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AN ANALYSIS OF USING PERSONAL PRONOUNS IN WRITING TEXT
(A STUDY OF THE TENTH GRADE STUDENTS AT SMAN 5 PADANG)
Despareni*)
English Departement, STKIP PGRI SUMBAR, [email protected] Yulmiati, M. Pd**) and Belinda Analido, M. Pd***)
Abstrak
Skripsi ini mengkaji penggunaan personal pronouns dalam tulisan siswa didalam menulis teks. Personal pronouns adalah kata ganti untuk orang atau benda yang digunakan didalam berkomunikasi, baik secara lisan maupun tulisan. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menggambarkan bagaimana ketepatan penggunaan personal pronouns oleh siswa kelas X SMAN 5 Padang didalam menulis text berdasarkan ketepatan penggunaan kata ganti person, number, dan case di dalam personal pronouns. Jenis dari penelitian ini adalah penelitian deskriptif. Sumber data yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini berupa dokumen dari tugas siswa kelas X-1, X-2, X-3, X-4, dan X- 5 SMAN5 Padang. Tekhnik pengambilan sample dalam penelitian ini adalah purposive sampling technique. Dari hasil penelitian, ditemukan bahwa sebagian besar siswa telah mampu menggunakan personal pronouns pada bagian person (first, second, and third person) dan number(singular and plural) dengan tepat ketika menulis text. Di sisi lain, pada penggunaan case peneliti menemukan beberapa kesalahan didalam tulisan siswa. Pada bagian subjective, kebanyakan siswa telah menggunakan subject pronoun dengan benar. Sedangkan pada penggunaan objective dan possessive masih terdapat banyak kesalahan. Kemudian, reflexive pronoun merupakan kata ganti yang paling jarang di temukan didalam tulisan siswa. Secara umum, kemampuan siswa kelas X SMAN 5 Padang dalam penggunaan personal pronouns masih kurang baik karena sebagian besar siswa masih melakukan kesalahan dalam menempatkan kata ganti yang tepat.
Key words: Personal Pronouns, Writing Text
*) Writer, **) First Advisor, ***) Second Advisor INTRODUCTION
Writing is one of the productive skills that should be learned by the students in learning English. It is one way to communicate besides speaking. In English communication, the students in senior high school do not just have to be able to talk, but also can write well. This skill is needed for them to support the progress of their academic achievement. Through writing, the students can express their ideas or convey the messages in their mind into written form.
In writing, the students in senior high school level are hoped to have an ability to understand and write many kinds of short functional texts or monolog texts.
In addition, to get writing clear sentences, the students are required to learn the rule of English Grammar and it’s components, such as the use of correct noun, verb, adverb, adjective, preposition, conjunction, pronouns and the others.
Moreover, one kind of pronoun that
frequently occurs in writing is personal pronouns. Personal pronouns are a type of pronoun that is used to point human being, animals, and also things that being talked about. When people use a language both in speaking and writing, they do not need to repeat the word or noun which is mentioned.
For example: Merry is my friend. Marry is very clever. In this case, the writer does not need to repeat the word Merry to continue her/his statement. She/he should use the word she to change Merry. She is one of personal pronouns to replace Merry who is a female (third singular person). In short, it is better Merry is my friend. She is very clever, so that it will not appear a redundancy.
According to Kolln and Robert (2012:290), “personal pronouns are the ones we usually think of when the word pronoun comes to mind, we generally label them on the basis of person, number, and case”.
Based on this theory, it can be concluded that personal pronouns are a pronoun that replace noun or noun phrase and it can be
2 seen based on the person (1st, 2nd, and 3th
person). Then, it can be seen based on the number whether it singular or plural. The last, it can be seen based on the case (subjective, objective, possessive, and reflexive). In addition, personal pronouns are needed to avoid the repeated same words while writing a paragraph or a text. Personal pronouns seemed to be a simple thing in writing process, but a little mistake in using it will give a big effect toward writing.
Furthermore, the use of appropriate personal pronoun is very needed in writing.
However, based on the researcher’s pre interview with a teacher at SMAN 5 Padang, the researcher some problems related to the use of personal pronouns in students’ writing. Here, the teacher said that the use of personal pronouns where is made by the students is not appropriate with what the expert explained. In addition, the teacher said that the students still difficult to use appropriate personal pronouns related part of personal pronouns itself. For example, the students used he’s to point out the possessive (his) of subject he. Actually, this is not a part of personal pronouns.
Sometimes, the students still difficult to use appropriate personal pronouns although it has been learned since junior high school.
Here, they got confused to differentiate where the personal pronouns which have to be a subject, object, possessive, and also reflexive, especially while writing.
Sometimes they made inappropriate personal pronouns to replace the noun.
In summary, the use of personal pronouns in writing a text is one of the important things that should be considered.
Besides, personal pronouns provide a text with cohesion and avoid the repeated same words.
REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE Definition of Writing
There are many experts that explain about definition of writing. According to Hyland (2003:3) states “writing is to see it marks as on a page screen, a coherent arrangement of words, clauses, and sentences, structured according to a system of rules”. It means that in writing, group of words and sentences in a paper must be organized and logical, it also has certain
regularities in the structure of the sentence.
So, there have rules in producing sentence that should be mastered in writing.
Moreover, Nunan (2003:88) defines
“writing is both a process and product”. The writer can produce good writing by passing the several steps in composing his or her writing. Some steps are the writer imagines, organize, drafts, edits, reads, and reread.
These steps as the process of writing that can guide writer to make a piece of writing.
After the writer passes this process, he or she will get good writing as product in writing. This idea is in line with Sokolik and Olson in Linse (2005: 98), state “writing is combination of process and product, and the concept that writing is a process is very useful to young writers”. The process refers to the act of gathering ideas and working with them until they are presented in a manner which is comprehensible to readers.
Process is important thing when the writers are writing because the students cannot produce good written form, if they do not do writing process well too.
Based on the explanations above, it can be assumed that writing is both a process and product. From this process, the students can produce some texts and convey the message, information or knowledge from the writer to the readers. In other words, when the students have something important in their mind, they can put it on a paper.
Therefore, when the ideas have been arranged well by using appropriate words and grammar, the students can produce a good writing
Component of Writing
There are some components in writing such as the content, organization, language use, mechanic, ideas, vocabulary, grammar, spelling, punctuation, clarity, coherence, and focus. These components can help the writer to control their writing. In this research, the researcher just focus to one component of writing that is grammar.
Grammar is one component of writing. It is supported by some theories. First, Oshima and Hogue (1997) state that there are five components of writing; content, organization, language use, vocabulary, and mechanic. The second, Nunan (2003:94) defines that “there are three essential components of writing; content,
3 organization, and grammar”. From this
theory, it can be seen that content describes what will the writer tells or conveys about.
Then, organization is how the writer organizes his/her ideas in writing. It is also the way how the writer arranges his/her ideas. Thus, grammar is about the description of the ways where the words can change their forms and can be combined into sentences.
Related to the theories above, it can be concluded that grammar is one part of writing. In context of grammar, the researcher just focused her study to the part of personal pronouns. In this research, the researcher would see the personal pronouns which were used by the students at senior high school 5 Padang in their writing.
Writing in Senior High School
The goal of learning English in Senior High School is to develop students’
potential in communication whether in written and spoken form. Based on the regulation of minister of education and culture (permendikbud 2014: no 59) states that the goal of learning English in senior high school is to develop students’ potential in the context of interpersonal, transactional, and also functional in speaking and also writing. Then, based on this regulation, writing is one of the skills besides speaking that need to master by the students in senior high school to extend their own potential in communication, especially in English.
Then, based on the syllabus of the tenth grade students in senior high school, the students are expected to be able to write any kinds of texts which were taught in the three functions; social function, texts structure, and the language feature. It means that students’ writing will be assess in three point; first the social function of the text, second the structure of the text, and the last the language feature of the text itself. For example, the social function of narrative text is to get entertain and to tell the moral value through the text. Then, the generic structures of the text are orientation, evaluation, complication, and resolution. Then, language feature of the text are the tenses that use in the text, conjunction, spelling, the use of singular and plural etc.
Personal Pronouns
Personal pronouns are part of pronoun that are associated primarily with a particular person ; first person as (I), second person as (you), or third person as (he, she, it). Personal pronouns may also take different forms depending on number (usually singular or plural), and case. Thus, personal pronouns are not limited to people only, but also refers to animals and things.
Accordong to Kolln and Robert (2012:290),
“personal pronouns are the ones we usually think of when the word pronoun comes to mind, we generally label them on the basis of person, number, and case”.
METHOD OF THE RESEARCH
This research was qualitative research which was designed in descriptive study.
According to Ary et al (2010:29),
“qualitative researchers seek to understand a phenomenon by focusing on the total picture rather than breaking it down into variables”.
It is concerned on condition or relationship that exist, opinion that are held, processes that are going on, effects that is evident, or trends that are developing and not about numeric analysis of data. It is also supporting by Gay and Airasian (2000:275),
“a descriptive study determines and describes the way things are”. It means that qualitative research only focus on describing the phenomenon without giving treatment to the students. So, based on the problems in the background of the research, the researcher analyzed and described about the use of appropriate personal pronouns on students’ writing text at tenth grade students of SMAN 5 Padang.
The source of data in this research was collected from students’ task in writing text. Then, in gathering the data, the researcher used purposive sampling technique to choose the participants.
According to Gay and Airisian (2000: 138),
“purposive sampling referred as judgment sampling, the researcher selects a sample based on his or her experience or knowledge of the group to be sampled”. Thus, purposive sampling was also known as subjective or selective sampling where the sampling can be chosen according to the need in the research. Related to the source of data, there were only five classes that
4 could be participated in this study; there
were X-1, X-2, X-3, X-4, and X-5. Then, the researcher took 10 student’ assignment in writing text for each classes.
Then, to help the researcher in doing analysis document, the researcher used form of document checklist. It is used to guide the researcher in order to keep the data relevant to the topic investigate.
FINDINGS
After analyzing the data, the researcher had answered the research question of the research or had found the result of this research. The answere was:
1. Person
Most of the students in senior high school 5 Padang could use appropriate personal pronouns in the part of person, included first person, second person, and third person. It was proofed that there were only 3 of 50 students who got wrong in this part. Here, the students could identify where is the first person (I), second person (you), and third person (male: he / female: she / neuter: it) while writing.
2. Number
Most of the students in senior high school 5 Padang were good in using appropriate pronouns in the part of number which is include singular and plural. In this part, there were 8 from 50 students. Related to the number, the students could identify where the singular (I, you, he, she, it) and plural (we, you, and they) of number in their writing.
3. Case
a. Subjective
In subjective, there were 11 from 50 students who got wrong or made inappropriate pronouns in replacing the subject.
b. Objective
In objective, there were 31 from 50 students who made unsuitable pronouns related to the objective form (me, you, him, her, it, us, and them).
c. Possessive
There were 33 from 50 students who got wrong in replacing the possessive place while writing. It was seem to be
difficult part for the students because most of them made inappropriate pronouns to replace the possessive form (my, your, his, our, your, and their).
d. Reflexive
Reflexive was the part of personal pronouns that rarely found in students writing. Based on the data that had analyzed by the researcher, there were 2 students who got wrong in reflexive form (myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, themselves).
In general, the students at tenth grade students of senior high school 5 Padang couldn’t use the appropriate personal pronouns yet. It caused there were many students that couldn’t use the appropriate pronouns and its part properly, especially in the part of objective and possessive in the case of personal pronouns. In this case, there were many students did not fulfill the concept of personal pronouns which is proposed by the theory or expert in chapter II.
Interpretation
Based on the findings, the researcher find the different result per each criterion.
First, the result shows that most of the students of SMAN 5 Padang at tenth grade are good in using appropriate personal pronouns in the part of person and number in their writing. Here, most of the students can identify where is the first person, the second person and also the third person. Then, the students are also good in replacing personal pronouns in the part of number, it is include the singular and also plural of personal pronouns. It seems that they do not have serious problem in this case.
On the contrary, some of the students of SMAN 5 unable to use suitable pronouns in the part of case which include subjective, objective, possessive and also reflexive. It is proofed based on the findings that found this part as the most difficult part of personal pronouns for the students. Here, the data show some of the students do not use appropriate personal pronouns related to the case. In addition, the students do not fulfill the concept of personal pronouns which is proposed by Kolln and Robert (2012:290),
5 especially in the part of objective and
possessive of the case in personal pronouns.
Here, the students make many mistakes or unsuitable pronouns to replace the objective and possessive. If the students use the appropriate personal pronouns their writing will be easily accepted by the readers. on the other hand, some of the students do not focus to the object that they tell. They tell about two or more character in their writing, but when it came to pronouns they replace it for himself/herself. Thus, they write personal pronouns based on what they hear, like when they show or replace the possessive (his), they write (he’s).
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION The conclusion of this research is the students’ knowledge about the use of appropriate personal pronouns are still less and do not fulfill the concept of personal pronouns that proposed by the expert yet. It is proofed based on findings that found there are many incorrect or unsuitable personal pronouns that they make in their writing text, especially in the form of case (objective and possessive) of personal pronouns.
Moreover, the students need to pay attention to their writing while replacing the personal pronouns and all criteria should be appropriate to fulfill the correct personal pronouns in writing.
Thus, after analyzing the personal pronouns which were used by the tenth grade students of SMAN 5 Padang, the researcher has some suggestion for the students and English teachers.
1. The students:
a. They should be active in learning and finding many resources in order to get more knowledge, especially the use of English personal pronouns.
b. It is suggested for the students to practice more in writing. Then, the students should be active in teaching learning process, especially in learning personal pronouns. If they do not understand they must be active or they must ask the teacher to explain it more.
2. The English teachers:
a. The teachers should pay attention to the material of case pronoun, especially objective and possessive more than any other personal pronouns.
b. The teacher should give and explain the material very detail related to use of personal pronouns.
c. The teacher should give the task or assignment about personal pronouns as much as possible because it will be very worth for them. Thus, the teacher could give remedial for the students who don’t achieve the standard yet.
REFERENCES
Ary, Donal et al. 2010. Introduction to Research in Education 8th Ed.
Wadsworth: Cengage Learning.
Gay, L. R and Peter Airisian. 2000.
Educational Research: Competencies for Analysisand Aplications. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, Inc.
Hyland, Ken. 2013. Second language Writing. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Kolln, Martha and Robert Funk. 2012.
Understanding English Grammar.
New Jersey: Pearson Education Nunan, David. 2003. Practical English
Language Teaching. New York: Mc Graw Hill.
Oshima, Alice and Ann Hogue. 1999.
Writing Academic English; 2nd. New York: Addison Wesley Publishing Company.
Permendikbud Republik Indonesia Nomor 59 Tahun 2014 tentang Kurikulum
2013 Sekolah Menengah
Atas/Madrasah Aliyah
Thomson, A. J and A. V. Martinet. 1995. A Practical English Grammar. Walton University Press.
