G. Definition of Key Terms
4. Collaborative writing
grade of MTsN Kamang in which the students still struggling with basic structure, lack of vocabulary and how to develop and organize ideas appropriately.
reader that involves a continuous process from the design to the revision process. He says collaborative writing is done in three stages, namely prewriting, drafting, and revising.
In the prewriting stage, students find out ideas for topics that they will write and then design their writing. This process will develop students' ability to pour their ideas into writing. Here they can be divided into small groups to discuss. It will help them get ideas and feedback. After that they made drafts that will be revised. In this phase, they exchanged and read their draft. After they were swapping, they revise their friends‟ draft (revising). Here is the role of the teacher to give the basic rule in revising process, for example by determining what should be commented or revised.
This is in line with what is stated by Shih in Brown (2001), he said that the writing process consists of several steps. First teachers should help students to understand the process of writing, so that they can find the appropriate strategy.
Furthermore, learners are given enough time to write and revise their writing. Then, teacher should give opportunities to other learners to give feedback so that the students not only get feedback from teacher but also from their friends. Thus, students are expected to learn independently.
In this strategy, the evaluation is carried out by portfolio assessment to evaluate what learners learned during the writing process, and how the quality of the product, and whether the learner still needs to learn to write again. Evaluation conducted by peers and teachers continuously during the writing process. Ideally
learners learn to evaluate themselves through the evaluation of others obtained during the collaboration.
Collaborative writing is different from others group work in the writing class in that it encompasses every group member‟s effort and participation at every stage of writing process, from planning through composing to revising. It is the sharing of responsibility over the production of a single piece of work through the pooling of resources, negotiation, and decision making. Everyone has a part to play in the whole process of writing. Allen, at.al (1987) define collaborative writing as “collaborators producing a shared document, engaging in substantive interaction, shared decision- making power and responsibility for it”. In other words, collaborative writing focuses on the whole process of writing by sharing the ideas.
Collaborative writing is gaining prominence because it provides an alternative to the individualistic and competitive atmosphere of learning to a more cooperative method of learning to write (Bosley, 1993). It means that collaboration helps students to value peer‟s contribution to the group. Students can also get to know one another and learn from group members in a natural way and in a safe social environment.
Besides, Gokhale (1995) defines collaborative writing as a teaching method that involves students in a small group (at least 2 people) to reach a certain academic aim. Through discussion, change of idea, the students get more portions to directly involve in the process of studying and students are responsible for the smoothes of
studying process. Similarly, Saunder (2002) defines collaborative writing is two or more people sharing responsibility for producing a single document through mutual interactions, shared expertise, and joint decision-making throughout the writing process. From the definition above it can be stated that collaborative writing is working in small group to produce a text. It emphasizes four key concepts: sharing responsibility, mutual interaction, sharing resources, and decision-making power.
Saunders (2002) says collaborative writing is distinct from other collaborative activities, such as collaborative publishing, because peers are expected to interact and contribute throughout each of the following task. He outlines four components of collaborative writing: firstly, planning includes decisions about the audience, purpose, topic, ideas, and organization; secondly, composing involves drafting coherence text, monitoring, and making changes; thirdly, reviewing includes reading the completed draft and identifying areas that need revision; lastly, correcting entails proofreading and editing.
The benefit of collaborative writing is the social dynamic of group interaction.
Students can learn more about writing by talking and listening to each member of the groups. Multiple inputs from each member also produce a richer document and reduce errors (Ede and Lunsford, 1990). Furthermore, social relations are developed through meaningful and purposeful joint work. Students learn from each member‟s writing strengths and weaknesses because collaborators contribute knowledge and
share expertise and a variety of strategies in the writing process. They provide support for one another through difficult points in the writing process.
In addition, Donato (1994) says collaboration can increase the awareness of audience. There is built-in feedback from each member as they compose and revise the text together. Every member becomes an immediate audience while the text is being constructed. Therefore, collaboration can develop the students‟ cognitive ability and expand their language growth.
While using collaborative writing has valuable advantages, its uses also have the drawbacks. Ede and Lunsford (1990) say that sometimes individual may be unwilling to give up their ideas or they may feel disappointed when their ideas are rejected. A second drawback is that some members may shirk responsibility or fail to share responsibilities among the members. This may result in loss of personal satisfaction and creativity in those who work hard because of those who do not. A further problem with using collaborative writing stems from power struggles which can be detrimental to group cohesiveness. Domineering members who assume an authoritative role can intimidate and discourage other members from participating.
The theories about collaborative writing offer a main conclusion that Collaborative writing can stimulate the students to actively participate in writing and change the egocentric become awareness of there is a reader so that they pay more attention about the strategies to improve writing. The use of this strategy also can
help learners to write more easily because in writing process, they do it together to exchange information and give a response to fulfill their own needs.