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TEACHING WRITING BY COMBINING ATTRIBUTE WEB STRATEGY AND WORD SPLASH STRATEGY
FOR SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL
By:
Marna*)
**) Lili Perpisa, S.S,M.Pd Staff Pengajar Program Studi Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris STKIP PGRI Sumatera Barat
ABSTRAK
Dalam makalah ini, penulis membahas tentang penggabungan strategi Attribute Web dan Word Splash dalam pembelajaran writing. Penggabungan kedua strategi ini diawali dengan memberikan kata kunci yang berkaitan dengan topik yang akan diajarkan. Guru memilih suatu topik yang berhubungan dengan menulis narrative teks, kemudian guru memberikan sejumlah kosakata yang kemudian di hubungkan dengan attribute web agar siswa mudah menghubungkan alur cerita dalam mengembangkan kalimat dan paragraf. Bagian-bagian makalah ini antara lain; menjelaskan tentang latar belakang dalam menulis makalah ini; menjelaskan tentang hakekat dari writing dan strategi Attribute Web dan Word Splash berdasarkan pendapat para ahli dalam bidang ini; selanjutnya mengenai materi yang akan diajarkan dalam pengajaran writing dengan strategi Attribute Web dan Word Splash, antara lain; Pre-teaching, Whilst-teaching, dan Post-teaching. Dan selanjutnya penulis menyimpulkan pembahasan dari makalah ini termasuk saran-saran penulis. Dengan demikian, strategi Attribute Web dan Word Splash diharapkan bisa membantu guru Sekolah Menengah Atas (SMA) dalam mengembangkan kemampuan menulis (writing).
Key word: Teaching Writing, Word Splash, Attribute Web
Introduction
Writing is the thinking process that expresses the ideas, thought, information, opinion, felling, message that is delivered by the writer to the reader in written form such as sentence, paragraph, and essay on the paper or electronic. Writing is also lonely act because the writers can see the reader when they express their idea, thought, information and so on. In writing process, the writers convey their feelings, ideas, expressions, and even share something to another. Thus, writing also encourages students in thinking, learning and motivating communication.
Actually, writing is an activity when the students’ need much times and much attention for arranging the ideas, using appropriate grammar, spelling, punctuation and vocabulary through teaching writing process. Teaching writing should be conducted well by the teacher through stimulates students in brainstorming and generating ideas, then helps them in drafting process, gives them a medium for reviewing, revising and editing the result of their work. Thus, a series of process in the teaching of writing will help students develop their writing skills. Besides, based on KTSP (Kurikulum Tingkat Satuan Pendidikan, 2006), the object of teaching English at Senior
High School is to develop students’ skill in writing. In the standard competence at Senior High School, especially for the second grade students, the students should be demanded to express the meaning in essay to have a form of report, narrative and analytical exposition in the context of everyday life.
Based on the writer’s experience in practice teaching at SMA Muhammadiyah 2 Padang, there were some problems that were faced by the students in learning writing, especially in writing narrative text. First, students still have lack in vocabulary.
Vocabulary problem, some students often got difficulties in developing and organizing their ideas. Then, the students have difficulty in selecting the appropriate words, using correct grammar, organizing good sentences and etc.
Last, students do not understand the generic structure of narrative text clearly. So, this led students unable to narrate their idea and organize paragraphs into unity.
To avoid the problems as stated above, it is important for an English teacher to consider about attractive and appropriate strategy in developing students’ writing ability. There are some strategies which are used in teaching writing such as attribute web strategy and word splash strategy. This
2 strategy set steps of teaching writing that require use of inquiry skills, this strategy include establishing a clear goal for writing.
Then, self-regulated strategy involves self- directed prompts that require the students to develop a plan for what they intend to say using frames to generate or organize writing notes. Attribute web strategy is a strategy that guide students to write by identify characters attribute before start to write. Last, word splash strategy which helps students to build relationship between words and key term.
Thus, the students are able to expressing their ideas and organizing them into good sentences.
Review of Related Literature
Writing is the way of a writer to deliver information, opinions, beliefs, feelings, arguments, explanations and theories in written letters and words. Generally, writing can solidify ideas and thoughts, and allow students to reflect on the ideas better than if the ideas remained evolving only in their head.
This corresponds to Clark (2007) who states that writing is powerful. Writing is an instrument of thinking that allows students to express their thoughts. So, writing is a necessary and important area of literacy that supports comprehension, critical and creative thinking.
Teaching writing is used as a practice tool to help students write successfully and enthusiastically in different styles. Coffin et al.
(2003) define teaching writing as an effort from the teacher to make the students understand how to write with focus on both the content and the form, which is language use, text structured, construction of argument, grammar and punctuation.
There are some kinds of text that will be learned by the students. One of them is narrative text. Narrative is one of the types of text which narrate a story by setting the scene, introducing the participants, telling the story problem and how the main characters solve the problem. White (1991) recommends that narrative text is a text amuse, entertain and deal with actual or vicarious experience in different ways.
Related to explanation above, narrative texts are dealing with problematic events which lead to a crisis or turning point of some kind, and found a completion at the end of the story. The event, crisis and completion
that find in a narrative text are known as generic structure of narrative text.
Generic structure of a text is necessary to learn because it helps the reader to catch idea on a reading passage and also helps writer in developing ideas to write a narrative text or the other kinds of essay. Goatly (2000) states that generic structure of narrative text has purposes such as arrange the plot of story in telling a story as a means of making sense of event and happenings in the world, it be both entertaining and informing. It means that, generic structures of narrative text is needed in make a narrative text become more structured from begin to the end.
In teaching writing, the teacher gives a key term for students to improve their vocabulary and develop their writing.
According to Luke and Freebody (2001) has pointed out that attribute web is a teaching strategy that make students’ vocabulary acquisition easier for generate students’
writing ability. Before beginning a new unit of study, a teacher will determine the most important vocabulary words for the topic that will be written.
There are some procedures that can be used in teaching writing through attribute web strategy. Antonacci and O’Callaghan (2012) also explain several steps in applying attribute web strategy as describe below:
First, Select a quality text. Teacher selects a picture or topic for the activity based on students’ writing level. Second, complete writing of the simple text. In the next session, teacher leads students in a summary of the text and guide their predictions for the next paragraph. Third, identify character attributes.
Teacher asks students to summarize their notes on the main character and discuss ways they surprised them after completing the text.
Fourth, apply to writing workshop. In the next session, teacher leads students in a review of how they crafted the characters. Fifth, compose the writing. In the next few session, students complete their narrative process.
Teacher meets individually with each dyad to guide them in applying their knowledge of crafting characters to their own stories.
Students revise and edit their text before it is published for their peers.
Beside the strategies above, the teacher also should apply word splash strategy to improve students writing ability through lead students write a letter with clear
3 explanation about the structure and the format.
According to Grant (2000), word splash is a strategy that used for students to make predictions about the text that has been read by the students. It means they will know about the meaning of the word from the text and understand about they have been read.
There are some procedures of word splash that can be used for the teacher in teaching writing. According to Grant (2000) there are five steps of word splash such as:
First, teacher selects 10-15 key words from the text and randomly put the words inside a square, students work in cooperative groups.
Second, discuss the meanings of the words and write a paragraph using all words. Third, each group shared its paragraph with the class.
Fourth, the teacher tells the students that they need to pay close attention to the paragraphs to see if the information contained in the paragraph is similar to that of the text. Fifth, after reading the paragraph and having students restate the key points, students revise their paragraph using the information that was presented in the text.
Based on the explanation above, the writer conclude that Attribute web is a strategy that helps students to develop their writing ability by give clear explanation about how the students create a draft with the attribute in webbing sign. And Word Splash strategy aims to improve students writing ability through lead students write a letter with clear explanation about the structure and the format.
Discussion
writing is an activity when the students’ need much times and much attention for arranging the ideas, using appropriate grammar, spelling, punctuation and vocabulary through teaching writing process. Besides, by wriitng students can share with their friend, students can explor their ideas with their teachers actively in the school or out of the school. The teacher should find appropriate and interesting the combination Strategy in teaching writing. The combination of attribute web and word splash Strategy. Before, starting the lesson which the teacher needs to do some preparation. Furthermore, the teacher should do some stages in teaching, such as; pre- teaching activity, whilst-teaching activity, and post-teaching activity.
Combination of Attribute Web and Word Splash Strategy in Teaching Writing
Writing is one of important skills in teaching learning process. In this section the writer tries to combine steps that have been describe by Antonacci and O’Callaghan (2012) for Attribute Web Strategy and Grant (2000) for Word Splash Strategy. These strategies can help teacher to get easy in teaching learning process. The combination of those strategies are :
First, select a quality text. Teacher selects a picture or topic for the activity based on students’ writing level. (AWS). Second, teachers select 10-15 key words from the text and randomly put the words inside a square, students work in cooperative groups. (WSS).
Third, discuss the meanings of the words and write a paragraph using all words. (WSS).
Fourth, identify character attributes. Teacher asks students to summarize their notes on the main character and discuss ways they surprised them after completing the text.
(AWS). Fifth, complete writing of the simple text. In the next session, teacher leads students in a summary of the text and guides their predictions for the next paragraph. (AWS).
Sixth, each group shared its paragraph with the class. (WSS). Seventh, the teacher tells the students that they need to pay close attention to the paragraphs to see if the information contained in the paragraph is similar to that of the text. (WSS). Eigth, Apply to writing workshop. In the next session, teachers lead students in a review of how they crafted the characters. (AWS). Ninth, compose the writing. In the next few session, students complete their narrative process. Teacher meets individually with each dyad to guide them in applying their knowledge of crafting characters to their own stories. Students revise and edit their text before it is published for their peers. (AWS). And the last, after reading the paragraph and having students restate the key points, students revise their paragraph using the information that was presented in the text. (WSS).
In the discussion, the teacher will describe activities about teaching and learning process by using attribute web and word splash Strategies. In this section, there are some activities will be done by the teacher, like ; Pre-teaching activity, Whilst teaching activity and Post teaching activity. These
4 strategies will use by the teacher in whilst teaching activitiy, as follow :
Pre – Teaching activities
Before the teacher start the lesson in the classroom. The teacher should be done pre- teaching activity. Pre- teaching activity is very important to begin the lesson. It’s aims to make the students concentration and motivate the students before start the lesson. Then, the teacher prepare the students to the new lesson or new topic. First, introduce the students with new material or topic which the teacher teach.
Second, teacher greets the students. Third, teacher checked the attendance list of the students. Fourth, teacher prepared the students to be involved in the teaching and learning process physically and mentally. Fifth, teacher shows the picture to brainstorm the students about material that will be taught to their students in the class.
Whilst- Teaching Activity
In whilst-teaching activities, the teacher conducts the class become active thinker during the learning writing process.
The implementation of combining Attribute Web and Words Splash strategies will be continued in this activity. The activities are : First, discuss the meanings of the words and write a paragraph using all words. (WSS), teacher helps students in understanding the meaning of the words. Second, identify character attributes. Teacher asks students to summarize their notes on the main character and discuss ways they surprised them after completing the text. (AWS), Teacher explains the characters of each figure that the students will be written in their narrative text by using attribute web. First, teacher explains the beggar characters. Third, complete writing of the simple text. In the next session, teacher leads students in a summary of the text and guides their predictions for the next paragraph.
(AWS), In this step, the teacher helps students to develop the keywords into sentences for each paragraph of narrative text based on the text structure. Teacher uses worksheet to organize each word uses for each generic structures of narrative text. Fourth, each group shared its paragraph with the class. (WSS), In this step, students share the paragraph with classmate in group to get reviewing and revising about the lose ideas and also the language features. Fifth, the teacher tells the
students that they need to pay close attention to the paragraphs to see if the information assosiation in the paragraph is similar to that of the text. (WSS), In this step, teacher walks around the group to ensure that each student reviews, revised and also shares ideas to make each paragraph complete. Sixth, apply to writing workshop. In the next session, teacher leads students in a review of how they crafted the characters. (AWS), teacher explains each character of the text based on the example in order to help students in determining characters of their in their own narrative text.
Seventh, teacher leads students start to complete the text. In the next few session, students complete their narrative process.
Teacher meets individually with each pair of students to guide them in applying their knowledge of crafting characters to their own stories. Students revise and edit their text before it is published for their peers. (AWS), teacher walks around the group to give students to develop students’ ideas about their characters of the text. Finally, after reading the paragraph and having students restate the key points, students revise their paragraph using the information that was presented in the text.
(WWS), based on the teachers’ guiding from the revising activity, students revise their text and make the text complete.
Post-Teaching Activities
In Post teaching activity are the activities at the end of the lesson. The activity consists of several activities that are intended to measure the students’ ability in writing, especially in writing narrative text. First, the teacher gives conclusion about the narrative text and explains briefly how to write a narrative text easily. Second, the teacher gives homework to write new narrative text with new key words. And the last The teacher closes the meeting.
In conclusion, in implementation the teacher should be follow some steps in teaching writing. The teacher should be done three procedures in teaching activities. There are in Pre-teaching, the teacher start to explain about the lesson. Then, in Whilst-teaching the teacher explain about the material step by step.
The last one, in Post-teaching the teacher closing the learning process.
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Conclusions
Based on the previous chapters, it can be conluded that Writing is the thinking process that expresses the ideas, thought, information, opinion, felling, message that is delivered by the writer to the reader in written form such as sentence, paragraph, and essay on the paper or electronic. In this paper, the writer focusses in teaching writing by using combining attribute web and word splash Strategy. Attribute web strategy is the strategy that helps students to develop their writing ability by give clear explanation about how the students create a draft with the attribute in webbing sign. This case, the students can get ideas from the topic that teacher given. It can improve the students knowledge about their writing skill and can also improve their vocabulary and develop their writing.
Furthermore, Word Splash strategy aims to improve students writing ability through lead students write a letter with clear explanation about the structure and the format.
It means they will know about the meaning of the word from the text and understand about they have been read.
From the explanation above, it can be concluded that the combining attribute web and word splash Strategies was better to give the best effect toward students writing ability.
These strategies can make the students brave to give opinions and ideas. They will organize their opinion, ideas and information to understand well about the purpose of writing.
References
Antonacci, A. Patricia and O’Callaghan, M.Catherine. 2012. Promoting Literacy Development. New York: SAGE Publication
Clark, Anna. 2007. English Teaching Forum V.13-2006. Australia: Melbourne University Publishing. Ltd.
Coffin, Curry, Goodman, Hewings, Lillis, &
Swann. 2003. Teaching Academic Writing. New York: Routledge.
Grant, Carl A. 2000. Proceedings of the National Association for Multicultural Education. Washington: Lawrence Erlbaum Association,Inc.
Goatly, Ammer. 2000. Writing Well: A Guide For Proper Writing Technique. United stated: Milliken Publishig Company.
Luke & freebody. 2001. Literacy Professional Learning Resource. From http://megan- sheakoski.suite101.com 12 February 201
White C. Hugh. 1991. Narration and discourse in the book of genesis.
Melbourne: Cambridge University Press.
