CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION
This chapter deals with the introduction of the final project including background of the study, reason for choosing the topic, statement of the problem, objectives of the
study, significance of the study, and outline of the report.
1.1 Background of the Study
As the first foreign language in Indonesia, English has been given a special attention in education Ramelan, 1992:3. Since English has become an urgent need in
Indonesia as a means to develop Indonesian people quality, it is taught earlier at school beginning from elementary schools as a local content up to third grade of
senior high schools. But unfortunately even though various methods and approaches have been tried out to reach the purpose, the result has not been satisfactory yet.
As stated in School based curriculum 2006, the objectives of English teaching cover the four language skills: listening, speaking, writing, and reading
through the mastery of the language components: vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation. According to Wells in Ridwan 2009: 1, in the informational level,
the emphasis is on reading and writing. Writing is a productive skill that is considered the most difficult for students.
Based on my observation in my teaching practice, I found some facts that the students
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faced difficulties in generating ideas, mastering vocabulary, and using grammar in writing class. The students were lazy, bored, and inactive when teaching and learning
process was taking place. From the facts above, I can say that it is big challenge for Indonesian teachers to change these difficulties through teaching writing attractively
and communicatively. The English teacher has the responsibility to guarantee the teaching and
learning process to run well, so they need to choose the right teaching strategies and materials. The teaching materials can be from the mass media, for example,
magazines, newspapers, radio, or internet. For school students, mass media do not only have a function to get information, but also to provide a chance to learn writing.
News is any new information or information on current events which is relayed by print, broadcast, Internet, or word of mouth to a third party or mass audience. The
reporting and investigation of news falls within the profession of journalism. News is often reported by a variety of sources, such as newspapers, television, and radio
programs, wire services, and web sites. en.wikipedia.orgwikiNews accessed on January 2
nd
2011. I choose news found in Jakarta Post Newspaper because this newspaper is quite popular either for teacher and the students in Indonesia.
The reason why I choose news item is because I think that the text is more complicated and difficult to understand than other types of text. These facts are
supported by my interview with an English teacher who said that the result of students’ writing news item was very unsatisfactory. Most of them faced difficulties
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in generating ideas, organizing sentences, choosing words, and using grammar. With all of these backgrounds, I would like to observe The Use of Jakarta
Post Newspaper to Motivate Students in Writing News Item Text Based on Generic Structure, Language Features and Social Function a Case of the Tenth Grade
Students of SMA N 1 Mranggen in the Academic Year of 20102011. I want to know how well the students’ writing news item texts based on those three aspects.
1.2 Reasons for Choosing the Topic
