30 design of Edmodo is similar to Facebook, it is more secure because it is a cloud-
based collaboration and it only focuses on educational websites. By using Edmodo the teachers play role as the users and the students only can join the class
by entering the code that the teacher has given to them. As users, teachers can add any files related to the material, assignments and can also make some quizzes. On
the other hand, the students also can access this website in order to download the files or to do the assignments. Using Edmodo as an educational social networking
site offers an opportunity to connect with students and helps them create norms and reflect on how different online actions will be interpreted.
In other words, Edmodo is a part of learning management system LMS. According to Berking and Gallagher 2013, Cobb and Steele 2013, and Richard
2010, the definition of Learning Management System LMS is a software package in the form of web-based systems used to manage learning resources,
administrative functions, assessments, and grading. Based on that definition, it means that Learning Management System LMS is one of the good educational
websites for the teacher and students because it provides some facilities used in learning process and it uses a modern technology in terms of internet where most
of the people in the world used. In addition, because the use of Edmodo as one of parts in Learning
Management System LMS is not really different from Facebook, the focus of using this website is only for writing skills especially for writing descriptive text.
Based on the definition which is described by some experts above, writing is a system for representing and communicating some ideas of a spoken language in
31 written. Because this research only focuses on descriptive text, the use of Edmodo
here is a medium use where the students can share and publish their works related to descriptive text. Hopefully, the use of Edmodo can help the students to develop
their writing skills.
32
CHAPTER III METHODOLOGY
This chapter presents a rationale for the methods of research and analysis. This chapter is divided into six parts: the research method, the research setting,
the research participants, the instruments and the data gathering technique, data
analysis technique, and research procedure.
A. Research Method
The methodology used in this research is quantitative research. According to Ary, Jacobs, Sorensen, and Razavieh 2010 quantitative research is a research
which deals with questions of relationship, cause and effect, or current status that researchers can answer by gathering and analyzing the numeric data p. 39.
Quantitative research may be further classified as either experimental or non- experimental. In this research, the quantitative research was classified as non-
experimental quantitative research because the researcher conducted survey method to discover the answer of the research problems. According to Babbie
1973 surveys are frequently conducted for the purpose of making descriptive assertions about some population: discovering the distribution of certain traits or
attributes p. 57. In this regard, the researcher is not concerned why the observed distribution exists, but merely what that distribution is.
However, according to Albaum and Tull 1973, p. 2, a survey method is a term that is susceptible to a variety of interpretation. It connotes a project to get
33 information from a sample of people by use of a questionnaire or a personal
interview. A survey may involve observation of respondent ’s behavior, or
evidence of such behavior, in conjunction with or separately from the asking question. Therefore, survey method is always concerned with the behavioral
members of the population of interest. Based on those explanations, Albaum et al. 1973, p. 3 state survey method as the systematic gathering of information from
a sample of respondents for the purpose of understanding and predicting some aspect of the behavior of the population of interest. Thus, Ary et al. 2010, p. 372
describe that in survey method,
investigators ask questions about peoples’ beliefs, opinions, characteristics, and behavior. Surveys also permit the researcher to
summarize the characteristics of different groups or to measure their attitudes and opinions toward some issues. Afterwards, the survey was also used to identify the
students’ perception on the use of Edmodo in writing descriptive text. Art et al. 2010, p. 28 state that the survey method is also called
descriptive research. It uses instruments such as questionnaires and interviews to gather information from groups of individuals. Particularly, the researcher used
three instruments in form of questionnaire, interview and direct observation to obtain the data. The questionnaire was used for collecting the data in order to
answer the research questions. Then, the interview and the observation were aimed to enrich the data which is related to the
student’s perception on the use of Edmodo in writing descriptive and how Edmodo helps the students in developing
their writing skills. Moreover, the goal of using three instruments in this research was not to compare the findings of each instrument but rather to combine them in
34 order to get the findings. Therefore, in this research, the researcher preferred to
triangulate the data which were collected by distributing the questionnaire, doing interview, and doing observation.
B. Research Setting
This research was conducted in SMP N 2 Yogyakarta, particularly for the first grade of junior high school students. The researcher implemented Edmodo on
February until April 2015. Then, the researcher distributed the questionnaire and interviewed the respondents on 18 May 2015.
C. Research Participants
The participants of this research were the first grade of junior high school students. Moreover, this research was also conducted only in writing descriptive
text materials. However, the researcher conducted this research by using three instruments in the form of questionnaire, interview and direct observation in order
to collect the data. Therefore, the researcher chose different numbers of the participants for each instrument.
In this research, the total population was 63 respondents who came from the first grade of junior high school. They were the students who had studied
descriptive text by using Edmodo. In order to collect the data from the questionnaire, the researcher selected 30 students as the sample. According to Ary
et al. 2010, p.148, the small group that is observed is called a sample, and the larger group about which the generalization is made is called a population.
35 Therefore, a sample is a portion of population. The sample used for gathering the
data from questionnaire was a purposive sampling. Ary et al. 2010, p. 156 state that purposive sampling is also referred to as judgment sampling; sample elements
judged to be typical, or representative, are chosen from the population. In other words, a purposive sampling is one of sampling that is selected based on the
knowledge of a population and the purpose of the research. The subjects were selected because of some characteristics. The researcher chose 30 students as the
sample of this research because they had same opportunity to be a respondent, then the researcher also considered that those students had implemented Edmodo
in writing descriptive text. Therefore, the researcher decided to choose those 30 students as the research participants who fulfilled the requirements of this
research. The researcher believed that they were able to give the information needed to complete the data.
In addition, in this research the researcher also employed a stratified sampling which was used for gathering the data from the interview. Stratified
sampling is a form of probability sampling which is used when the population consists of a number of subgroups, or strata that may differ in the characteristics
being studied. According to Ary et al. 2010, p, 153 in stratified sampling, the researcher has to identify the strata of interest and then randomly draw a specified
number of subjects from each stratum. The basis for stratification maybe geographic or may involve characteristics of the population such as income,
occupation, gender, age, year in college, or teaching level. The advantage of
36 stratified sampling is that it enables the researcher to look for the differences that
might exist between various subgroups of a population. Since the 30 students were chosen as the respondents in order to obtain the
data from the questionnaire, the researcher also took some students from that sample by using stratified sampling as the respondents for the interview. The
researcher chose 6 students from the same sample. The researcher decided to use stratified sampling because the researcher categorized those students into three
types based on their learning level. The learning level that the researcher used is high, medium, and low level, so each level consisted of two students.
As stated before, the researcher used three different kinds of research instruments: questionnaire, interview, and direct observation. The total
respondents of the questionnaire were 30 students and the total respondents of the interview were 6 students who were selected from the same sample by using
stratified sampling.
D. Instrument and Data Gathering Technique
To answer the research questions, the researcher employed three instruments: questionnaire, interview, and direct observation and the further
explanation will be explained in the following page as follows:
1. Questionnaire
The researcher used questionnaire in order to obtain the data based on the respondent’s response towards the questions given. The results of this
questionnaire will be used as the main data of this research. According to Wilson
