topic sentence. If a sentence is not relevance with the main idea in the topic sentence, this sentence should be omitted.
b. Coherence
Coherence means parts of the paragraph are logically connected. It plays an important role in making paragraphs. Carino 1991:160 says that coherence occurs
when each sentence is logical and clear from one sentence to the following sentences. Wong 1999:369 adds that coherence means the ideas and sentences flow together
smoothly in a logical, organized manner. It can be concluded that every sentence in a paragraph should connect to each other logically.
To achieve coherence, the writer needs to use transitions. Bram 1995:22 believes that it is difficult to achieve a coherence paragraph without the transitions.
According to Oshima and Hogue 1991:29, transitions signals are words and phrases that connect the idea in one sentence with the idea in another sentence. It means that
using appropriate transitions are needed to create a coherence paragraph, makes the ideas flow smoothly one after the others.
E. Content
Content is something that is to be expressed through some medium, as speech, writing, or any of various arts. In this case, content means something that is to be
expressed through writing. According to Hughey,et.al 1981:92 the content of writing deals with knowledgeable and understandable of the subject, substansive
information which supporting the main point, development method of the thesis, and the relevance of the paragraph development to the assigned topic. From this
statement, it can be inferred that content is the ability to use knowledgeable and understandable subject, developing information to support the main idea in conveying
a sense of completeness, and building the relevance of paragraph development to the assigned topic.
paragraph in easy way. Moreover, Alexander 1990:ix explains that controlled writing will enable students to master the difficulties of constructing sentence form
and bring them to a point where they will be capable of writing composition with minimum of errors. By making just a few errors, students will be motivated to
practice writing more because they will have an assumption that writing is not really difficult.
From the ideas above, it can be concluded that controlled writing has some advantages. Firstly, it is easy to mark and it does not spend much time. Secondly, it
can give practice the correct form of composition as well as fit into any level of students. Thirdly, by applying controlled writing students can practice and apply
language pattern in easy way, so that the teacher shouldn’t give complicated explanation about the language pattern used. Fourthly, it might be able to reduce the
students’ errors at least if they want to practice it frequently for a long time. This is because controlled writing can be designed from the simplest to complex one and
based on the students’ need. It is going to be very helpful when they come to free composition. Fifthly, it enables students to solve the difficulties of constructing
sentence form, so they could make gramatically correct sentences easily after being practiced writing continuously by using controlled writing.
Meanwhile, the disadvantages of controlled writing are; a The students cannot express their ideas freely; b Sometimes, it makes the students get bored because the
topics given; c It is bad for advanced students because there will be little challenge to make a writing task more vivid.
From the explanation above, it can be concluded that in teaching writing, the level of difficulties of the task should be differentiated based on the level of the
students. It is suggested for the English teacher to apply controlled writing technique for the beginner students since it reduces the students’ mistake in writing English
sentence because the tasks in controlled writing technique are designed to lead the students to write grammatical correct sentences. Therefore, controlled writing is
acceptable to be applied in the teaching of writing for the beginner students.
The Research Design of the Classroom Action Research
Adapted from Lewin, 1980 in Elliot, 1991:70
Preliminary study
-Facts finding -Problems
identification -Determining
problem to investigate
Revising some
necessary aspects
The results of test and
observation do not
achieve the targeted score
Planning of the action
-Preparing materials
-constructing the lesson plans
-Preparing the observation guide
and writing test. -Constructing
writing test -Setting the
research criteria of success
Implementation of the action
Teaching writing by using
controlled writing technique
Observation Evaluation
Administering writing test
Analysis and
Reflection
Cycle stops Reporting
the result
The results of test and
observation achieve the
targeted research
objectives
14. Drawing a conclusion to answer the research problems since the results of
observation and writing test in the second cycle achieved the targeted score
3.2 Area Determination Method
The research area was determined by using purposive method. Purposive method is a method used based on certain purposes and reasons Arikunto, 2006:70.
In this research, SMA Muhammadiyah 3 Jember was determined as the research area because of some considerations. Firstly, the students of class X-9 at SMA
Muhammadiyah 3 Jember still had difficulties in writing paragraph, especially in
writing descriptive paragraph. Secondly, the students at this school had the low score of writing 62,09, so it needed to be improved by applying controlled writing
technique. Thirdly, controlled writing technique with the types of controlled composition and guided composition were actually available in the students’ English
handbook, but the English teacher never used this technique in teaching writing. The last, the Principal and the English teacher gave permission to the researcher to
conduct this classroom action research in this school.
3.3 Research Subject Determination Method
Research participants are the persons who give some responds or answers to the researcher’s questions either in the oral or in the written form Mc Millan, 1992:217.
Purposive method was used to determine the research subjects in this research. The subjects of this research were the students of grade X-9 of SMA Muhammadiyah 3
Jember in the academic year of 20102011. This class was chosen based on the preliminary study that the students in this class still had problems in writing a short
paragraph, especially in descriptive paragraph writing. Moreover, from the data of English writing test given by the English teacher, it was known that the scores of the
students were various with the average score was 60 and only 57 of students got ≥70 as the standard score at this school. Therefore, this class was chosen as the
subjects of this research.
are constructed based on the 2006 Institutional Level Curriculum and are consulted first to the English teacher and the consultants.
Meanwhile, McMillan 1992:104 defines reliability as a consistency of scores or the extent to which measures are free from errors. If measurement has high
reliability, it has relatively little errors. To ensure that the result of the test is reliable, inter-rater reliability was applied in this research, which means the writing produced
by the students in the test was fotocopied. Then, the researcher and the English teacher scored the result of the writing test separately.
In this research, the scoring method applied to score the students’ writing was analytical scoring method. Hughes 2003:100 defines analytic scoring method as a
method of scoring which requires a separate score for each of aspects of a task. In this case, there were five aspects that were scored analitically, they were; grammar,
vocabulary, mechanics, organization, and content. In controlled composition test, the focus of scoring was on the aspect of grammar, while in guided composition test the
focus of scoring was on the aspects of grammar, vocabulary, mechanics, organization, and content.
The following table is the scoring criteria to score the students’ paragraph writing.
COMPOSITION PROFILE
ASPECT OF WRITING
SCORE
CRITERIA
CO NT
E NT
16-14
EXCELLENT TO VERY GOOD: Knowledgeable Substantive Thorough development
Relevant to assigned topic
13-10
GOOD TO AVERAGE: Some knowledge of subject adequate range limited development
thesis Mostly relevant to topic but lack of details
9-7
FAIR TO POOR: Limited knowledge of Subject little substance inadequate development of
topic
6-5
VERY POOR: does not show knowledge of subject little substance not pertinent OR not
enough to evaluate
O R
G A
N IZA
TI ON
16-14
EXCELLENT TO VERY GOOD: fluent expression ideas clearly stated supported
succinct well organized logical sequencing
13-10
GOOD TO AVERAGE: somewhat choppy loosely organized but main ideas stand out
limited support logical but incomplete sequencing
9-7
FAIR TO POOR:
non fluent ideas confused or disconnected lack logical sequencing and development
