42
i. Not all the students were active throughout the teaching and learning
process. j.
The students’ motivation to write was low. Reflecting on the findings of the preliminary classroom observation,
interviews, and questionnaire, there were a lot of problems that could be found in the field. The majority of the students found English to be difficult to learn
especially when it came to speaking and writing. However, some of those students admitted that speaking activity was actually quite fun but then a question arose,
what about writing? Did anybody like writing? The problems that the students faced were quite varied. In writing
especially, sometimes some of the students were overflown with ideas but they had a hard time to express those ideas in English as they had very limited
vocabulary. In another time, other students faced a hard time just to think about any ideas for their writing task.
2. Selection of the Problems Based On the Level of Feasibility
Once the field problems were identified, the researcher still had to select those problems based on the level of feasibility. She once again needed to discuss
the matter with the English teacher so that the data could at least be considered as valid. The teacher in this situation had lent a great helping hand which made it
easier for the researcher to correctly select the problems. Based on what both parties were agreed upon, the selection of the
problems according to the level of feasibility was as follows.
43
Table 1. Problems Selection Based on the Level of Feasibility No.
List of the Problems Level
1. No chance to work in groups especially during writing
activities. Fair
2. Teacher’s voice was not loud enough.
Low 3.
Students were less enthusiastic in the course of the lesson.
Low
4. The students had difficulties in generating ideas during
writing process. High
5. The students’ vocabulary mastery was low.
High 6.
Many of the students found constructing English sentences hard to do.
High
7. The students frequently made writing errors.
High 8.
The students were afraid of making mistakes in writing.
Low
9. Not all the students were active throughout the
teaching and learning process. Fair
10. The s
tudents’ motivation to write was low. Fair
From the list of problems that had been categorized above, the researcher then possessed the appropriate instrument to help her did the next stage in her
research which was determining suitable actions to overcome the problems. The problems which had high level of feasibility were all directly related
to aspects that were very important in students’ writing performance such as difficulties in generating ideas, limited vocabulary, problems in constructing
English sentences, and frequent writing errors.
44
3. Benchmark or Standard Scores
The standard scores were acquired through pre-test. This was essential in order to help the researcher measured the
students’ improvement especially on writing skills after the necessary actions had been implemented. The pre-test itself
was given at the beginning of the research so that the researcher could understand the
students’ basic writing skills as well. During the pre-test, the students had to write a descriptive text based on a
series of pictures. They just needed to tell what the person in that picture set did in written form. It was quite hard because they only used to describe how people
looked like or what certain places were like. From the results of the pre-test, the researcher found that the students had
acquired various scores. The ideal mean of the pre-test scores was 55.5. This type of mean is calculated by adding up the highest score and the lowest score and then
dividing it by two. The group of participants was considered having a good achievement if the empirical mean of their scores was above the ideal mean. The
empirical mean can be calculated by adding up all scores and dividing it by the number of students in class.
The numbers below presented the students’ pre-test scores and the
empirical mean they had achieved.
Table 2 . Students’ Pre-test Writing Scores
Score Category
f Interpretation
∑
69.5 – 76.3
Excellent 2
62.6 – 69.4
Very good 3
Good 14
34.15 55.7
– 62.5 Good
9
