@gmail.com
Abstract
The purpose of this thesis was to improve students’ descriptive text writing by using pictures of grade 10A of SMAN 1 Kayan Hulu in the academic year 2016/ 2017. From the pre-observation interview, the writer found that the students had problems in using present tense and in differentiating the generic structure of descriptive text. Then, most of them lacked imagination and felt difficult to transfer their thoughts onto writing. This research was conducted through Classroom Action Research in two cycles. The participants of this research were 32 students in class 10A. The writer used measurement and observation technique to collect the data. He found that the students still had some problems of their writing in the first cycle, including generic structure, simple present tense, and the media used. To solve the students’ problem, the teacher decided to give more explanation about the use of simple present tense and generic structure of descriptive text, the teacher also asked the students to bring a dictionary in order to help the students in constructing a sentence. As a result in the second cycle,the students could write a descriptive text with good grammar and organization. In the first cycle, the students’ mean score was 59.68, it increased to 73.59 in the second cycle. In conclusion, the use of pictures improved the students’ writing of descriptive text.
Keywords: Descriptive Text Writing, Pictures, Classroom Action Research
Writing is one of English language skills to express or to transfer thoughts and feelings. As Harmer (2004) stated, writing is a form of communication to deliver thought or to express feeling through written form. Therefore, it is important for students who study a language to learn writing in order to help them communicate in the written form.
In senior high school, writing is learning the types of texts including descriptive text. Based on Competency Standard – Standar Kompetensi (SK) and Basic Competency - Kompetensi Dasar (KD) Depdiknas (2006) the first grade students in high school are expected to be able to express meaningful ideas in terms of functional text and create short story in the form of descriptive text to interact each other or people in their nearest environment. Based on the observation on the tenth grade students of SMAN 1 Kayan Hulu,
an English teacher stated that many students have problems and difficulties in writing a descriptive text. The teacher said that the students often made mistakes in using present tense and in differentiating the generic structure of descriptive text Then most of them lacked imagination and felt difficult to transfer their thoughts onto writing. Consequently, the students often made mistakes when they write a descriptive text.
2 Brown (2001, p. 335) “ Written products as
the result of thinking, drafting, and revising procedures that require specialized skills, skills that not every speaker develops naturally.” That statement shows that writing is not a simple and instant process. Therefore, to be able to write something good, students must do a lot of practices. It is done to get them used to write anything in the well-ordered steps. There are six steps of creating written work. There are drafting, structuring, reviewing, focusing, generating ideas and evaluation. As a conclusion, writing is a productive skill that must be mastered by the students who learning English as a foreign language that involved the process of thinking, drafting, and revising.
Descriptive text is one of writing skills that should be learned by senior high school students. Based on Competency Standard – Standar Kompetensi (SK) and Basic Competency - Kompetensi Dasar (KD) (Depdiknas, 2006) the first grade students in high school are expected to be able to express meaningful ideas in terms of functional text and create short story in the form of
descriptive text to interact each other or people in their nearest environment. Descriptive text is one of the ways to tell about something by giving more details so we can visualize what it actually looks, what its taste, and etc through our senses.
According to Mukarto (2007), descriptive text is a kind of text to describe something, someone or place. Descriptive text has two main parts, they are identification and description. The structure of a text is called the generic structure.
It can be assumed that each kind of descriptive text writing has different purposes and a suitable descriptive detail can strengthen the main idea. Dietsh (2003, p. 139) states “A successful description has a purpose: giving details to the thesis or the point of the description so the reader will catch the message”.
The purpose of descriptive text is to describe and reveal a particular person, place, or thing. Then Dietsh (2003, p. 143) mentions that, however, another source divides several purposes of description, and it can be seen as follows:
Table 1. The Purposes of Descriptive Text
Purpose Description
To entertain An amusing description of a Teenager’s bedroom To express feelings A description of your favorite outdoor retreat so your
reader understands why you enjoy it so much
To relate experience A description of your childhood home to convey a sense of the poverty you grew up in
To inform (for the reader unfamiliar with the subject)
A description of a newborn calf for a reader who has never seen one
To inform (to create a fresh appreciation for the familiar)
A description of an apple to help the reader rediscover the joys of this simple fruit
To persuade (to convince the reader that some music videos degrade women)
A description of a degrading music video
Descriptive text often uses 'be' and 'have'. Tense which is often used is Simple Present Tense. However, sometimes it uses Past tense if the thing to be described does not exist anymore. According to Hammond (1992) Significant grammatical features of descriptive text, they are: 1.Focus on specific participant (My English teacher, Andini’s cat,
3 thick fur); 6. Use of action verbs 'Material
Processes' (It eats grass, It runs fast); 7. Use of adverbials to give additional information about behavior (fast, at tree house); 8. Use of Figurative language (John is as white as chalk.)
In teaching English, the teacher’s creativity is very important. A verbal presentation all the time in the classroom will not be effective. Monotonous activities in teaching make students feel bored and their attention will decrease. Therefore, any media is very helpful to support the teaching-learning process. It can be used to enhance student interest and it will help to improve the retention of material given. Media is a communication channel, which refers to anything that carries information from the source of information to the receiver of information, for instance text, images, video, television, and books Sutrisno (2011).
Giles and Baggett (2008, p. 45) view, “Using computer presentation programs, such as Microsoft PowerPoint, allows teachers to include charts, clip art, photographs, sounds or video segments to demonstrate concepts”. In addition, Asyhar (2011, p. 45) “PowerPoint Presentation is a kind of multimedia presentation that consists of text, graphics, pictures, sound and video which can be used to convey the material in teaching and learning process.” It means that PowerPoint presentation is the use of some media types into an integrated application or presentation to deliver the material in teaching and learning process.
According to Sriyanto (2009) there are some advantages of the use of PowerPoint Presentation, they are: 1) Presentation will be more interesting because there are colors, fonts and animations, both animated text and animated images. 2) Stimulate students to learn more information about the teaching materials presented. 3) The students comprehend the information better visually.4) Teachers do not need to talk a lot in explaining the teaching materials that are being presented. 5) The materials can be printed as needed. 6) Data can be stored in the form CD or flash, so it can be taken everywhere. The
writer believes that PowerPoint Presentation can make the process of teaching and learning in the classroom more enjoyable and students’ comprehension. Media are means of communication and source of information that can be in various forms. Arsyad (2009) stated that media is a learning source component which contains instructional subject in student’ environment that can stimulate them to the study. There are many types of media in teaching and learning, one of them is a picture. Pictures are a sketch of object(s) visualized in a surface of paper, board, wall, etc. In teaching media, it belongs to visual aid. Wright (1989) stated that picture as media is able to motivate students, to make the subject they are dealing with clearer, and to illustrate the general idea and forms of an object or action which are particular to a culture. Pictures are a photographic or a hand-drawing object. Pictures are most often used by teachers for some reason, for instance, easy to get; simple to use and interesting Wright (1989). Then the characteristic of pictures itself is raising the students’ motivation and focusing their attention on the materials. It can be used as an educational media and it has a value which enables students to study effectively. Pictures contribute to teaching language. Emphasizing in teaching writing, pictures can be stimulation for gaining the idea. Some things in the picture can build students’ vocabulary mastery by mentioning some objects. The vocabularies can help students to construct the paragraph to write. There are variety of activities that can be created by using pictures.
4 the statement of Akbari (2008) that picture can
motivate students and nowadays, motivation is found to be an important factor in learning everything. Pictures are also contextual in which a teacher can draw certain situation on them. Pictures bring the outside world into the classroom in a concrete way. They can improve students’ stimulus because after observing the picture, the students will immediately need the vocabularies, idiom, and sentence structures to discuss or to explain what they see. In addition, Wright (1989, p. 17) stated that there are some roles of pictures in writing, as follows: 1) Pictures motivate the students and make them want to pay attention. 2) Pictures contribute to the context in which the language is being used. They bring the world into the classroom. 3) Pictures can be described in an objective way or interpreted or responded to subjectively. 4) Pictures can cue responses to question or cue substitutions through controlled practice. 5) Pictures can stimulate and provide information to be referred to in conversation, discussion, and storytelling.
From the explanation above, it can be assumed that the role of pictures is really essential in teaching English. It concludes that the role of using picture is quite appropriate in teaching writing. The consideration of the use of picture media is because the students are interested in new things which can encourage their motivation to learn about it. They also can enrich their imagination by seeing picture on the slide. Therefore, they can get many ideas in starting to write by imagining the pictures that have been given by the teacher. Hopefully, they might easily to write down their ideas onto a paper.
Teaching writing is necessary for teachers to prepare interesting strategy because in writing there are complex skills that students must be learned. Teaching writing by using picture media that showed in PowerPoint slide is a good strategy to encourage student motivation to learn. It is effective to prevent students’ bored while teaching and learning process. It is creating a new various activity than a monotonous strategy such as using textbook all the time. In
this case the writer will teach the students through picture media in PowerPoint presentation. The writer believes by using pictures as the media, students’ problems in writing a descriptive text will be solved. Reiser and Walter (1996) stated that media are often used to help to present this instruction activity. Therefore, the students’ imagination will be improved and they can explore their idea to put them in form of writing.
Media or visual aids also play an important role in teaching and learning process. The use of media facilities the teacher and students to reach the goal of the study. According to Wright (1976) there are many media and styles of visual presentation which are useful to the language learner. There is no general rule to indicate which medium and which visual styles are appropriate to choose at any one time. The choice is divided by three things as follows: a) The age, interest, type of intelligence and experience of the learner b) The physical circumstances of the classroom c) The cost and convenience of the materials available.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
This study was conducted through Classroom Action Research. Technically, an action research should be taken in the class during the teaching and learning process. Pelton (2010, p. 5) stated that “Action research is best seen as a way you approach your work in the classroom and school setting”. Think of it as a mindset for teaching, it is a powerful mindset for teaching because it emphasizes the role as a reflective practitioner who is continually observant, thoughtful, and willing to examine personal actions in the light of the best possible practices for the students. So that an action research is well known as the way how the writers do the best action in form of playing a teacher model as creative as well.
5 Furthermore, in the process of writing
descriptive text through pictures in PowerPoint presentation, the writer designed procedures in implementing it as following:
Planning in constructing observation checklist, field note, and speaking assessment rubric, and also in trying out the teacher to use pictures as the media in teaching descriptive text.
Acting
The teacher followed the lesson plan to teach descriptive text writing by using pictures as the media. Firstly, the teacher explained to the students about a descriptive text including definition, social function, generic structure, and grammatical features. Secondly, the teacher gave an explanation how to use present tense in writing descriptive text. Thirdly, the teacher presented the students an example of descriptive text with its pictures. The teacher gave brief explanation.Then, the students learned how to construct a descriptive text by using pictures had prepared by the teacher. Finally, the teacher showed the students pictures followed by list of vocabularies and asked the students to write a descriptive text of the pictures that had been displayed on LCD projector. Students followed the instruction that stated above the pictures.
Observing
The writer worked together with the teacher to collect the data. The writer wrote the classroom situation while teaching-learning processed, pre-activity, whilst-activity, and post-activity in the field note, then the writer gave the comment on the teaching-learning process that had been done. Afterwards, the teacher and the writer discussed the final result of the observation together as a consideration to prepare a better plan in teaching for the next cycle.
Reflecting
The writer and the teacher had discussed the result of the observation phrase, therefore the writer got important feedback because it was needed to re-planning the next action. It also helped the writer to revise the planning such as changing or adding certain action to create a better process of teaching and learning.
Technique of Data Collection
In collecting the data, it is important to choose an appropriate technique. In this case, the writer used measurement technique and observation technique. The measurement technique aimed to collect the data by administrating a written task to measure the students’ ability in descriptive text writing. While the observation technique was applied to record and collect the data from the subject research. It measured the students’ feedback toward the teacher’ action in writing.
Tools of Data Collection
Tools of data collection of this study are: Observation checklist table
It aimed to observe what is happening in the classroom during teaching learning process including the students, the role of writer, it took during the teaching and learning process while the treatment is applied. It aimed to know the progress and to find out the weaknesses of the action in every single meeting (see Appendix B-1 and B-2 on pages 58-61).
Students’ Task
It included a written test that related to the students’ writing in descriptive text. It aimed to check the students’ improvement in writing descriptive text by using pictures in power point presentation. (pages 75 and 84) Photograph
6 descriptive text writing using pictures. In line
with that, this could be kept as the evidence that this research was truly conducted.
Data Analysis
To analyze the students’ descriptive text writing during the teaching-learning process, the writer did a data analysis. In order to investigate the improvement the students’ descriptive text writing in the classroom, the writer described the result of the data from the observation checklist and field note. In other words, to know the result of the students’ writing after the writer used pictures in power point presentation by asking the students to write a descriptive text based on the pictures that displayed on LCD Projector. The writer used the ESL composition scoring guide to assess the students’ writing (see pages 39 and 46).
Students’ individual score
Note:
To compute the class performances, the writer used the formula of mean score. All students score summed and divided by a number of the students in the class. The formula is taken from Heaton (1988, p. 169)
𝐌 ∑ 𝒙𝑵 ...(2)
Notes:
M = the students’ average score Ʃx = the sum of students score N = the number of students
To classify the data, the writer provides the table as follows:
Table 2. Data Classification (adopted from J.B Heaton, 1988)
Mean Score Qualification 80 – 100 good to excellent
60 – 79 Average to good 50 – 59 poor to average
0 - 49 poor
RESEARCH FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
Research Findings
The first cycle of this research was conducted on May 29th, 2017. It has four stages. They are planning, acting, observing and reflecting.
Planning Stage
In this stage, the writer collaborated with the teacher to prepare the lesson plan, media, observation checklist, field notes and hand out for the students. The pictures were about describing a person. He planned to use an LCD projector in teaching descriptive text writing.
Acting Stage
In acting stage, the writer conducted a research of teaching writing of descriptive text through pictures. The teacher applied the lesson plan and media which were prepared by the writer in the planning stage. In this stage, the teacher taught descriptive text writing through pictures, while the writer recorded all activities which happened in teaching and learning process by using observation checklist table and field note, and camera which were prepared in the planning stage.
There were some steps of teaching and learning activity during apply pictures as the learning media. Firstly, the teacher started the class by greeting the students and then asked one of them to lead the class to pray. After that, the teacher invited the students to do brainstorming by showing them some pictures of famous people by using LCD projector. Then, the teacher asked the student to mention the name of the person who was displayed on LCD projector. Those pictures brought the students’ attention to the specific topic of a X: Students’ individual score
TI: Content T4: Vocabulary T2: Organization T5: Mechanics T3: Grammar
7 descriptive text. Secondly, the teacher
showed an example of an actor picture. Then the teacher asked the students to guess who the picture is. Then, after one of them mentioned the name of the actor, the teacher invited the students to describe the actor who had been displayed on LCD projector. Then, the teacher explained the definition, social function, generic structures and language features (simple present tense) of descriptive text. The students paid attention to teacher’s explanation, they also took notes of those explanations. Afterwards, the teacher presented an example of descriptive text with its pictures.
After that, the teacher explained the correlation among the pictures and the text. The teacher mentioned that those pictures were prepared to help them to build their ideas in writing descriptive text. Then the teacher pointed that the first paragraph referred to the identification and the second and the third paragraph referred to the description. The teacher also explained what aspects which are contained in identification and description. Most of the students paid attention to those explanations. Some of them asked some questions related to teacher’s explanations: how to differentiate the generic structure of descriptive text? ; what the character of descriptive text?; then, the teacher answered their question clearly. After explaining the material, the teacher asked the students to write a descriptive text based on the pictures with helpful vocabularies given. It can be seen in appendix C-1 (p.76). After the students did the exercise, the teacher asked their difficulties in writing and understanding the pictures. Some students told their difficulties that they still felt confuse in differentiating the generic structure and many of them lacked vocabulary, then the teacher gave them
feedback by giving more explanation and asked the students to bring dictionary next activities which happened in teaching and learning including the lesson plan, teaching material, teaching media, the teacher’s performance and students’ responds. The teacher and the writer found that some students gave positive responses during teaching and learning process. For example, the students paid their attention to the teacher explanation. Some of them participated actively but most of them still did not follow the activities well; consequently, their writing were unsatisfactory. The students’ score could not reach the KKM of English subject. They had low score because they did not understand how to differentiate the generic structure of descriptive text. Most of them were still confused in using present tense and lacked vocabulary in writing descriptive text. Then, time allocation was not organized well in Modelling and Deconstructing the text and in joint construction of the text. The teacher took much time in explaining the material of vocabulary and present tense because the LCD Projector did not work properly. Many students still felt confused in understanding the teaching materials.
Furthermore, the teacher and the writer assessed students’ writing based on some criteria. They are organization (the generic structures), grammar (simple present tense), vocabulary and mechanics (spelling, punctuation, and spelling) of descriptive text. The result of the students’ writing can be seen on the following table:
Table 3. The Result of Students’ Writing in Cycle 1
No
Students’ Code
Criteria
Score
Content Organization Grammar Vocabulary Mechanics
1 AD 15 10 10 15 10 60
8
3 AGP 12 8 6 10 9 45
4 AGT 15 10 6 11 8 50
5 BS 18 15 12 15 15 75
6 DK 15 15 10 15 15 70
7 GN 10 8 5 10 7 40
8 IL 15 13 10 16 16 70
9 JH 14 12 8 16 15 65
10 JL 18 12 14 14 12 70
11 JLK 13 8 4 10 10 45
12 LD 12 10 8 16 14 60
13 LI 14 10 8 12 11 55
14 MMA 12 12 6 10 10 50
15 MMI 14 10 10 13 13 60
16 MNZ 16 14 12 15 13 70
17 MRA 18 17 15 18 17 85
18 NA 15 10 8 12 10 55
19 ND 15 10 15 15 10 65
20 NI 8 5 2 8 7 30
21 NL 10 10 8 12 10 50
22 OA 14 12 10 16 18 70
23 ODS 12 10 8 15 15 60
24 PT 10 8 4 10 8 40
25 RM 18 16 16 16 14 80
26 RS 15 15 10 12 13 65
27 SP 14 16 8 15 12 65
28 VDK 15 15 6 14 10 60
29 WJ 10 15 10 15 15 65
30 YA 10 10 10 10 10 50
31 YIB 16 15 10 17 12 70
32 YP 10 15 4 8 8 45
Total 1910
Mean 59.68
Note: M = The students average score
∑𝐱 = The sum of students score
N = the number of students
The result of individual students’ score showed that from 32 students averagely 6.25% students (whose scores were 80-100) were qualified as good to excellent. 53.12% students (whose scores 60-79) were qualified as average to good. 18.75% students (whose score 50-59) were qualified as poor to average
and 15.62% students (whose scores were under 50) were qualified as poor. Then the sum of students’ score was divided by the number of students to obtain the mean score. It was 59.68 and this was qualified as average to good.
More than 50% of the 32 students whose score were under the minimum level of 70 had difficulties in working with their writing tasks, It was difficult for them to start writing with
𝐌 =
∑𝐱
𝐍
𝐌 =
𝟏𝟗𝟏𝟎
𝟑𝟐
9 identification and developing their ideas into
clear description. They could not describe real details of an object. Then, the main problem was that the students still confuse in using simple present tense in writing a descriptive text. Some of them were good in divide identification and description, but they could not write a sentence grammatically. Therefore most students were making some mistakes in building a sentence. Besides, some students could not describe the pictures properly because they were lack of vocabulary consequently they often made mistakes in vocabulary and mechanics of descriptive text.
Reflecting Stage
This step began after finding the result of previous stages (planning, acting, and observing) that were conducted by the teacher and the writer. The reflection covered the entire process of the first cycle. At this stage, the teacher was helped by the writer to explore what she had done and what the effects of the actions were used to decide what actions were conducted in the next cycle, after knowing the result of action stage was not unsatisfying to fulfill the indicators of success. Both the teacher and the writer decided to continue the action to the next cycle. Moreover, after doing the reflection, the teacher had some ideas for the next cycle. 1) The teacher should make the class ready to start the learning process. Then, it is necessary to check the teaching media such as LCD projector, to make sure all stuff work properly. 2) The teacher should consider about the time to teach the material of descriptive. Avoid taking much time to translate the meaning words by words. Teaching vocabulary should be by asking the students to predict the vocabulary through pictures. 3) The students still made many mistakes in using present tense. 4) The teacher should manage time well in giving the instructions to the students while showing pictures as the media in writing descriptive text. 5) All students should bring dictionary in the next meeting in order to help them find some difficult words.
Referring to the reflection of the first cycle, the teacher and the writer discussed new
plans for cycle 2. The second cycle of this research was conducted on May 29th, 2017. This cycle also has four stages, they are:
Planning Stage
In this stage, the writer also collaborated with the teacher prepared the lesson plan, media, observation checklist, field notes and hand out for the students. The pictures were about describing an animal. The teacher planned to use LCD projector in teaching descriptive text writing. Besides the soft file, the teacher and the writer also prepared the printout of the material. Referring to the reflection of the first cycle, the teacher and the writer discussed new plans for cycle 2. The teacher and the writer planned to apply a new strategy to increase the students’ understanding in writing descriptive text because the first cycle there were many students that cannot write well.
Acting Stage
In this stage, the writer conducted a research of teaching writing of descriptive text through pictures. The teacher applied the lesson plan and media which were prepared by the writer in the planning stage. In this stage, the teacher taught descriptive text about describing an animal. Materials of descriptive text were displayed on LCD projector, the teacher also gave each the students a paper of the material. While the writer recorded all activities which happened in teaching and learning process by using observation checklist table and field note, and camera which prepared in the planning stage.
10 (pet). Then the teacher asked the students to
mention how the picture looks like. Then the teacher asked the students “do you have any pet in your house?” the students answered enthusiastically. After that the teacher asked some students about kind of pet they have. Afterwards, the teacher explained the definition, social function, generic structures and language features (simple present tense) of descriptive text. In this cycle the teacher explained more about the generic structure of descriptive text and she also gave more explanation about present tense, because in the first cycle still many students could not differentiate the generic structure of descriptive text. Then, they were difficult to build a sentence in present tense form. While the teacher explained the material, the students paid attention to teacher’s explanation, they also took notes of those explanations. Furthermore, the teacher presented an example of descriptive text about describing an animal.
The teacher asked the student to read the text together, after that she let the student to ask referring to the text had been displayed. Then, some students asked several questions related to teacher’s explanations after that, the teacher answered their question clearly. After explaining the material, the teacher asked the students to write a descriptive text based on pictures with helpful vocabularies given. It can be seen in appendix C-2 (p.85). After the students did the exercise, the teacher asked
their difficulties in writing and understanding the pictures. Some students told their difficulties and then the teacher gave them feedback by giving more explanation.
Observing Stage
In this cycle, the teacher and the writer observed the result of planning and acting stages. They also observed whole activities which happened in teaching and learning including the lesson plan, teaching material, teaching media, the teacher’s performance and students’ responds. The teacher and the writer found that some students gave positive responses during teaching and learning process. Most of them participated actively, therefore there was an improvement in this cycle. The students writing was satisfactory. The students’ score could reach the standard of success point. Many students got high scores, they were able to evaluate the generic structure of descriptive text in term of differentiating identification and description, but, the teacher and the writer also found that some students were still weak in using simple present tense.
Furthermore, the teacher and the writer assessed students’ writing based on some criteria. They are organization (the generic structures), grammar (simple present tense and agreement), vocabulary and mechanics (spelling, punctuation, and spelling) of descriptive text. The result of the students’ writing can be seen on the following table:
Table 4.The Result of Students’ Writing in Cycle 2
No
Students’ Code
Criteria
Score
Content Organization Grammar Vocabulary Mechanics
1 AD 18 16 14 16 16 80
2 AGN 20 18 16 18 18 90
3 AGP 16 15 10 14 10 65
4 AGT 16 14 10 15 15 70
5 BS 20 18 17 20 20 95
6 DK 20 14 12 20 14 85
7 GN 14 12 10 14 10 60
8 IL 20 14 10 16 20 80
11
10 JL 18 15 14 15 18 80
11 JLK 15 13 10 12 15 65
12 LD 18 15 12 12 18 75
13 LI 14 14 12 16 14 70
14 MMA 16 14 10 15 15 70
15 MMI 20 12 10 18 15 75
16 MNZ 20 15 15 15 15 85
17 MRA 20 20 17 20 18 95
18 NA 15 15 10 15 10 65
19 ND 18 20 12 15 20 85
20 NI 15 15 10 10 15 60
21 NL 16 19 10 10 10 65
22 OA 18 18 10 18 16 80
23 ODS 10 20 10 10 10 60
24 PT 8 10 6 17 14 55
25 RM 20 20 15 20 20 95
26 RS 20 20 12 15 13 80
27 SP 14 20 8 14 9 65
28 VDK 10 15 6 14 10 55
29 WJ 13 18 12 12 20 75
30 YA 10 15 6 12 12 55
31 YIB 18 18 14 14 16 80
32 YP 15 20 10 10 10 65
Total 2355
Mean 73.59
Note: M = The students average score
∑𝐱 = The sum of students score
N = the number of students
The result of individual students’ score showed that from 32 students averagely 40.62% students (whose scores were 80-100) were qualified as good to excellent. Then, just the same as the first cycle, 50% students (whose scores 60-79) were qualified as average to good. 9.37% students (whose score 50-59) were qualified as poor to average and 0% students (whose scores were under 50) were qualified as poor. Then the sum of students’ score was divided by the number of students to obtain the mean score. It was 73.59 and this was qualified as average to good. There were 20 students of the 32 students who reached the standard score of English subject.
Reflecting Stage
This step began after finding the result of previous stages (planning, acting, and observing) that were conducted by the teacher and the writer. The reflection covered the entire process of the second cycle. At this stage, the teacher was helped by the writer to explore what she had done and what the effects of the actions. After combining the results of observation checklist, field notes and students’ score of writing, the writer found that the students’ descriptive text writing in second cycle was better than the first cycle. Students’ mean score in the first cycle was 59.68 but in the second cycle the
𝐌 =
∑𝐱
𝐍
𝐌 =
𝟐𝟑𝟓𝟓
𝟑𝟐
12 students’ mean score was 73.59. It meant that
their writing was improved. All of their problems in writing recount text were solved. As a result, the writer concluded that the second cycle of this research was successful.
Discussions
This classroom action research was conducted in two cycles. Each cycle consist of planning stage, acting stage, observing stage, and reflecting stage. The acting stage was conducted in one meeting (2 x 45 minutes) that was performed during the teaching-learning process.
In the first cycle of this research, the writer found the students’ writing of recount text were still poor. It was because of some problems. Firstly, the teaching media to teach descriptive text did not work properly such as LCD projector and the energy sources. Consequently, the material was not delivered as well. Secondly, in explaining the material, the teacher did not focus on the students’ problems such as, the generic structure of descriptive text and the use of present tense. Then, the pictures given in the students’ task were not appropriate, because the teacher and the writer did not prepare the printout too. Therefore, the students could not work effectively in doing the task. Afterwards, the students could not understand the instruction well. Consequently, the students got confused in understanding the pictures and expressing their ideas. It showed by their writing mean scores. Their mean score was 59.68 which is categorized as poor. The last problem was the students never used pictures that displayed on LCD projector before. Therefore, some of them were still confused in understanding the material. It showed by their respond during teaching and learning process. Most of them did not participate actively. Based on the research findings in the first cycle, the teacher and collaborator decided to continue the action in the second cycle. To solve the students’ problem in the first cycle, they decided to give more explanation in the student problems, they are generic structure, simple present tense and the media itself. Then the teacher told the students to bring a
dictionary in order to help the students in building a sentence.
In the second cycle, the writer found the students’ writing of recount text were improved. It proved by their mean score which was 73.59. It was a good category. There was an explicit improvement in the second cycle. It meant, their problems in writing generic structures (identification and description) and the use of grammar (simple present) of descriptive text were solved. Their improvement also showed by their response in teaching and learning activity. Most of them participated actively. When the teacher gave the questions, most of them rose their hands to answer those questions. The research findings of this cycle were supported by the previous study conducted by Chairena (2007). Her research was an action research which is entitled The Use of Pictures to Teach Descriptive Text. As the result, she concluded that (1) in general, pictures can contribute greatly in student writing especially descriptive text writing; (2) using pictures in teaching writing is a good innovation since it stimulates the students’ interest in writing (3) the data shows that there is a significant improvement of the students’ writing ability after being taught by using pictures
In conclusion, the writing problems of the tenth grade students class A of SMAN 1 Kayan Hulu were solved by implementing pictures as the media to teach writing of descriptive text. As the result, the predictions of the action hypothesis of this research were accepted.
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION Conclusion
13 All their problems were solved. 2) Pictures
improved students’ descriptive text writing which is showed by the comparison of their mean score among the first and second cycle of this research. The students’ mean score in the first cycle was 59.68 which was poor categories; then, their mean score in the second cycle was 73.59 which qualifies as a good category 3) Students problems in writing generic structures (identification and description) and language features (simple present tense) of descriptive text were totally solved in the second cycle. It showed on the result of students’ writing in the second cycle which was good category. 4) Giving some helpful vocabularies below the pictures made the students easy in describing the pictures and building a sentence, therefore they could express their ideas in writing form by translating their imagination of that picture.
Suggestions
Based on the results of this research, the writer would like to provide some suggestions, they are: 1) The writer recommends that the teacher should use an interesting media to teach descriptive text writing such as picture. 2) The writer recommends that the teacher should use pictures with some helpful vocabularies as the media to teach descriptive text writing. 3) The writer recommends that pictures which were implemented in teaching writing of recount text should be about describing a person, an animal and thing that familiar for the students. 4) The writer recommends that pictures which are used in teaching descriptive text writing should give clear information to the students, therefore they can transfer their imagination in writing form correctly.
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