33 observation checklists and the teacher only needed to check it based on the reality
of the class. The third stage was collecting and analyzing the data evidences. In this
stage, the researcher began to collect the students‟ diaries which should be submmitted twice a week, on Friday and Tuesday. The researcher also gave some
feedback for the students‟ writing in each meeting. The feedback was delivered
orally, written, and in the form of some exercises in the meetings on Tuesday. The researcher should collect and analyze
all of the data including in the students‟ results from the class exercises to see their improvement.
The last stage was reflection. In this stage, the researcher had to reflect all of the things which happened during the implementation. After conducting the last
stage, the researcher could see what the things should be improved and what the things should be kept for the next cycle. Then, the researcher could decide
whether the implementation of weekly diary had overcome the students‟ problems
or not.
B. Research Setting
The researcher conducted this classroom action research for the students of class VIIID of SMPN 1 Wungu. This school is located on Madiun, East Java.
The researcher conducted this research from March 26, 2013 until April 17, 2013.
34
C. Research Participants
The participants of this research were students of VIIID in SMPN 1 Wungu. The class consisted of 10 female students and 9 male students. The
academic year was 20122013. At that time, they were at the second semester of eighth grade and they were learning the materials of a recount text. Then, in the
preliminary study, the researcher found that they had some problems in writing a recount text
D. Instruments and Data Gathering Technique
There were some instruments used by the researcher during this research. They were field notes, questionnaires, interviews, observation checklist, and the
students‟ diaries.
1. Field Notes
The researcher made the field notes when the strategy was implemented in the classroom. She obser
ved the students‟ improvement overcoming their problems in writing a recount text during the implementation of weekly diary
assignment followed by the teachers‟ feedback. According to Dovey 2012 field
notes itself is Notes made by the researcher in the course of qualitative fieldwork, often
observations of participants, locations or events. These may constitute the whole data collected for a project as in an observational project or add to
it as when field notes supplement conventional interview data As cited in Wallace, 1998, P. 120.
When the researcher conducted the preliminary study, she also used field notes as the instrument to observe the teacher in classroom.
35
Besides, the researcher always used it during taking action in the class like taking notes some information as date time, class, number present, absentees,
work done, homework, etc., as cited by Wallace 1998. Wallace 1998 also states that field notes could help the researcher to
prevent her hard-won experience, ebbing away and being lost in the tide of pressur
es caused by „getting on with the next thing‟ p. 58.
2. Questionnaires
The researcher distributed questionnaires twice during this research. The first questionnaire was distributed for all of the students in the preliminary study
to convince what the real problems which were faced by the students were. The second questionnaire was distributed for all of the students at the end of the
research to know whether the implementation of weekly diary assignment improved students‟ writing abilities in writing a recount text or not.
These are the sample of the questionnaires:
Table 3.1 The Sample of Questionnaire in Preliminary Study
No. Pernyataan
SANGAT TIDAK
SETUJU TIDAK
SETUJU SETUJU
SANGAT SETUJU
1. Saya
menyukai kegiatan
menulis dalam Bahasa Inggris Jelaskan alasanmu
2. Kemampuan menulis Bahasa
Inggris saya sangat baik 3.
Saya selalu mendapatkan nilai yang
baik pada
kegiatan menulis dalam Bahasa Inggris
4. Saya
pernah menuliskan
pengalaman masa lalu saya dalam Bahasa Inggris
5. Saya mempunyai kendala pada
saat menulis dalam Bahasa Inggris
terutama menulis
tentang pengalaman masa lalu
36
Table 3.2 The Sample of Questionnaire at the end of the Third Cycle
No. Pernyataan
SANGAT TIDAK
SETUJU TIDAK
SETUJU SETUJU
SANGAT SETUJU
1. Saya semakin menyukai pelajaran Bahasa
Inggris. 2.
Menulis dalam Bahasa Inggris adalah kegiatan yang semakin menyenangkan untuk saya.
3. Menulis
pengalaman pribadi
berbentuk recount
dalam diary adalah hal yang menarik. 4.
Saya mengerjakan sendiri tugas weekly diary dengan tertib. 2x seminggu
5. Weekly
diary banyak
membantu saya
meningkatkan kemampuan menulis saya, terutama menulis pengalaman pribadi dalam
bahasa Inggris berbentuk recount.
Wallace 1998 states “we use questionnaires and interviews when we
want to tap into the knowledge, opinions, ideas, and experiences of our learners, fellow teachers, parents,
or whatever” p. 124. In other words, the researcher wanted to know students‟ opinion based on their experiences during the
implementation of weekly diary assignment. Wallace 1998, p. 124 also adds that questionnaires are more effective than the other instrument because it can save the
time and structured systematically. Burns 2009 divides questionnaires into three types as cited by
Nugroho, 2011, p. 35. They are closed items, scaled items, and open-ended items. The researcher used scale items as the form of each questionnaire. She used
Likert Scale which consists of four scales, such as strongly agree, agree, disagree, and strongly disagree. Besides, the researcher completed the questionnaires with
some questions which are included into open-ended items.
37
3. Interviews
In this research, the researcher conducted interviews twice, in the preliminary study and at the end of the research. After distributing the
questionnaires, the researcher thought that she needed to convince the students ‟
problems deeply by interviewing a few of the students. Through interview, the researcher could explore the students‟ opinion clearly. The form of the interviews
were open-ended questions. Even though, the researcher also adjusted some additional questions which developed during the interviews. Therefore, Wallace
1998, p. 146 states that interviews are more flexible to know someone ‟s opinion.
In the preliminary study, the researcher interviewed the teacher and three students based on the teacher‟s suggestion. The first student was the student who
had high-ability in writing, the second was the student who had moderate-ability in writing, and the third was the student who had low-ability in writing. The
researcher interviewed the teacher to know deeply about the students‟ condition, especially in writing the text, what their difficulties in writing a text in English
were, and the roots of th e students‟ problems in writing a recount text. Besides,
the researcher‟s interview questions for the students were about their difficulties in writing a recount text deeply.
At the end of this research, the researcher interviewed three students who got the highest score, moderate score and the lowest score of the last two diaries.
Those students could explain the more things which had not been explained in the questionnaires. The researcher asked how the weekly diary assignment could help
38
them to improve their writing abilities in writing a recount text, whether they liked this assignment or not and the reasons why they liked it or did not like it.
4. Observation Checklist
As stated by Wallace 1998, p. 146, observation checklist is one of some forms of observation in the learning process. During the implementation of
weekly diary assignment, the researcher conducted 8 meetings in the class. The English teacher attended the class as the observer. The researcher gave two
observation checklists in every meeting. An observation checklist was aimed at observing the researcher and another was aimed at observing the students.
This is the sample of the observation checklist:
Table 3.3 The Sample of observation checklist for observing students
No Statements
Yes No
1 The teacher checks the students‟ readiness
2 The teacher explains the materials clearly
3 The teacher give clear instruction to the
students for each activity 4
The teacher masters the materials 5
The teacher explains about weekly diary assignment and the purpose clearly
39
Table 3.4 The Sample of Observation Checklist for Observing the Researcher
The results of observation checklists could help the researcher to know what went well and what did not go well. The teacher did not write her opinion in
the observation sheets. She would rather tell the researcher for the things that needed to improve briefly at the end of the class.
5. Students’ Diaries
The main instrument of this research was the students‟ diaries collected
from three cycles of the weekly diary assignment. The researcher asked them to provide a notebook as the diary. The researcher provided the same book covers
for all of the students of VIIID. It was aimed at making them be tidy. The students had to submit their diaries twice a week individually. They
wrote their past experiences in the form of a recount text based on the topic given on that book as their diaries. They had decided a certain topic which had been
agreed together. There were three cycles which were conducted by the researcher. The students had submitted six writing in the form of a recount text for three
cycles. The s tudents‟ diaries were the main evidence explaining whether their
writing abilities in writing a recount text had improved or not.
No Statements
Yes No
1 The students are ready to follow lesson
2 The students pay attention to the teacher‟s
explanation 3
The students conduct all the task given by the teacher seriously
4 The students ask questions and answer
teacher‟s questions actively 5
The students are active to come in front of the class to write their answers
40
Besides, the students got some written and oral feedback from the researcher
in the class. The teacher‟s feedback was also given in the form of some exercises which were conducted in a meeting. The exercise was the analysis of the
stud ents‟ writing in their diaries.
The data was gathered based on the stages conducted by the researcher. They were the preliminary study, planning, action, collecting and analyzing data,
and reflection. At the first time, the researcher had to collect enough data to convince the
stud ents‟ problem in writing a recount text. The researcher made some field notes
while observing the class. Then, the researcher collected some additional data by interviewing the students and the teacher, and distributing the questionnaire to the
students. After that, the researcher decided to use the weekly diary assignment. Then, the researcher asked the students to submit their past experiences in
the form of recount text in their diaries twice a week. The researcher had to check the students‟ writing one by one and gave the written feedback and the scores.
The researcher had to analyze their improvement week by week. Besides, the researcher gathered the data from
students‟ exercises which were included into the teacher‟s feedback.
The researcher also collected the teacher‟s observation checklist to help the reseacher to know what went well and what did not go well in class during the
implementation of weekly diary assignment. After getting all of the data, the researcher made some reflection of the
result to decide whether she had to continue to the next cycle or not. After the
41 third cycle, the students‟ writing abilities in the recount text had improved. The
last data was gathered through distributing the second questionnaires and interviewing three students. Finally, the researcher concluded that the
implementation of weekly diary assignment improved the students‟ writing
abilities in a recount text for the students of VIII D of SMPN 1 Wungu.
E. Data Analysis Technique
After gathering the data, the researcher analyzed them. The researcher used the data triangulation to get the validity. According to John Elliott 2007,
triangulation is collect pedagogical data from three points of view: of the teacher, his or
her students, and an external observer. In some contexts the pedagogical situation may be far more complex, involving perhaps a team of teachers
with different subject specialisms, members and representatives of the local community, as well as students and perhaps an external observer
occasionally p. 2.
The researcher triangulated the data by discussing all of the activities given to the students with the teacher as external observer and looking at the curriculum.
All of the activities during the implementation of weekly diary assignment were based on the theories written in the second chapter of this thesis.
The next data were the field notes and the observation checklist. The analysis of those data was in descriptive form. The researcher analyzed all of the
notes from field notes to describe the things related to this research like the condition of the class, the condition of the students, and everything happened
during the implementation in the class. The observation checklists were also
42
analyzed in descriptive form. It helped the researcher to give some supporting data in the fourth chapter.
The researcher also distributed questionnaires as the data to identify what the real problems faced by the students were. The researcher used Likert Scale as
the form of the questionnaires. The researcher analyzed the result of the questionnaire in the percentage form. Meanwhile, the researcher described the
result in descriptive form. Besides, the researcher interviewed the students. The result of interviewing students was analyzed in descriptive form. It also helped the
students to support the success of weekly diary assignment. In the preliminary study, the results of interviewing students also helped the researcher analyze the
students‟ problem in writing a recount text. The main data of this research were the students‟ diaries submitted twice a
week. The researcher analyzed the students‟ writing one by one and discussed them in the fourth chapter in the descriptive form. The researcher concluded the
success of weekly diary assignment from the description of th e students‟ writing
week by week. The students‟ writing from the first cycle until the last cycle had
improved slightly, for example, at the first time they could not make sentences properly, at the last cycle they could make sentences properly.
The researcher also put the score into the students‟ diaries. The researcher used Brown and Bailey
scoring profile to analyze the students‟ writing. In the last cycle, cycle three, the students could improve their scores and pass the minimum
passing grade. The researcher took the average score of each week diary‟s writing.
43 The researcher saw the improvement of the students‟ writing abilities from the
scores of the diary per week. Score of first diary + Score of second diary =
2
The researcher also gave some feedback in the form of some exercises in the meeting on Tuesday. The analysis depended on the exercises, as the example,
in one exercise, the students had to answer ten questions about past tense. Then, it would be analyzed in descriptive form whether they could answer the questions or
not.
F. Research Procedures
