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AN ANALYSIS OF STUDENTS ABILITY IN WRITING BUSINESS LETTER (A Study at XII Grade Students of SMK N 6 Padang)
Rudi Yuliandra
English Departement, SKIPT PGRI SUMBAR, [email protected] Belinda Analido 1)
Riny Dwitya Sani 2)
ABSTRAK
Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengetahui dan menganalisis kemampuan siswa di dalam menulis atau membuat surat bisnis. Penelitian ini adalah descriptive research dengan menggunakan tulisan siswa sebagai dokumen. Di dalam mengumpulkan dokumen, peneliti menggunakan random sampling diambil 10% dari populasi dari 6 kelas pada siswa kelas XII SMK N 6 Padang yang berjumlah 344 siswa dan siswa diacak dan dipilih menjadi 34 siswa. Di dalam menganalisis dokumen, peneliti menggunakan dokument checklist sebagai instrumen. Document checklist akan menganalisis hasil dari tulisan siswa yang telah dikumpulkan. Hasil dari dokument checklist yang telah dilihat, peneliti menemukan hasil dari 34 tulisan tangan siswa di dalam membuat surat bisnis adalah baik dimana 30 siswa yang membuat surat bisnis sesuai dengan kriteria yang baik dan 4 diantaranya salah di dalam menulis surat bisnis dimana tidak sesuai di dalam kriteria menulis surat bisnis dengan baik. Itu telah dilihat dan dijabarkan dari ketiga surat bisnis yang telah dikumpulkan. Surat pertama, inquiry letter, dimana dari 10 tulisan siswa, 8 tulisan siswa yang membuat inquiry letter baik sesuai dengan kriteria yang baik di dalam membuat surat bisnis. Surat kedua, order letter, dimana peneliti mengumpulkan 10 tulisan tangan siswa di dalam menulis order letter adalah baik dan sesuai dengan kriteria menulis surat bisnis. Surat ketiga, application letter, dimana 14 tulisan tangan siswa, 12 tulisan siswa baik dan sesuai dengan kriteria menulis surat bisnis dan 2 tulisan siswa tidak memenuhi kriteria yang baik di dalam menulis surat bisnis.
INTRODUCTION
Writing is one of the four basic skill that should be learned by the students in Senior High School besides speaking, listening, and reading.
This skill is needed for them to support the progress of their academic achievement. By writing, the students will know how to write a good content into a text about the object that they want to describe and how to organize the ideas which are supported with relevant supporting sentences. In this skill the students can improve their grammar such as how to use correct tenses, adjective, articles, and noun phrase. They also can arrange a text into good mechanics such as word spelling, punctuation, and capitalization. Thus, this skill is make it give a many schools.
Learning English writing at SMK (Vocational School), the students can write a sentences properly. One of the writing is to create a business letters. Business letters are the formal letter that people use in business activities. To practice the students’ writing, they can start to understand and construct simple business letter. By writing the parts of business letter it can be determined that kinds of business
letters. It is good for them to increase their ability in writing. If they have good ability in writing, they will be easy to make business letter well.
Bussiness letters consists of three kinds, that is; inquiry letter, order letter, and application letter. Inquiry letter is letter of inquiry which asks someone for specific information. Then, order letter is a letter that deals with orders and payments for merchandise in form of business activity. Finally, application letter is a document which is sent with your resume to provide additional information on your skills and experience to apply a job.
Business letter has a rule. Criteria of good in writing of business letter is heading letter, date, the inside addrees, greeting or salutation, the body of letter, the complimentary close and signature line. After that, it can all be said to be a business letters. Then, know the kinds of business letter and to whom the letter was made.
In writing business the students often found some difficulties. First, students writing of inquiry letter. Second, students writing of order letter. Third, students writing of
2 application letter. Last, criteria of good in writing business letter.
CONCEPTUAL OF THEORY Definition of Business Letter
Business letters are the formal letter that people use in business activities. Esther (2000:4) states that business letter is the most widely or commonly used form of external written communication. With the variuos intentions a business correspondent has in writing a business letter, one finds difficulty in giving a precise definition of a business letter.
Indeed, how can there be a specific meaning of a business letter when it serves many purposes.
It seeks to explain, to sell, to introduce, to apologize, to invite, to refuse, to promise, to complain, and to organize.
Furthermore, Bond (2005:1) business letter is written on the company’s letterhead stationary, which includes the organization’s full name, full address and telephone, fax or telex numbers, and (if available) the e-mail address. In business letter, the writer can describe about the parts of business letter (see the sample letters in this chapter) are date, attention line, inside address, subject line, salutation, body of the letter, complimentary closing, signature, reference initials, enclosure notation, and copy notation. Not all of the above components are always used. The “Attention line” “Subject line” and “Enclosure” notations are used only as they apply to a particular letter.
In addition, Kishore (2005:10) add that a business letter is obviously to be typed in duplicate, as one copy is meant for official record. In the states that all your business letters should invaribly be typewritten. They should be typed out neatly, correctly, and the use of eraser should be avoided as far as possible. A typed letter is an attractive thing if typed out with proper margin, lines, and words properly spaced and well paragraped. The paragraphs should be shorts, concise, intelligible, and well indented.
The text of letter should start two spaces below the salutation and terminate two spaces above the complimentary close. When the letters are long continuation sheets should be used, and each additional sheet should carry the page number, the name of the addressee and date.
This sheets should match the letterhead in size and quality.
Kinds of Business Letter
There are some kinds of business letter. It will be explained by some experts below:
According to Isnenti (2014:35) that a business letter consists of three kinds:
Inquiry letter is letter of inquiry ask someone for specific information. Example in advertisement at the company. According to Joseph and Danielle (2000:121) when you first approach a foundation, you should send a letter of inquiry to find out if the foundation would be interested in your idea. The letter itself looks and acts like an executive summary. It enables the reader to find out what you want and decide if she cares to learn more. From your perspective, the purpose of the inquiry letter is to give the foundation the basic outline of your proposal and convince the reader to set up a meeting or to invite you to send a full proposal.
From the foundation perspective, the purpose of the inquiry letter is to nip unwanted proposals in the bud. The foundation officer uses the inquiry letter to decide whether you fit within the foundation’s current priorities, and if so, whether you deserve a tiny sliver of her already overburdened schedule.
According to Garrido (2006:21), the inquiry (or request) letter it is used to ask for information. It is usually followed by a reply including the information required. In brief, Kolin (2011:110), an inquiry letter asks for information about a product, service, or procedure. Business frequently wxchange such letters. As a customer, you too have occasion to ask in a letter about a service or a special line of products, the price, the size, the color, delivery arrangements or recenttechnological changes.
The clearer your letter, the quicker and more helpful your answer are likely to be. Shortly, inquiry letter letter of inquiry ask someone for specific information at the company.
Order letter is a letter that dealing with orders and payments for merchandise form of business activity. In the order letter containts about ordering a product or an item to another person or company. According to Garrido (2006:21) order letter it is used to order goods or services. It is usually followed by a reply confirming the order.
Furthermore, Guffey and Almonte (2009:124) to order items by letter, supply the same information that an order form would require. In the opening let the reader know immediatelly that this is a purchase authorization and not merely an information inquiry. If you’re ordering many items, list them vertically in the body of your letter. Include as
3 much specific data as possible: quantity, order number, complete description, unit price, and total price.
In brief, Geffner (2010:192), many companies use special forms for ordering merchandise or service. They may use their own, called a purchase order, or one provided by the seller, called an order form. These forms have blank spaces to ensure the inclusion of all necessary information. Their advantage is that they enable a company to number and track all expenditures.
Application letter is a document which is send with your resume to provide additional information on your skills and experience to apply a job. Application letter is also called a job application letter or applying for a job to a company. According to Geffner (2007:107), a letter of application is a sales letter in which you are both salesperson and product, for the purpose of an application is to attract an employer’s attention and persuade her to grant you an interview. A letter of application serves as the cover letter of your resume. Like a resume, it is a sample of your work, and it is, as well, an opportunity to demonstrate, not just talk about, your skills and personality.
According to Ghost (2009:283), job application letters are designed in the manner as sales letter. It serves as a covering letter for the enclosed resume. In brief, Raimes and Miller- Cochran (2015:28), a job application letter outlines an applicant’s qualifications for a position and draws connections between those qualifications and the job advertised.
Criteria of Good Writing Business Letter In order to write a good business letter, the students must have to know some component business letter. There are some component: the heading, date, the inside address, the greeting, body, the complimentary close, and the signature line. According to Crowther (2000:12), parts of business letter are as the follow:
The heading: the heading of a letter contains the street address, city, state, and the date.
The inside address: the inside address consists of the name of the person or of the firm and the address. The address should comprise the street number, the city, and the states. The inside address may be written at the end of the letter, from lthe left, below the signature.
The salutation: the salutation or complimentary address to the person to whom the letter is written, in a social letter should begin at the left-hand side of the sheet about half an inch below the heading and inch from the edge of the paper. In business letter the form of salutation in common use are: “Dear Sir”,
“Gentlemen”, “Dear Madam”. The salutation follows the inside address and preserves the same margin as does the first line of the address.
The body of the letter: the opening sentence is in an important position, and this is obviously the place for an important fact. It ought in some way to state or refer to the subject of or reason for the letter, so as to get the attention of the reader immediately to the subject.
The complimentary close: follows the body of the letter, about two or three spaces below it.
It begins about in the center of the page under the body of the letter.
The signature: is written below the complimentary and a little to the right, so that it ends about at the right-hand margin.
Purpose of Business Letter
The purpose of letter writing is to convey information and the aim of layout, or construction, is to make the information easily followed by the reader and pleasing to see.
Grenville (2007:1) explains that the purpose of business letter is you will write business letter to inform readers of specific information.
However, you might also write a business letter to persuade others to take action or to propose your ideas, business letter even function as advertisements at times. Consider the letters long distance phone companies send to those not signed up for their services or the cover letter to your resume. Both of these serve to promote or advertise.
According to McGraw-Hill (2008:57) purposes of business letter are giving and seeking information, making or answering an enquiry, placing an order, demanding or refusing credit, mollifying the injured feeling of a customers, selling goods and services, making, accepting or refusing a request, making or responding to complaints, and creating goodwill etc.
In addition, Foster (2010:48) adds that you can write many types of business letters, including letters of request, invitations, letters to the editor, cover letters for resumes, and claim
4 and adjustment letters. Each type of business letter has a specific purpose : a letter of request asks for a favor, a service, an appointment, or an item, an invitation requests someone’s attendance at an event, a letter to the editor expresses the writer’s viewpoint about a current item in the news, a cover letter for a resume seeks to motivate an employer to read a resume by highlighting key points related to a job applicant’s qualifications, work experience, and interests, and then a claim and adjusment letter deals with mistakes or perceived mistakes made in business transactions. Customers state claims while businesses write responses called adjustment letters.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
In this research, the researcher used descriptive research. According to Gay and Airasian (2000:275), descriptive research determines and describes the way things are. It can be said that in descriptive research only describes about phenomena and do not find treatment in descriptive research. The researcher chose the descriptive research because the researcher wanted to describe the fact in writing of business letter, which is written by students at SMK N 6 Padang. In addition, descriptive research has been becoming useful research design in investigating many kinds of educational problem include writing of business letter. Therefore, by writing this descriptive research, the researcher describes deeply the fact about writing of business letter which is written by students at SMK N 6 Padang.
According Creswell (2012:223), document consists of public and private record that qualitative researchers obtain about a site or participants in a study, and they can include newspapers, minutes of meetings, personal journals, and letters. These sources provide valuable information in helping researchers understand central phenomena in qualitative studies. They represent public and private documents.
In this research, researcher used students’
writing as the document. The collecting of document involve 6 class at XII grade SMK N 6 Padang there are XII Cullinary Art (87 students), XII Hospitality (53 students), XII Fashion (121 students), XII Hair Beauty (25 students), XII Skin Beauty (27 students), and XII Computer Network Engineering (31 students). All student of XII grade at SMK N 6 Padang are 344 students. In the collecting data,
researcher used random sampling. According to Gay and Airasian (2000:77), simple random sampling is the best way to represent the population, and if there are differencess between the population and the sample they are a result of chance, not a result of the researcher’s bias.
Each respondent of the survey responded to an invitation to participate, thus providing a random sample.
Based on the research above, the researcher devided of the random sampling between 10% from population which has been summed. The researcher got the result of population random sampling. Finally, the researcher chose students’ writing of the class.
In this research, students at XII grade SMK N 6 Padang were 344 students from 10%
± 34 students. Thus, 34 students from 6 classes at XII grade were taken about 5 students (random sampling). The researcher took a 34 students from 6 classes randomly in this study at SMKN 6 Padang. The researcher used the instrumentation as tool to collect the data.
According to Gay and Arasian (2000:145), instrument as tool or something that used to collecting the data. In this research, the researcher used document as the instrument.
According to Ary, L.Cheser, Sorensen, and Asghar (2010:442) document is written by someone who has has firsthand experience with the phenomenon under study. The term documents here refers to a wide range of written, physical, and visual materials, including what other authors may term artifacts.
Document may be personal, such as autobiographies, diaries, and letters: official, such as files, reports, memoranda, or minutes:
or documents of popular culture, such as books, films, and videos.
In analyzing document, the researcher used document analysis. The researcher chose document analysis as a technique of collecting the data. Choosing this technique is grounded to the data in this research where the data came from document that is made by students. The purpose is also to find out students’ ability in writing of business letter. The data would be collected included textbook and students’
writing. According to Ary et al(2010:442), document analysis can be of written or text- based artifacts (textbooks, novels, journals, meeting minutes, logs, announcements, policy statements, newspapers, transcripts, birth certificates, marriage records, budgets, letters, e- mail messages, etc.). Based on the previous
5 research above, in doing analysis document, researcher used document checklist as an instrument. Document checklist used to analyze how students’ ability in writing business letter.
The researcher done some steps in collecting the data of study. First, the researcher took a document of the students writing. Second, researcher analyzed it. After that, researcher used document checklist in analyzing the students writing. Third, the researcher compiled both the result of the document and document checklist to analyze it. Last, the result described students’ ability in writing business letter at XII grade SMK N 6 Padang.
After collecting the data, the researcher analyzed the data to answer the research question and get the result of this this research.
Creswell (2012:237) state that there are six steps in analyzing the data: The researcher prepare and organize the result of students’ writing for analysis. Second, the researcher engage in an initial exploration of the result of students’
writing through the process of coding it (topic, word choice, structure, and content/accuracy).
Third, the researcher used the codes to develope of the result students’ writing. Next, the researcher represent the findings through students’ writing. Then, the researcher make an interpretation of the students’ writing. Finally, the researcher conduct strategies to validate the accuracy of the findings (document of students’
writing).
ANALYSIS AND FINDING
In this chapter, the researcher presents the results of this research. The result of this research from the documents cheklist and document analysis from the students English teachers who taught writing business letter at XII grade SMK N 6 Padang.
Referring to the data analysis, the researcher found that result of students writing of business letter at XII grade students of SMK N 6 Padang is well. The students meet criteria of good in writing business letter. It could be seen from document checklists’ result. It is supported by Crowther (2000:12), there are some component that related to the indicators business letters such as: the heading, the inside address, the greeting/salutation, the body, the complimentary close, and the signature line. The result of document checklist that can be seen; from 10 students’ writing, 8 students’ writing who are good at writing inquiry letter where the error occured in writing the body and not a comma of writing the letter. Second, 10 students’ writing who are good at writing order letter has been collected. Last, from 14 students’ writing, 12 students’ writing who are good at writing application letter where the error occured in writing the heading and date of writing application letter. In conclusion, the students’
writing business letters are written well.
CONCLUSION
Writing is one of the four basic skill that must learn by the students in Senior High School especially in Vocational School. One of the writing is to create a business letter.
Business letter consists of three kinds, that are inquiry letter, order letter, and application letter.
Beside that, business letter has a rule and criteria of good in writing business letter. To explain this issue, the researcher conducted a study about students’ ability in writing business letter at Vocational School. This research was descriptive qualitative research that was done in SMK N 6 Padang.
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