Significance of the Study

6 our awareness of the realities around us, for solving problems and shaping arguments … Writing is also a way of finding out what we know and what we need to learn.” 4 Sylvan Barnet and Marcia Stubbs on their book; Practical Guide to Writing also said that, “Writing is a physical act. It requires materials and energy. And like most physical acts, to be performed skillfully, to bring pleasure to both performer and audience, it requires practice. 5 We can learn to write for all practical purposes including pleasure. Furthermore, “Writing makes a special contribution to the way people think. When we write, we compose meanings, we put together facts and ideas and make something new …” 6 When students write, they create a complex web of meaning in which sentences have different relationships to each other. Moreover, “Writing also contributes uniquely to the way we learn.” 7 When the students take notes during lecturers or as they read, writing enables them to store new information in memory. Writing also makes another important contribution to learning. Because it is always a composing a new meaning, writing enables them to find and establish our own connections and networks of information and ideas. It enables them to clarify and deepen our understanding of a new concept and to find ways to connect it to other ideas within a discipline. Based on the explanation above it can be concluded that writing is widely used within foreign language courses, a way of sharing personal meanings, as an act of mind, more than a medium communication, a physical act, a special contribution to the way people think, contributes uniquely to the way we learn which enables them to store new information in memory. 4 James C. Raymond, Loc. Cit., p. 2. 5 Sylvan Barnet and Marcia Stubbs, Barnet and Stubbs’s Practical Guide to Writing, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1974, p. 3. 6 Rise B. Axelrod and Charles R. Chooper, The ST. Martin’s Guide to Writing, New York: St. Martin’s Guide to Writing, 1985, p. 2. 7 Ibid., p. 2. 7

2. Stages Process in Writing

An emphasis on language structure as a basis for writing teaching is typically a four-stage process; they are familiarization, controlled writing, guided writing and free writing: 8

a. Familiarization

Learners are taught certain grammar and vocabulary, usually through a text. 9 Table 2.1 Substitution patterns Types : A, B, and C. hThere are Kinds . These are A, B and C. Y Classes of X are A, B and C. hThe Categories Consists of categories Y classes. These are A, B and C. Can be divided kinds : A, B and C. into types classes , A, B and C are kinds of X types categories

b. Controlled Writing Controlled writing is learners manipulate fixed patterns, often from

substitution tables. 10 The similar opinion came from Lois Robinson that “Controlled writing is all the writing for which a great deal of the content andor form is supplied.” 11 In controlled writing students are given tasks an outline to 8 Ken Hyland, Op. Cit., p. 3. 9 Ibid., p. 4. 10 Ibid., p. 4. 11 Ann Raimes, Technique in Teaching Writing, New York: Oxford University Press, 1983, p. 95.