F. Organization of the study
6. Concept of Narrative Text a. Definition of Narrative Text
20 l. Review
To provide public feedback on an artwork or event. The following is the generic structure:
a. Orientation: textual background information b. Interpretative recount: concluding statements
c. Evaluation: a synopsis of the artwork, including characters and plot.
d. Evaluative summary: the final judgment or punch line of the artwork being criticized.24
6. Concept of Narrative Text
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story includes a climax and resolution at the end. The narrative text then tells the story of fictional and non-fictional characters.
b. Purpose of Narrative Text
According to Pardiyon the main purpose of narrative text, according to the writer, is to tell a story, a life, to entertain and teach readers a moral lesson.27 It means that the purpose of the writer's narrative text is to tell a story and entertain the readers.
From the perspective of the readers, after reading the text, they will be entertained and have learned a moral lesson for their lives. If readers do not feel entertained or learn any moral lessons after reading the text, the story may not be well constructed or textually meaningful.28 It means that the goal of readers' narrative text is to entertain them while also teaching them moral lessons.
According to these explanations, the narrative serves two purposes.
The first is the purpose from the writer's perspective, and the second is the purpose from the readers' perspective. From the writer's perspective, he or she can tell or create a narrative story to entertain the readers. From the perspective of the readers, the story can both entertain and teach them moral lessons after they have read the text.
c. The Generic Structure of Narrative Text
According to Anderson, the elements of narrative text are composed of orientation, complication, event sequence, resolution, and coda. To be clear, the explanation as follow:
27 Pardiono, 40.
28 Pardiono.
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1) Orientation: This section informs the audience about who is in the story, when the story is taking place, and where the action is taking place, so it can be considered the story's introduction.
2) Complication: this section of the story in which the narrator describes something that will set off a chain of events. These events will have an impact on one or more of the characters. So this section is all about character development. On the other hand, this section demonstrates the story's problem.
3) Event Sequence: This section describes some of the events in the story.
4) Resolution: This section can be found in the previous story. The problem will be resolved here.
5) Coda offers a comment or moral based on what the reader has learned from the story.29
Based on the explanation above, it is possible to conclude that there are five generic narrative text structures: orientation, complication, event sequence, resolution, and coda.
d. The Language Features of Narrative Text
According to Gerot and Peter Wignell, the following language features are common in narratives:
1) Focus on specific and individualized participants with distinct identities. Mayor participants are either rare humans or animals with human characteristics.
29 Anderson, Text Types in English 2, 12.
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2) Application of material processes (behavioral and verbal processes)
3) Application of relational and mental processes.
4) Using time conjunctions and adverb of time.
Like: After, before and, between, once upon a time, one day,a long time ago, etc. The sequence of event is mirrored by the sequence of clauses, and as reader understand these follow one another in time.
5) Using the past tense
Example : He lived in there five years ago.
6) Using action verb.
An action verb is a verb that expresses an action, such as Linda eats an apple today or I work very hard in this office.
When using action verbs, the sentence structure will be subject + action verb + object or component. The following is an example of an action verb sentence: My brother kicks the ball (kick is an action verb that describes what my brother is doing).30 7. Students’َّDifficulties
Higa’s nation in Hadler states warns of the dangers of circular argumentation when assuming the existence of abstract concepts such as difficulty.31 Difficulties are relative concepts with both objective and subjective validity. It is also a comparative concept in the sense that a starting point and a goal are indicated, as well as unstated comparisons.
30 Gerot, Making Sense of Functional Grammar, 162.
31 Hadler, English Language Learning Difficulty in Hongkong School, 45.
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When asked to describe difficulty, a student or teacher might express difficulty in terms of the amount of work necessary to finish a task.
Meanwhile, Cronbach in Levine views difficulty as anxiety, which expresses motivation to avoid psychological failure. It implies that difficulty is a bad situation in which something difficult to do is stuck in our minds.
When students practice writing on paper, it is well known that they have difficulty.32 According to some of the above points of view, student difficulties indicate that students are unable to think or express what ideas they have in their minds.
8. Students’َّDifficultiesَّinَّWriting
According to Richard in Gharabally, learning to write well is a difficult, time-consuming process that causes anxiety and frustration in many students.33 In Solagna, Koutsoftas and Gray explained that the student frequently struggles with productivity, complexity, and grammar. It means that writing is a difficult task. Furthermore, writing is a productive skill that affects written communication, and it requires a good organization to produce meaningful sentences.34 The students will face some challenges in developing and building their imaginations. As a result, they should generate their ideas using the rules of written communication and then express them in a meaningfully written form.
32 Levine, Difficulties with Writing, Access on November20th 2022 from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/misunderstanding/experiences/writingexpza.html.
33 Gharabally, “The Writing Difficulties Faced by L2 Learners and How to Minimize Them, International Journal of English Language and Linguistics Research,” 67.
34 Solagha, Writing Difficulties in the Swedish ESL-Classroom, How Teachers of English Deal with Students‟ Writing Difficulties, 4.
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When discussing the term writing difficulties, Ericson in Husna mentioned writing words in corrected spelling. Due to their age, students who do not have the qualifications to write in the manner expected of them are referred to as having writing difficulties.35 It means that students must consider many factors when writing, such as grammar, spelling, punctuation, and vocabulary, and that students may experience difficulties forming letters or connecting their minds to writing; therefore, in order to create adequate compositions, students must consider every single detail.
The difficulties associated with writing As non-native speakers, students must remember many structural rules that differ from their native language.36 This means that accounting instructors who want to help students improve their writing face the most difficult challenge. They recognize a problem intuitively but lack the technical vocabulary to describe it to the students. Structural errors are the most difficult to grade because simple indications of the problem, such as circling or underlining the error, are insufficient feedback to help the students. Many students do not understand the relationship between logic and language.
According to Harmer, the students' reluctance to write stems from the fact that they rarely write in their native language, so the activity in the classroom feels strange to them.37 When given a writing assignment, L2 students are frequently overwhelmed. Even at the beginning, some students will struggle to get started. Because they are afraid of making mistakes,
35 Husna and Akhmad Multazim, “Students‟ Difficulties in Writing Recount Text at Inclusion Classes, Let: Linguistics, Literature and English Teaching Journal,” 45.
36 Husna and Akhmad Multazim, 57.
37 Harmer, How to Teach Writing, 2008, 61.
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some of them are uninterested in writing classes.38 Finally, some students believe they do not need to devote more time and effort to writing. There are times when process writing is simply not appropriate, whether because classroom time is limited, we want students to write quickly as part of a communication game, or we want them to compose a letter when working alone.
It can be inferred that when writing, students should pay attention to many detail points of writing in addition to grammar, spelling, punctuation, vocabulary, and other aspects of writing because they will encounter challenges that will make them confined in expressing the meaningful sentence.
9. Types of Students’َّDifficultiesَّinَّWritingَّ
When students are assigned to write a paragraph, they face a variety of general difficulties. According to Hasan and Marzuki, there are six common difficulties that students will face when writing a text: grammar, vocabulary, punctuation, spelling, coherence and cohesion, and relevance.
First and foremost, grammar.39 Grammar is necessary for competent language users, and students must remember the important grammar to apply in their writing. Grammar refers to the correct grammatical forms and syntactical patterns.
38 Gharabally, “The Writing Difficulties Faced by L2 Learners and How to Minimize Them, International Journal of English Language and Linguistics Research.”42.
39 Hasan and Marzuki, “An Analysis of Student Ability in Writing at Riau University Pekanbaru Indonesia. Theory and Practice in Language Studies.” Access on November20th 2022 from http://dx.doi.org/10.17507/tpls.0705.08
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The second is vocabulary. Vocabulary can be defined as a set of alphabets arranged in a dictionary consisting of one word that has a meaning, or more than one word or what is called a collection of words (phrases) which have their own meaning. Vocabulary is important in making the meaning of sentences clear and understandable and vocabulary is the main capital for learning sentence contruction and other skills in language. Mastering a lot vocabulary will make it easier for someone to Read, Write, Listen and speak English.
The third element is punctuation. Punctuation acts as a traffic signal, directing people where to go and where to stop. Fourth, there's spelling.
When one letter is misplaced or missing in a word, it creates a different meaning, which causes the readers to have a different understanding. The fifth characteristic is coherence and cohesion. Cohesion, on the other hand, is grammatical, indicating a formal syntactic link between sentences, and rhetorical, indicating a relationship between speech acts rather than forms.
Furthermore, coherence is concerned with the relationship between the in the sense that the meaning of a sentence, the meaning of sentences in a text, or an utterance in a discourse The sixth factor is relevance. In this context, relevance refers to the task's content. The content of the students' letters must be pertinent to the task at hand.40
Every learner faces a unique set of difficulties. The writer would use these numbers when grading students' narrative text, particularly in writing
40 Hasan and Marzuki.
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aspects, to indicate that students encountered difficulties. Harmer stated that there are five students' difficulties in written text, which are as follows:
a. Grammar
The description of a language's grammar explains how words can take on different forms and be put together to form sentences.
b. Vocabulary
Due to the word's dual meaning of synonym and antonym, vocabulary is a contributing factor in students' difficulties.
c. Handwriting
Many students have difficulty forming letters because the orthography of their native language differs greatly from that of English. Specialized instruction should be provided to students. The style of one's handwriting is a matter of preference. It shouldn't be expected of students to use a particular style.
d. Spelling
The fact that there isn't always a clear correlation between a word's pronunciation and its spelling is one of the reasons spelling is challenging for English students.
e. Punctuation and layout
In written communication formats like letters, reports, and publicity, different writing communities follow different punctuation and layout conventions. One or a few languages only use certain punctuation conventions, such as capitalizing names, months, and the pronoun "I."41
41 Harmer, The Practice of English Language Teaching, 255–256.
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Nasser classified the difficulties in writing composition into grammar, spelling, punctuation and handwriting there are:
a. Grammar
1) Misuse of tense
Tense refers to the passage of time. In English, there are six tenses: the present tense, the past tense, the future tense, the present perfect tense, the past perfect tense, and the future perfect tense. Each of these six tenses is divided into two forms:
simple and progressive.42 Misuse of tense occurs when you use the incorrect verb tense. The verb tense indicates to the reader whether the action is taking place in the past, present, or future.
2) Subject verb agreement
The general rule for subject-verb agreement is that singular subjects require singular verbs, and plural subjects require plural verbs. Our goal is to identify the subject so that we can determine whether the verb is singular or plural.43 It means that a singular number is used when a noun refers to an object. A plural number is a noun that represents more than one object. Singularity is indicated by adding "a" or "an" before the noun. When using a singular subject, use a singular verb.
42 Harmer, 255–256.
43 Royal, The Little Gold Grammar Book Mastering the Rules That Unlock the Power of Writing, 58.
30 3) Article
An article is used to distinguish certain nouns. English has three articles: a, an, and the. A and an are indefinite articles, while the is a definite article.44 They may accompany a singular or plural noun. Before a word begins with a vowel sound, each of the articles undergoes a change in pronunciation as well as spelling.
4) Word order
Although some languages, like English, rely more heavily on word order than others, word order is a grammatical signal in all languages. The terms "the man finished the job" and "the job finished the man," as well as "he died happily" and "he died happily," have very different meanings.45 Word order is the arrangement of the words in a phrase, clause, or sentence. Word order is the arrangement of words in a phrase, clause, or sentence. In English, the phrase "SVO" (subject, verb, object) is used.
5) Identifying sentence paterns
A sentence follows a formula, which we'll refer to as a sentence pattern. Consequently, a word arrangement based on the proper form or pattern is referred to as a sentence pattern.
The first pattern is the subject plus the action verb. Only the subject and verb slots are needed for this pattern. For instance,
44 Royal, 59.
45 Algeo, The Origins and Development of the English Language, 4.
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dogs bark. The second pattern is subject + action + verb + direct object. Transitive verbs are a type of verb. A transitive verb is followed by a direct object to receive an action from the subject.46
6) Type of sentence
Simple sentences, compound sentences, complex sentences, and compound-complex sentences are the different types of sentence structure. A simple sentence consists of one independent clause containing one subject and one verb. A compound sentence is made up of two or more independent clauses that are joined together to form a complete sentence. A complex sentence connects at least one independent clause to at least one dependent clause. There are at least two independent clauses and one dependent clause in a compound-complex sentence.47
b. Vocabulary
Students struggled with the vocabulary because the word has both synonim and antonym meanings. That is, vocabulary refers to the selection of words that are meaningful and appropriate in the context.48 Vocabulary is a collection of words that should be
46 Benjamin and Berger, Teaching Grammar Really What Works, Routledge:, 13.
47 Jacobs, English Grammar Rules & Mistakes: Learn Writing, Speaking, Literature and Punctuation Rules Complete with 10 Key Skills and Over 200 Common Error Examples, 80.
48 Harmer, The Practice of English Language Teaching, 255–56.
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learned in groups. Vocabulary is the content those are suitable the selection of words 49
c. Handwriting
Handwriting is our brains must activate motor skills as well as thought processing in order to put pen to paper and create a letter.
Handwriting problems are classified as follows: missing space, incorrectly written letters, letter style. Handwiriting is a way to express one's personality.50 The size, shape, and style of letters, as well as the spacing between words, all contribute to clear handwriting.
d. Spelling
The fact that there isn't always a clear correlation between a word's pronunciation and its spelling is one of the reasons spelling is challenging for English students. There are include in spelling:
1) Word spelling
Spelling is the correct way to write a word. It is imperative that you focus carefully on word spelling as a result. As an English-language writer, you must consistently spell words correctly.51 It is critical that you spell words correctly in order to convey the intended message.
2) Confusing sound and letter
49 Puspita Kirana, Basthomi, Fitriani, “A Corpus-Based Study of Vocabulary as Input in EFL Text-Book: A Case in an Indonesian Islamic College,” 93–104.
50 Montgomery, Spelling, Handwriting, and Dyslexia, 34.
51 Jacobs, 200 English Grammar Mistakes! A Workbook of Common Grammar and Punctuation Errors with Examples, Exercises and Solutions So You Never Make Them Again, 198.
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One of the reasons spelling is challenging for English language learners is that there isn't always a clear correlation between a word's pronunciation and its spelling.52 English is often referred to as the "language of exceptions" because it appears to have more exceptions to the rules than instances of actually following those rules.
e. Punctuation and layout
In written communication formats like letters, reports, and publicity, different writing communities follow different punctuation and layout conventions. There are include in punctuation and layout:
1) Misuse of capitalization
Capitalizing can use: the first word of a sentence, the names of the days and months, the names of holy festivals, the names of languages, the names of manufacturers, the names of specific people, places, or things, pronouns, religious names and terms, the names of books, films, magazines, newspapers, and pieces of music, and so on.53
2) Misuse of full stop
A period is also known as a "full stop." When you're finished writing a complete statement or sentence, end it with a period. It means that a full stop is used when we have finished writing a
52 Harmer, The Practice of English Language Teaching, 255–65.
53 Harmer, 255–56.
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sentence, and it will be placed at the end of the sentence.54 As a result, the full stop is also used in abbreviations.
3) Misuse of commas
A comma is nothing more than a pause in a sentence. It is also used to connect words or sentences. You should also be aware that a comma can sometimes replace the conjunction
"and" in a sentence.55 It implies that we can separate two adjectives with a comma rather than the conjunction "and".
10. CausesَّofَّStudents’َّDifficultiesَّinَّWritingَّ
Some students who struggle with their writing process are frequently found when teaching and learning writing. In this case, it is evident from their writing achievement or score, as well as some errors in their writing.
Alfaki proposed the following five causes of students' writing problems:
a. The Nature of Writing
According to Byrne categorizes writing complexities as psychological, linguistic, and cognitive issues.56 As stated in the above explanation, writing is a difficult activity that requires the creation of competent writing, which does not come naturally but is instead acquired through a continuous effort or process and lots of practice. The intricate process is broken down into phases, much like writing steps. Students ought to be aware of and knowledgeable about the writing process.
54 Jacobs, 200 English Grammar Mistakes! A Workbook of Common Grammar and Punctuation Errors with Examples, Exercises and Solutions So You Never Make Them Again, 85.
55 Jacobs, 156.
56 Byrne, Teaching Writing Skills, 1988, 4.