Identification of the Problems
not paying attention to the teacher. It turned out that most of the students had a mindset that English is a difficult subject and they did not even make an effort.
Even though the skill taught that day was writing which was a productive skill, almost all of the students did not bring a dictionary. The teacher said in the
interview that the students still lacked in vocabulary mastery. Therefore, when productive skills were taught, the students did not bring any dictionary which they
were supposed to. Actually, dictionaries were available in the library for the students to borrow, but they were not willing to borrow it. A few of students
actually brought their own dictionary, but they were reluctant to open it when it was needed. The students also had low motivation in learning English. It was
shown by their little interest during the teaching and learning process. When the researcher checked the students’ writing, the researcher found that the students
had difficulties in generating ideas. The proofs were: the texts written were mostly short; many details were missing in the text; and there were not many supporting
ideas to support the main idea in the text. The students had difficulties in organizing their texts as well. Their texts were badly organized. Some texts did
not focus on the subject supposedly written, some discussed different topics in one paragraph, and some others were not developed well. They also lacked in
vocabulary mastery that they would use wrong words. Thus, their ideas were wrongly expressed in their sentences. Other than that, the students would just
translate their sentences directly from Indonesian and their sentences ended up being unnatural. Another problem related to the students wa
s the students’ difficulties in writing with the use of correct grammar. Some students still could
not spell English words well, even for the common English words. They also could not arrange their sentences well that sometimes their sentences did not make
any sense. The second problem was concerned with the teacher. The teacher could not
attract the students ’ attention that the students did not show their interests in
answering the teacher’s questions. The last problem was related to the media used during the teaching and
learning process. The media used by the teacher was not sufficient. Sometimes the teacher would use the computer room to show the students slide shows videos by
using a projector. The teacher used the computer room because only a few classes were occupied with a projector. However, it was done approximately only once a
month. The teacher rarely used media to teach English, especially for writing skills that the teaching process was quite monotonous.
Other than the results gained from the field notes, the researcher also used questionnaires to know more about the factors that may cause the problems. After
distributing the questionnaires about the students’ learning style preference, the researcher found that the major learning style preference of class VIIID students
in SMP N 1 Rembang was visual. Based on the results of the interview, questionnaires, and observation
conducted with the teacher and the students, there were some problems that could be identified. When the teacher came to the class, the students were still not ready
to study. Some of the students made noise in the class. The students were bored during the teaching and learning process of writing. The students gave little
attention to the teachers explanation. The students did not bring any dictionary. Some students were reluctant to open the dictionary. Some students showed low
interest in answering the teachers questions. The media used by the teacher was not sufficient. The media used by the teacher could not motivate and give the
students enjoyment in participating in the teaching and learning process. The students had low motivation in learning. The students had limited vocabulary
mastery and sometimes used wrong English words to express their ideas. The students considered writing as a difficult skill to master. The students lacked idea
to write. Most of the students had difficulties in generating and developing ideas in writing a text. Other than that, the students found it difficult to organize
sentences into good paragraphs that they did not organize their texts according to the generic structure taught. They also directly translated their Indonesian
sentences into English. In conclusion, all aspects related to the students, the teacher, the material, and
the media need to be improved. The improvement can be reached by finding ways which could minimize the problems mentioned above and at the same time
improve the quality of the teaching and learning process.