Teaching English for Junior High School Students

22 4. If students are working in groups, a computer screen can sometimes be far more visible to the whole group than a piece of paper might be. Students can also make use of computer to write e-mails. They can apply their English writing skills by writing e-mails for their friends around the world. This type of activity can be really motivating and exciting especially because the communication is immediate. Aside from approaches of student writing, Harmer also suggests that teacher takes a really significant role in English language teaching in general or teaching writing in English specifically. Harmer 2001: 261-262 proposes that teacher at the very least has three important roles. The first is teacher as a motivator. Teacher motivates the students. They create conducive atmosphere for their students to generate ideas. They will try to make them interested in writing activity by giving them good reasons why writing is not only useful but also exciting. Teacher also encourages the students to make as much effort as possible for achieving their full potential. The second one is teacher as a resource. Teacher must be ready to provide more information and language especially when students are dealing with extended writing tasks. They have to be prepared to offer constructive advice and suggestions. The last is teacher as a feedback provider. Of all teachers’ responsibilities, maybe giving feedback especially on writing tasks will require a bit of an extra attention. Teacher must respond positively of what students have written. They also have to act encouragingly when students seem to hit the wall so that hopefully they will never give up in writing. When teacher offers correction, they 23 need to decide on what and how much to focus on based on students’ need at that particular stage.

3. Cooperative Learning

Students’ ability in writing especially writing description text is not the same for all students. Therefore, it is necessary to find a method in teaching writing that can improve students’ ability in writing description text. One of popular teaching methods that are evidently effective in doing so is cooperative learning.

a. Definition of Cooperative Learning

Researchers and practitioners have studied cooperative learning for more than a decade. They learned that students working in small cooperative groups were able to develop the type of intellectual exchange which fosters not only creative thinking but also productive problem-solving. According to Kagan 1989: 4 cooperative learning refers to a set of instructional strategies which includes cooperative student-student interaction over subject matter as an integral part of the process. He also defines cooperative learning as a teaching arrangement which refers to small, heterogeneous groups of students working together to achieve a common goal. They work together to learn and are responsible for the teammate’s learning as well as their own Kagan, 2010: 85. Kagan also created cooperative learning model of his own. The model is based on the concept and use of structures and it is considered as an innovative approach to classroom instructions. Kagan’s model of cooperative learning is