The Implementation of Picture-Cued Tasks in Writing Class: An Action Research at SMA Muhammadiyah 4 Yogyakarta
The Implementation of Picture-Cued Tasks in Writing Class: An
Action Research at SMA Muhammadiyah 4 Yogyakarta
A Skripsi
Submitted to the Faculty of Language Education
In a Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of
Sarjana Pendidikan
Nur Anggraini Saputra
2012 054 0045
English Education Department
Faculty of Language Education
Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta
2016
Statement of Authenticity
I hereby certify that this skripsi is definitely my original work. I am
completely responsible for the content of this skripsi. Any theories, findings, and
research techniques which are not my own work are quoted or cited in accordance
with the standard referencing practices. Theoretical contribution and findings in
this skripsi are truly my original words and have not been submitted for any
degrees in other Universities or Institutions.
Yogyakarta, June 2016
The researcher,
Nur Anggraini S
iii
Acknowledgement
First of all, I thank to Allah Subhanahu Wata’ala for his blessing and
mercy until I am able to accomplish my skripsi. I want to express my deepest
gratitude to my beloved father and mother. Thank you for your unstoppable
support till now. I sincerely thank to my beloved sister and little brother for being
my spirit in accomplishing this skripsi.
Secondly, tons of thanks to my beloved supervisor Mrs. Sri Rejeki
Murtiningsih, Ph.D. who has provided support and help throughout this skripsi. I
also thank to my examiners who had given the valuable input and advice for the
improvement of this skripsi.
I also would like to thank to the headmaster of SMA Muhammadiyah 4
Yogyakarta who has helped and allowed me to conduct the research. Special
thanks also goes to my research participants. Thank you for your help and
cooperation during the action.
I also dedicate this skripsi to my beloved Tivani, Anisa, Dallia, Erlin,
Dewi, Reni, Erni, and Lina. This skripsi would not be finished without your big
support. I also thank to Teguh, Sulis, Ghofar, Iskandar, and Aris for always
supporting me. Thanks for providing me some amazing vacations during the
completion of my skripsi. That means a lot to me.
I truly realize that this skripsi still needs constructive critics to be a
remarkable skripsi. I do hope this skripsi can be useful for readers especially for
students of English Edcucation Department Universitas Muhammadiyah
Yogyakarta.
Yogyakarta, June 2016
Nur Anggraini S.
iv
Table of Contents
Cover ..........................................................................................................
i
Approval Sheet ...........................................................................................
ii
Statement of Authenticity ..........................................................................
iii
Acknowledgement ......................................................................................
iv
Table of Contents .......................................................................................
v
List of Table ...............................................................................................
viii
List of Figures ............................................................................................
ix
List of Appendices .....................................................................................
x
Abstract ......................................................................................................
xi
Chapter One .............................................................................................
1
Introduction ................................................................................................
1
Background of the Study .......................................................................
1
Statement of the Problems .....................................................................
4
Scope of the Problems ...........................................................................
6
Research Question .................................................................................
7
Purpose of the Study ..............................................................................
7
Significance of the Study ......................................................................
7
Outline of the Research .........................................................................
8
Chapter Two .............................................................................................
9
Literature Review .......................................................................................
9
Writing Skill ..........................................................................................
9
v
Process of Writing .................................................................................
10
Problems in Writing ..............................................................................
12
Types of Text .........................................................................................
15
Narrative Text ........................................................................................
17
Picture-Cued Tasks ................................................................................
18
Varieties of Picture-Cued Tasks .............................................................
19
Picture-Cued Tasks in Teaching and Learning Writing ........................
21
Previous Study .......................................................................................
23
Conceptual Framework .........................................................................
25
Chapter Three ..........................................................................................
28
Research Methodology ...............................................................................
28
Design of the Study ...............................................................................
28
Setting of the Study ...............................................................................
30
Subject of the Study ..............................................................................
30
Procedure of the Study ..........................................................................
30
Data Collection Method ........................................................................
34
Instruments of the Study ........................................................................
35
Data Analysis ........................................................................................
37
Chapter Four ............................................................................................
38
Findings and Discussion ............................................................................
38
The Implementation of Picture-cued Tasks ...........................................
39
The Students’ Responses on the Use of Picture-cued Tasks .................
51
Discussion .............................................................................................
56
vi
Chapter Five .............................................................................................
59
Conclusion and Suggestions ......................................................................
59
Conclusion .............................................................................................
59
Suggestion .............................................................................................
60
References ..................................................................................................
62
Appendices .................................................................................................
65
vii
List of Table
Table 3.1 Action Research Plan ..................................................................
33
Table 3.2 Two Column Notes ....................................................................
36
Table 4.1 The Students’ Condition (Before and After Implementing) ......
50
viii
List of Figure
Figure 2.1 Picture-Cued Sentence Writing Task ........................................
19
Figure 2.2 Picture-Cued Story Sequence ...................................................
21
Figure 2.3 Conceptual Framework .............................................................
27
Figure 3.1 Action Research Model ............................................................
29
ix
List of Appendices
Appendix 1. Research Permit .....................................................................
65
Appendix 2. Research Completion ............................................................
66
Appendix 3. Picture-cued Tasks ................................................................
67
Appendix 4. Interview Guidelines .............................................................
71
Appendix 5. Research Activities ................................................................
73
x
Abstract
This study is conducted to describe the implementation of picture-cued tasks in
writing class. Writing becomes an important and challenging skill in language
learning. Writing is needed in many aspects especially in educational aspect.
However, many students have problems in their writing such as lack of
vocabularies, lack of grammar knowledge, and lack of ideas. Therefore, it is
necessary to have teaching strategies to solve the students’ problems in writing.
One of the strategies is using picture-cued tasks. Hence, this study clarified in
detail about how picture-cued tasks helped solve the students’ problem in writing.
The students’ responses toward the implementation of picture-cued tasks is also
described in this study. I used action research in this study. This study took place
at SMA Muhammadiyah 4 Yogyakarta and the participants were the students of
class 11 IPS 3. I used observation and interview to collect the data. The findings
of this study uttered that picture-cued tasks could solve the students’ problem in
writing such as problems in mastering vocabularies and generating ideas.
However, picture-cued tasks did not work well to solve the students’ problem in
using past tense. Thus, it is necessary to combine other teaching strategies to get
the best performance on the students’ writing.
Keywords: Picture-cued tasks, writing skill, narrative text
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1
Chapter One
Introduction
The points that will be discussed in this chapter are the background of the
study, the statement of the problems, the scope of the problem, the research
questions, the purpose of the study, the significance of the study, and the outline
of the research.
Background of the Study
Mastering language skills are needed in using a language. Saragih,
Silalahi, and Pardede (2014) asserted that in order to be able to communicate and
socialize with a group of people, every person should be able to master the four
basic skills in using the language; speaking, listening, reading, and writing. It
means that every person is able to convey their messages, thoughts, and feelings
by using a language skill. By mastering the language skills, people will be able to
comprehend and use a language easily. Besides, people will be more easily to
convey a message when they master the language skills well.
Writing is one of the basic language skills that should be mastered by
every person. Writing is a form of written communication which is important in
many things such as academic field, business field, and political field. For
example, in academic field, writing is needed for students to produce an academic
writing. The form of academic writing can be an essay or a report. Students must
be able to write well in order to make a good academic writing by considering the
aspects of writing such as content, grammar, word choices, syntax, organization,
2
and mechanics. Therefore, writing is a language skill that students obligate to
master.
Writing is also challenging for some students. These days, there are
several problems that many students face in their writing such as lack of
motivation, lack of idea, and lack of grammar knowledge. First, many students in
these days are lazy when they are asked to write anything. As I have experienced,
I felt that I did not have a mood when the teacher asked me to write. That problem
is caused by lacking of motivation. Students do not have enough motivation in
writing so that they feel lazy when they have a writing task.
The second problem is caused by lacking of ideas. Nowadays, many
students feel hard to gain and express their ideas into a writing. They even have
difficulties in starting their writing because they do not know how to start. As said
by Tho (2000) as cited in Tuan (2010, p. 81), “non-native writers may not have
enough ideas to write down or, even worse, they have nothing to say.” It means
that English Foreign Language (EFL) learners have problems in discovering ideas.
In addition, Negari (2011) said that writing in academic context is difficult to
learn for students since they do not know how to generate ideas when they are
writing. In this case, generating ideas is the basic stage in writing. If the students
have a problem in generating ideas, then they will get difficulties to make a
writing.
Furthermore, lack of grammar knowledge is also one of the students’
problems in writing. Seyabi and Tuzlukova (2014) have found that most of the
students in Omani school, Southwestern Asia, which is mostly English Foreign
3
Language (EFL) learners have problem with lexical and contents aspect of
writing. In writing, people should be in touch with grammatical aspect. It is
because to make a good writing, people should consider some lexical things such
as organization, subject-verb agreement, punctuation, and spelling. Considering
those problems that occur to the students in these days, writing can be said as the
challenging skill in language.
Consequently, it is necessary to have teaching strategies that are
appropriate and comfortable for students in order to solve the students’ problems
in writing. There are four strategies in teaching writing that can be used, such as
using picture, using reading, using translation, and using all language skills.
Strategy in using picture here means the teacher use picture as a media in
teaching-learning process. While strategy in using reading here according to
Raimes (1983) is a strategy when the students create their own writing based on
text that they read. For example, students are asked to summarize a text or make a
speculation based on the text. In addition, a strategy in using translation is a
strategy when the students are asked to translate a text into a target language.
Then, Raimes (1983) stated that strategy in using all language skill is a strategy
that is involving all language skills. This strategy can be applied in group of three.
The first student is asked to speak about one topic. Then, the second student must
write what he has heard and comprehended. The third student will read the second
student’s writing. From those strategies, the appropriate strategies to be
implemented in this study was the strategy in using picture. It was because picture
is an interesting media that provide a real-life situation and the participants of this
4
study were mostly hyperactive students. By using picture in the teaching-learning
process, it can make the students pay attention to the classroom activity and more
interested in learning narrative text. Thus, based on those reasons, this research
focused on the strategy in using picture.
A picture has been often used in teaching-learning process. I used picture
as a media because picture has been familiar among students and it provides a
real-life situation. Thus, by seeing a picture, students can feel the atmosphere of
the picture. Furthermore, there are many kinds of pictures, such as picture
sequence, picture story and picture series. Brown (2004) proposed those kind of
pictures that are integrated with some clues of questions namely picture-cued
tasks. Picture-cued tasks are good for stimulating students’ written responses
(Brown, 2004). It means picture-cued tasks can stimulate students to write
anything. Students will have some ideas when they are seeing a picture. Thus, it
can stimulate students’ willingness in writing. Considering the explanation above,
I am interested in knowing the implementation of picture-cued tasks in writing
class.
Statement of the Problems
In language learning, the first thing that students must learn is about four
basic skills in English language; speaking, listening, reading, and writing. From
those skills, writing is the hardest skill to be learned. Based on my observation
during the internship program that was held at SMA Muhammadiyah 4
Yogyakarta, there were several problems that were faced by the students in their
writing such as; lack of practice, problems in using correct grammar and
5
vocabulary, and problem in teaching-learning process. The first problem was
lacking of practice. There were many students who could not write anything. Most
of them had difficulties in expressing their ideas into a writing. There were also
students who had no idea at all. That problem was caused by lacking of practice.
Besides, the lack of practice session that was given by the teachers also became
the students’ problem in writing. Therefore, both of the students and the teacher
should provide more time to practice the students’ writing skill.
The second problem came from the using of correct grammar and
vocabulary. There were many students who had difficulties in determining the
word choices and grammar used. Aydogan and Akbarov (2014) also emphasized
their statement on the difficulties of writing skills as a follow:
Writing is the productive skill in the written mode. It, too, is more
complicated than it seems at first, and often seems to be the hardest of the
skills, even for native speakers of a language, since it involves not just a
graphic representation of speech, but the development and presentation of
thoughts in a structured way. (p. 674)
It means that writing is the hardest skills in language. It is because people must
pay attention to the unity and coherence elements when they are writing. It is
different from speaking skill which just pays attention to the message that will be
delivered.
The third problem deals with teaching-learning process. I saw that some
teachers in the research’s place rarely encourage the students to write. They only
asked the students to pay attention to the teacher’s explanation and did some
6
assignments. I saw that some teachers only focused on the cognitive aspect
without giving the students opportunities to practice their skills. That statement is
in line with Ariningsih (2010) who stated that the teacher has not given chances to
the students to train and improve their writing and has not given right treatment to
solve the students’ writing problem. Thus, based on those problems, writing is
very important to be learned because it is considering that writing is the hardest
skill in English language.
Therefore, based on those problems, the strategy that is appropriate to use
in overcoming the students’ problem in writing is using picture-cued task. Besides
picture provides a real-life situation, pictures can also provide many tasks.
Therefore, it will be easier to use in the teaching-learning process. Thus, I want to
know the implementation of picture-cued tasks as a strategy in teaching writing.
Scope of the Problems
The scope of the research is limited to discuss about the implementation of
picture-cued tasks in writing narrative texts. I chose narrative text because it was
appropriate with picture-cued tasks which was about telling a story. Then, it was
also based on the syllabus. In addition, students have studied narrative text since
junior high school. Thus, it will be easier for the students because they have
familiar with narrative text. In addition, the respondent of this research was also
limited to 11th grade. The meeting for doing the research was limited to four times
meeting. It was because the time’s restriction to do the research.
7
Research Questions
Based on the background above, the research questions addressed in this
study are:
1. How do picture-cued tasks help solve the students’ writing problem?
2. What are students’ responses on the use of picture-cued tasks in writing
class?
Purpose of the Study
There are some purposes of this research that related with the research
questions above. Here are the goals of this research:
1. to see the implementation of picture-cued tasks whether it helps solve
the students’ problem in writing.
2. to find out the students’ responses toward the implementation of
picture-cued tasks in writing class.
Significance of the Study
There are several benefits of this study that can be used by the teachers,
the students, the researcher, and future researcher. The significance of this study is
described as a follow:
The teachers. This research can be the reference for the teacher to find the
interesting teaching strategies for teaching writing. This research can also be the
reference to use different strategies in teaching writing by using picture-cued
tasks.
The students. For students in the research’s place, this research will
motivate the students to write and encourage the students to improve their writing
8
ability. Besides, for English Education Department students, this research can be a
reference for teaching writing in the internship program.
The researcher. I can get new experience in teaching writing using
picture-cued tasks and explore more interesting teaching strategies for teaching
writing.
Future researchers. This research can be a reference for the future
researcher to do the same research in different place. This research can also be a
reference for the research of the future researcher.
Outline of the Research
This research encompasses five chapters. In the beginning of the research,
I discussed about the background of the study which told about the reason why
this research should be conducted and the basis of the problem in this study. I also
gave the scope of the study to limit the study that was researched. In the next
chapter, I gave an overview of writing skill, process of writing, problems in
writing, types of texts, and narrative text. Besides, I also discussed about the
picture-cued tasks, the varieties of picture-cued tasks, and picture-cued tasks in
teaching-learning activities. In the third chapter, I focused on the methodology
that was used to collect the data of the research. The next chapter discussed about
the finding of the research that will answer the research question. The last chapter
concluded the whole research including reiterating the findings of the research.
The suggestion for the teachers, the students, and the further researcher were also
discussed in this chapter.
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Chapter Two
Literature Review
This chapter deals with the basis theories that emphasize the use of picture
cued task to improve students’ writing ability. This chapter will cover the
description of writing and picture-cued tasks itself. Those theories are explained
as follow.
Writing Skill
There are four basic skills in language. They are speaking, listening,
reading, and writing. Harmer (2001) divided the language skills into two
categories. Reading and listening skills belong to receptive skills, while speaking
and writing belong to productive skills. Receptive skills mean the ways in which
people receive information from the discourse they see or hear (Harmer, 2001). It
means that people only receive the information without producing it. In contrast,
productive skills are the ways in which people receive information and produce it.
It other words, people produce what they have got in speaking or writing way.
Among those four skills, writing is one of the productive skills which
produce language in a written form. It is also supported by Aydogan and Akbarov
(2014) who stated that writing is the productive skill in a written mode. In other
words, by writing, people can express their feeling or ideas without seeing directly
to the reader. In addition, Wuzaro (2012) stated that writing is the way people
express their ideas of what they saw, heard, and felt into a form of text.
10
Besides, writing is the hardest skill in language learning. As said by
Barkaoui (2007), writing is the hardest skill for second language learners because
it needs the mastery of linguistics, cognitive, and sociocultural competencies. It is
also supported by Nunan (1989) who stated that in writing, people must be able to
organize and integrate ideas into cohesive and coherent paragraph. It means that
writing is not merely conveying a feeling or ideas in a written mode, but people
must deal with language features. Therefore, to have a good writing, people
should pay attention to the structure of the writing’s content.
Process of Writing
Producing an effective writing cannot be done in a short time. There are
several steps to do in order to produce a good writing. According to Harmer
(2004), there are four main stages in writing such as; planning, drafting, editing,
and final version. The description of each stages is explained as follow.
Planning. This stage deals with the ideas that will be written. In the
planning stages, the writers must consider three things such as purpose, audience,
and content structure. First, before they write something, they must consider the
purpose of their writing. It will influence several things including the type of text
that they will produce, the language they use, and the information they will
choose. The second is audience. It will influence the language that will be used by
the writers. The last thing that the writers must consider is the content structure. It
deals with the construction of the ideas. Considering the three things above that
the writers must consider, brainstorming can be a way to plan a writing.
11
Drafting. In this stage, the writing has been produced. However, this is
not the final version of the writing. The form of drafting is a piece of writing
which is incomplete. Drafting usually is a process of explaining some points that
has been arranged in the planning stage. In the drafting stages, a writer should be
focused only on the content that want to explain. The writing aspect like grammar,
organization, and spelling can be checked in editing stage.
Editing. After the writers produced a draft, then they should read through
what they have written. Perhaps there is some information which is not clear.
Some ambiguous and confusing sentences are also happened in writing.
Therefore, the writers should do an editing after they write their draft. Besides,
reflecting and revising from other readers are also needed to make a better
writing. In editing stage, not only the content that should be checked, but also the
grammar, spelling, and organization of the content itself.
Final version. This stage is also known as final draft. It means that this
stage has overstepped the drafting and editing process. After the writers make
change to the draft, the writers can produce their final version. The final version
means that it is the fix version of the writing. The final version of a writing can be
published in a printed or online version.
Moreover, Brown (2001) framed a writing process into three stages, such
as pre-writing, drafting, and revising. The detail information of each stage is
described as follow.
12
Pre-writing. This stage is related to generating an idea. In this stage, a
writer tries to discover some ideas that will be expressed into a writing. In
generating idea, a writer can do some ways such as, reading a passage,
brainstorming, discussing a topic in a group, and free writing.
Drafting. This stage is a core of writing process. It is because in this stage
a writer is getting started to write. A writer writes their content of writing in this
stage. In this stage, the writing has been produced but it is not in a final version.
Revising. In this stage, a writer will do an editing. Here, the content of the
writing has been finished. A writer will edit his writing by reading through his
writing. This stage can be done by doing some ways such as, peer-reviewing for
content, editing for grammatical errors, and proofreading.
Producing a writing is not always following the stages above. However, it
will be better if the writers can follow every steps in writing in order to make the
writing become more effective. Following the stages also make easy the writers to
produce a good writing.
Problems in Writing
Writing is one of productive skills which is very challenging for some
students. Writing becomes a challenging skill because there are many difficulties
in doing writing activities. In writing, there are many problems that are faced by
most students. Those problems are lacking of motivation, lacking of grammar
knowledge, lacking of vocabularies, hard to generate and develop ideas, and lack
of practice. Those problems are described below.
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Lack of motivation. The biggest problem in writing that almost students
faced is laziness. As I have experienced, I found that many students were very
lazy when they were asked to write. It can be caused by lacking of motivation.
Students did not have enough motivation to write, thus it makes them lazy to do
the writing activity. It is supported by Mettaningrum, Dantes and Suarnajaya
(2013) who said that, “students are not only lack of ability in writing, but also lack
of motivation to write.” It clears that students also have an internal problem which
is related to the students’ motivation.
Lack of grammar knowledge. Grammar also becomes the problems in
writing. It is because writing cannot be separated with the grammar context. A
good writing is not only seen from the content itself, but also it can be seen from
the grammar used. Therefore, grammar becomes a frightening thing since it is
difficult to learn. As said by Huy (2015), there are some basic mistakes in the
writing tasks that students frequently did such as grammar, spelling, punctuation
and organization. It means that students have inadequate grammar knowledge. It
is also supported by Farooq, Hassan and Wahid (2012) who said that the writing’s
difficulties that students often faced are the use of correct sentence structure and
paragraph development to create a coherent form. Therefore, it can be said that
lack of grammar knowledge is a problem in writing that students frequently faced.
Lack of vocabularies. Vocabularies is basic knowledge in learning
English. Although it is a basic thing, but there are many students who still have
limited vocabulary mastery. It is supported by Adas and Bakir (2013) who said
that English language learners frequently repeat the same word in their writing
14
because they still have limited vocabulary. It means that students often use the
same word because they cannot develop their vocabulary. That problem can affect
the students’ writing ability. It is because the vocabulary’s restriction may affect
the message that will be conveyed by the writers in their writing. According to
Seyabi and Tuzlukova (2014) based on their research’s result, lack of vocabulary
also becomes the second biggest problem for school students.
Deciding how to start. Starting to write becomes one of the problem in
writing that faced by almost students. Most of the students are confused on how to
start writing. According to Seyabi and Tuzlukova (2014), they found that deciding
how to start writing becomes the biggest problem for school students. It is clear
that deciding how to start writing becomes the one of the problem in writing.
Hard to generate and develop ideas. Writing is related to conveying a
message or ideas. Then, generating and developing ideas also becomes the
problem in writing. Almost students frequently hard to generate idea about one
topic in writing. They do not know what they are going to discuss in their writing.
Moreover, almost students feel hard to develop their ideas. Although they have
many ideas to write, it does not mean that they have not any problem in writing.
Developing the ideas that they have got also becomes their problem in writing.
Most of them have a problem in developing the ideas into a good paragraph. It is
also supported by Mettaningrum, Dantes and Suarnajaya (2013) who said that
students have problem in finding idea and developing the ideas into a good
coherent paragraph. Then, generating and developing ideas are also the problems
that students faced in their writing.
15
Lack of practice. From many problems that students faced in their
writing, there is one problem that causes they have a low writing ability. That is
lacking of practice. Almost students realize that they have low ability in writing
and they have many problems in their writing, but they rarely practice to improve
their writing ability. It can be caused by the students have no motivation in
writing or there is not enough time to practice. It is supported by Huy (2015) who
said that the students have not enough time to practice their writing in their high
school. Thus, it can be said that lack of practice in writing being one of problem
for students in writing.
Those are the problems that students commonly faced in their writing.
Those problems may affect the product of the students’ writing. Therefore, writing
can be said as the challenging skill since there are many students who faced those
problems.
Types of Text
Many types of texts have been learned since elementary school. According
to Gerrot and Wignell (1994) as cited in Akmalia (2011), there are thirteen types
of text in writing. They are narrative, recount, spoof, descriptive, procedure, news
item, explanation, discussion, analytical exposition, hortatory exposition, review,
repot, and anecdote. The first is Narrative text. Narrative text is a text that has a
social function to amuse the reader and deals with a real experience, imagination,
or crucial phenomenon in the past. There is some example of narrative text such
as folk tale, legend, fable, myth, and short story. The second one is recount text.
Recount text is a text that is reporting an event or activity of one’s experience to
16
inform or amuse the reader. The example of this text is incident report, newspaper
report, articles, letter, and journal. Thirdly, spoof is a text that is related to a funny
story. Actually, spoof text has a similarity with narrative text, but this text usually
adds some humor in the end of the story. Then, descriptive text is related to
describing someone, thing, or place in a specific way. The form of this text can be
a description of something, biography, or autobiography.
The fourth type of text is procedure. This text is telling about steps or
instructions in doing something through a sequence of steps. Recipes and manual
instruction are the example of procedure text. The next is news item. News item is
a text that informs readers about an important phenomenon or event of the day.
The events should be newsworthy. The form of this text can be a news or
informative articles. Then, explanation text is a text that is discussing about theory
that is related to the natural phenomena. The form of explanation text can be an
articles or report.
The next type is discussion text. Discussion text is a text that identifies pro
and contra about one argument. This text usually gives a recommendation in the
end of the text. Then, analytical exposition is also known as argumentative text.
This text is discussing about opinion between pro and contra. This text only
contains an argument or opinion about something. Besides, hortatory exposition is
related to discussing one problem that becomes a controversy. Hortatory
exposition usually contains a sentence that persuades the reader to agree with the
writer’s statement. Hence, this text is also known as persuasive text. The next type
is review text. Review text is a text that discusses and analyzes about one’s
17
creation. The review of a movie, book, or music is the example of review text.
The next type is report text. Report text is a text that discusses about the result of
observation or research about thing, animal, person, or place. The last type is
anecdote. Anecdote is a genre of text that tells about unusual or amusing incident.
From those thirteen kinds of text, this research focused on the students’
narrative writing. It was because narrative text was suitable with the media used.
Besides, students have been studied narrative text since junior high school. Hence,
it will be easier for the students because they have familiar with narrative text.
Narrative Text
Narrative text is one of the text types that students have familiar with.
Narrative text is a text that tells about real event or imagination that happen in the
past. In addition, Karolina (2006) stated that narrative text is a text that tells about
interesting story which has a purpose in amusing and entertaining the reader.
Narrative text has a structure. According to Anderson (1997) as cited in
Karolina (2006), the generic structure of narrative text is orientation,
complication, sequence of event, resolution, and reorientation. The first is
orientation. In orientation, there is an introduction to the character and setting of
the story. The next is complication. Complication tells the problem of the story
and how the main characters solve the problem. Then, sequence of event tells how
the characters react to the complication including the character’s feeling and
action. The forth is resolution. In resolution, the problem has been resolved. The
outcome can be better or worse. The last is reorientation. Reorientation is the
18
ending of the story. It can be used or not because reorientation is an optional
closure of the event.
Narrative has some characteristics of language feature. Hakim (2010)
divided the language feature of narrative text into six such as; focus on specific
participant, use noun as personal pronoun, use past tense, use time conjunction,
use action verbs, and use saying verb. From those characteristics, the prominent
characteristics of narrative text are the use of past tense and action verbs.
Picture-Cued Tasks
Picture is one of medium in teaching language. As a medium in teaching
language, Raimes (1983) argued that picture provides a stimulating focus for
students’ attention. Pictures are able to get the students’ attention in order to make
them more focus on the teaching-learning process. There are many pictures that
can be used in teaching-learning writing such as picture series, picture sequences,
maps, and others. Those kinds of picture are called as picture-cued. According to
Brown (2004), picture-cued may be very simple or sometimes more complex. He
also argued that picture-cued is designed to elicit a word or a phrase and
composed of a series that tells a story.
In teaching-learning writing, teachers can use picture-cued tasks as the
activities in the classroom. Picture-cued tasks are one of the way to assess
students’ writing ability that use picture as a medium. It is called as picture-cued
tasks because those kinds of picture-cued are integrated with some clues of
questions. Picture-cued tasks separate reading and writing connection and
proposing a nonverbal means as a substitute to stimulate written responses
19
(Brown, 2004). It means that, picture-cued tasks can arouse the students’ written
reaction without a verbal means.
Varieties of Picture-Cued Tasks
As explained above, picture-cued tasks are a strategy to assess students’
writing ability. Picture-cued tasks have varieties of task. The varieties of task are
based on each language skill. For writing skill itself, there are three varieties of
picture-cued tasks based on Brown (2004); picture-cued sentence writing, picturecued story description, and picture-cued story sequence.
Picture-cued sentence writing. The picture that is shown in this task is a
picture that draws a simple action. This task asks students to write a brief sentence
based on picture that they have seen. The sample task of picture-cued sentence
writing can be seen below.
Figure 2.1 Picture-cued sentence writing task according to Brown (2004)
20
Picture-cued story description. The picture that is used in this task may
be more complex. The students asked to write a sentence that is more complex.
For example, the sentence that students should write in this task such as a cat
under the table, books and pencils on the table, or chairs around the table. In this
task, the students are asked to describe the picture using a preposition; on, over,
under, next to, around, above, and others.
Picture-cued story sequence. The picture shown in this task is a picture
that describes a sequence of three to six pictures in a story line. It means that
among the pictures must be related each other. For example, teacher gives a
picture sequence and a simple question related to the picture. Then, students are
asked to write down the answer by paying attention to the grammatical features.
This research used this type of picture-cued tasks because it was suitable with the
type of the text that was used in this research which was using narrative text. The
nature of narrative text is telling a sequence of story. Thus, this type was suitable
with the research. The sample task of picture-cued story sequence can be seen
below.
21
Figure 2.2 Picture-cued story sequence according to Brown (2004)
Picture-Cued Tasks in Teaching and Learning Writing
In teaching and learning writing, picture-cued tasks are one of teaching
strategies that use picture as a medium. Sometimes, integrating picture in teaching
learning process is necessary. Pictures have an important role in teaching-learning
process, especially in teaching-learning writing. There are three main points that
make picture must be integrated in teaching-learning writing.
First, pictures can be a stimulus in gaining students’ attention. As we
know, students usually do not pay attention to their teacher. It is only the rest of
them who care about the teacher’s explanation. Students do not want to pay
attention to the classroom if the learning process is very boring. Therefore, it is
important for the teacher to find how to get students’ attention. According to
Wright (1989), pictures make students pay attention and take part in the classroom
22
activity. It is because pictures provide a real-life situation. When teacher shows a
picture about an activity in the street, students will feel that they are taking part in
that picture. It is supported by Ariningsih (2010) that pictures bring the outside
world into the classroom like in real-life. Thus, students will give their full
attention in the classroom activity if the teacher uses visual media in the teachinglearning process.
Second, pictures can be a stimulus for gaining and exploring students’
ideas. Researcher has observed an EFL class when they had a writing task. The
teacher just gave them a topic of the writing, then the students is asked to write a
story related to the topic. It was about ten percent who can explore their idea quite
easily. The rest of the students have a difficulty in expressing their idea. It
happened because there was no treatment or stimulus when the teacher gave the
task. As the visual media, pictures can be a stimulus for the students’ imagination.
Picture can make students imagine about what happen in the picture. It is line with
Munadi (2008) as cited in Sa’diyah (2011) who stated that people can catch ideas
and information from pictures which the information conveyed in the pictures is
clear more than expressed verbally.
The last role is pictures provide many tasks. Using picture can be an
interesting media in teaching writing because there are a lot of tasks that can be
done by using picture. According to Raimes (1983, p.27), “A picture can be the
basis for not just one task but many, ranging from fairly mechanical controlled
compositions, sentence-combining exercises, or sequencing of sentences to the
writing of originals dialogs, letters, reports, or essays.” It means that one picture
23
can propose many different tasks. For example, teacher gives a picture about
Audy’s activities in the evening. The teacher can apply some tasks regarding to
that picture like question and answer, sentence combining, paragraph completing,
and many others. Therefore, pictures have an important role in teaching-learning
writing. It is because they propose many tasks that can make students more
enjoyable to the class activities.
Based on those explanations, pictures have an important role in teachinglearning writing. Considering those roles, I used pictures for this research. It can
be the interesting medium in learning writing for EFL students and can be the way
to improve their writing ability.
Previous Study
This research is supported by previous study. Nisa (2013) conducted a
research entitled “The Effectiveness of Using Picture Cued Task to Improve
Students’ Speaking Skill in Narrative Text of the Eleventh Grade Students of
SMA Negeri 1 Comal in the Academic Year 2013/2014.” Based on her research
picture-cued tasks can be an effective way to teach narrative text. In this research,
she made some limitations, such as she used one of the type of picture-cued tasks
which is named picture-cued elicitation of future tense and she want to examine
the students’ speaking skill in narrative text by using that media. She used an oral
test in measuring the students’ speaking skill. Based on the result of her study,
picture-cued tasks have a significant result to improve students speaking skill in
narrative text. After being taught using picture-cued tasks, students are able to
24
express their ideas of the story orally. Thus, picture-cued tasks can be used as a
good way in teaching and learning process.
The similarity of her study and my study is using picture-cued tasks as a
strategy in teaching-learning process. I also used picture-cued tasks in this study.
However, I focused on the implementation of picture-cued tasks in writing class. I
only want to know whether picture-cued tasks are good to be implemented or not
without knowing the students’ writing achievement. Nisa’s study could be used as
a reference that supports this study. Therefore, for this research I saw whether
picture-cued tasks can solve the students’ problem in writing or not.
Another study that is in line with this research was conducted by
Ariningsih (2010) entitled “The Effectiveness of Using Picture Series to Improve
the Students’ Writing Skill Viewed from Their Learning Motivation (An
Experimental Study in the Seventh Grade of SMPN 1 Tanjunganom in the
Academic Year 2008/2009).” I used this study because the restrictiveness of the
research that is using picture-cued tasks. This previous research can support my
research because this research used one of picture-cued varieties. In her research,
she assessed picture series in improving writing skill. However, in her research,
she compared whether picture series is more effective than translation. She also
examined whether the technique that she used in her research influenced the
students’ motivation. Based on the result of her research, picture series is an
effective technique to teach writing. In addition, the used of this technique also
improved the students’ motivation.
25
The similarity of Ariningsih’s research with my research is using picture
in teaching writing. Although her research was not using picture-cued tasks, but
her research used picture series that is one of picture-cued varieties. However, I
only focused on the picture-cued tasks without comparing with the other teaching
strategies. I also did not examine the students’ motivation. I only focused on the
implementation of the picture-cued tasks. Considering that my research used the
same media, Ariningsih’s research could be a reference for my research.
Conceptual Framework
There are a lot of problems that faced by the students in writing. Three of
them are lack of vocabularies, lack of ideas and lack of grammar knowledge. This
research focused on solving the students’ problems in writing especially the
problems in vocabulary mastery, gaining an idea and using of grammar. In
writing, there are a lot of text types that can be learned by the students. One of the
text types that the students familiar with is narrative text. Narrative text is always
learned by the students since they were in primary school. Narrative text is a text
that discusses about a real or imagination story that happens in the past. To
overcome the problems that faced by many students, teachers should have an
interesting strategy in teaching writing. One of the strategy to teach writing is
using picture-cued tasks. This research conducted in a cycle. There were three
cycle in this research which in each cycle included four steps; planning, acting,
observing, and reflecting. In this research, each cycle involved the process of
writing which is pre-writing in the first cycle, writing in the second cycle, and
editing in the last cycle.
26
Subsequently, this research has two variables. Using picture-cued tasks as
an independent variable and writing as a dependent variable. Picture-cued tasks
are called as independent variable because picture-cued tasks can stand alone and
can influence writing ability which stands as dependent variable in this research.
Besides, writing can be called as dependent variable because writing is influenced
by picture-cued tasks which stand as independent variable in this research.
There
Action Research at SMA Muhammadiyah 4 Yogyakarta
A Skripsi
Submitted to the Faculty of Language Education
In a Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of
Sarjana Pendidikan
Nur Anggraini Saputra
2012 054 0045
English Education Department
Faculty of Language Education
Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta
2016
Statement of Authenticity
I hereby certify that this skripsi is definitely my original work. I am
completely responsible for the content of this skripsi. Any theories, findings, and
research techniques which are not my own work are quoted or cited in accordance
with the standard referencing practices. Theoretical contribution and findings in
this skripsi are truly my original words and have not been submitted for any
degrees in other Universities or Institutions.
Yogyakarta, June 2016
The researcher,
Nur Anggraini S
iii
Acknowledgement
First of all, I thank to Allah Subhanahu Wata’ala for his blessing and
mercy until I am able to accomplish my skripsi. I want to express my deepest
gratitude to my beloved father and mother. Thank you for your unstoppable
support till now. I sincerely thank to my beloved sister and little brother for being
my spirit in accomplishing this skripsi.
Secondly, tons of thanks to my beloved supervisor Mrs. Sri Rejeki
Murtiningsih, Ph.D. who has provided support and help throughout this skripsi. I
also thank to my examiners who had given the valuable input and advice for the
improvement of this skripsi.
I also would like to thank to the headmaster of SMA Muhammadiyah 4
Yogyakarta who has helped and allowed me to conduct the research. Special
thanks also goes to my research participants. Thank you for your help and
cooperation during the action.
I also dedicate this skripsi to my beloved Tivani, Anisa, Dallia, Erlin,
Dewi, Reni, Erni, and Lina. This skripsi would not be finished without your big
support. I also thank to Teguh, Sulis, Ghofar, Iskandar, and Aris for always
supporting me. Thanks for providing me some amazing vacations during the
completion of my skripsi. That means a lot to me.
I truly realize that this skripsi still needs constructive critics to be a
remarkable skripsi. I do hope this skripsi can be useful for readers especially for
students of English Edcucation Department Universitas Muhammadiyah
Yogyakarta.
Yogyakarta, June 2016
Nur Anggraini S.
iv
Table of Contents
Cover ..........................................................................................................
i
Approval Sheet ...........................................................................................
ii
Statement of Authenticity ..........................................................................
iii
Acknowledgement ......................................................................................
iv
Table of Contents .......................................................................................
v
List of Table ...............................................................................................
viii
List of Figures ............................................................................................
ix
List of Appendices .....................................................................................
x
Abstract ......................................................................................................
xi
Chapter One .............................................................................................
1
Introduction ................................................................................................
1
Background of the Study .......................................................................
1
Statement of the Problems .....................................................................
4
Scope of the Problems ...........................................................................
6
Research Question .................................................................................
7
Purpose of the Study ..............................................................................
7
Significance of the Study ......................................................................
7
Outline of the Research .........................................................................
8
Chapter Two .............................................................................................
9
Literature Review .......................................................................................
9
Writing Skill ..........................................................................................
9
v
Process of Writing .................................................................................
10
Problems in Writing ..............................................................................
12
Types of Text .........................................................................................
15
Narrative Text ........................................................................................
17
Picture-Cued Tasks ................................................................................
18
Varieties of Picture-Cued Tasks .............................................................
19
Picture-Cued Tasks in Teaching and Learning Writing ........................
21
Previous Study .......................................................................................
23
Conceptual Framework .........................................................................
25
Chapter Three ..........................................................................................
28
Research Methodology ...............................................................................
28
Design of the Study ...............................................................................
28
Setting of the Study ...............................................................................
30
Subject of the Study ..............................................................................
30
Procedure of the Study ..........................................................................
30
Data Collection Method ........................................................................
34
Instruments of the Study ........................................................................
35
Data Analysis ........................................................................................
37
Chapter Four ............................................................................................
38
Findings and Discussion ............................................................................
38
The Implementation of Picture-cued Tasks ...........................................
39
The Students’ Responses on the Use of Picture-cued Tasks .................
51
Discussion .............................................................................................
56
vi
Chapter Five .............................................................................................
59
Conclusion and Suggestions ......................................................................
59
Conclusion .............................................................................................
59
Suggestion .............................................................................................
60
References ..................................................................................................
62
Appendices .................................................................................................
65
vii
List of Table
Table 3.1 Action Research Plan ..................................................................
33
Table 3.2 Two Column Notes ....................................................................
36
Table 4.1 The Students’ Condition (Before and After Implementing) ......
50
viii
List of Figure
Figure 2.1 Picture-Cued Sentence Writing Task ........................................
19
Figure 2.2 Picture-Cued Story Sequence ...................................................
21
Figure 2.3 Conceptual Framework .............................................................
27
Figure 3.1 Action Research Model ............................................................
29
ix
List of Appendices
Appendix 1. Research Permit .....................................................................
65
Appendix 2. Research Completion ............................................................
66
Appendix 3. Picture-cued Tasks ................................................................
67
Appendix 4. Interview Guidelines .............................................................
71
Appendix 5. Research Activities ................................................................
73
x
Abstract
This study is conducted to describe the implementation of picture-cued tasks in
writing class. Writing becomes an important and challenging skill in language
learning. Writing is needed in many aspects especially in educational aspect.
However, many students have problems in their writing such as lack of
vocabularies, lack of grammar knowledge, and lack of ideas. Therefore, it is
necessary to have teaching strategies to solve the students’ problems in writing.
One of the strategies is using picture-cued tasks. Hence, this study clarified in
detail about how picture-cued tasks helped solve the students’ problem in writing.
The students’ responses toward the implementation of picture-cued tasks is also
described in this study. I used action research in this study. This study took place
at SMA Muhammadiyah 4 Yogyakarta and the participants were the students of
class 11 IPS 3. I used observation and interview to collect the data. The findings
of this study uttered that picture-cued tasks could solve the students’ problem in
writing such as problems in mastering vocabularies and generating ideas.
However, picture-cued tasks did not work well to solve the students’ problem in
using past tense. Thus, it is necessary to combine other teaching strategies to get
the best performance on the students’ writing.
Keywords: Picture-cued tasks, writing skill, narrative text
xi
1
Chapter One
Introduction
The points that will be discussed in this chapter are the background of the
study, the statement of the problems, the scope of the problem, the research
questions, the purpose of the study, the significance of the study, and the outline
of the research.
Background of the Study
Mastering language skills are needed in using a language. Saragih,
Silalahi, and Pardede (2014) asserted that in order to be able to communicate and
socialize with a group of people, every person should be able to master the four
basic skills in using the language; speaking, listening, reading, and writing. It
means that every person is able to convey their messages, thoughts, and feelings
by using a language skill. By mastering the language skills, people will be able to
comprehend and use a language easily. Besides, people will be more easily to
convey a message when they master the language skills well.
Writing is one of the basic language skills that should be mastered by
every person. Writing is a form of written communication which is important in
many things such as academic field, business field, and political field. For
example, in academic field, writing is needed for students to produce an academic
writing. The form of academic writing can be an essay or a report. Students must
be able to write well in order to make a good academic writing by considering the
aspects of writing such as content, grammar, word choices, syntax, organization,
2
and mechanics. Therefore, writing is a language skill that students obligate to
master.
Writing is also challenging for some students. These days, there are
several problems that many students face in their writing such as lack of
motivation, lack of idea, and lack of grammar knowledge. First, many students in
these days are lazy when they are asked to write anything. As I have experienced,
I felt that I did not have a mood when the teacher asked me to write. That problem
is caused by lacking of motivation. Students do not have enough motivation in
writing so that they feel lazy when they have a writing task.
The second problem is caused by lacking of ideas. Nowadays, many
students feel hard to gain and express their ideas into a writing. They even have
difficulties in starting their writing because they do not know how to start. As said
by Tho (2000) as cited in Tuan (2010, p. 81), “non-native writers may not have
enough ideas to write down or, even worse, they have nothing to say.” It means
that English Foreign Language (EFL) learners have problems in discovering ideas.
In addition, Negari (2011) said that writing in academic context is difficult to
learn for students since they do not know how to generate ideas when they are
writing. In this case, generating ideas is the basic stage in writing. If the students
have a problem in generating ideas, then they will get difficulties to make a
writing.
Furthermore, lack of grammar knowledge is also one of the students’
problems in writing. Seyabi and Tuzlukova (2014) have found that most of the
students in Omani school, Southwestern Asia, which is mostly English Foreign
3
Language (EFL) learners have problem with lexical and contents aspect of
writing. In writing, people should be in touch with grammatical aspect. It is
because to make a good writing, people should consider some lexical things such
as organization, subject-verb agreement, punctuation, and spelling. Considering
those problems that occur to the students in these days, writing can be said as the
challenging skill in language.
Consequently, it is necessary to have teaching strategies that are
appropriate and comfortable for students in order to solve the students’ problems
in writing. There are four strategies in teaching writing that can be used, such as
using picture, using reading, using translation, and using all language skills.
Strategy in using picture here means the teacher use picture as a media in
teaching-learning process. While strategy in using reading here according to
Raimes (1983) is a strategy when the students create their own writing based on
text that they read. For example, students are asked to summarize a text or make a
speculation based on the text. In addition, a strategy in using translation is a
strategy when the students are asked to translate a text into a target language.
Then, Raimes (1983) stated that strategy in using all language skill is a strategy
that is involving all language skills. This strategy can be applied in group of three.
The first student is asked to speak about one topic. Then, the second student must
write what he has heard and comprehended. The third student will read the second
student’s writing. From those strategies, the appropriate strategies to be
implemented in this study was the strategy in using picture. It was because picture
is an interesting media that provide a real-life situation and the participants of this
4
study were mostly hyperactive students. By using picture in the teaching-learning
process, it can make the students pay attention to the classroom activity and more
interested in learning narrative text. Thus, based on those reasons, this research
focused on the strategy in using picture.
A picture has been often used in teaching-learning process. I used picture
as a media because picture has been familiar among students and it provides a
real-life situation. Thus, by seeing a picture, students can feel the atmosphere of
the picture. Furthermore, there are many kinds of pictures, such as picture
sequence, picture story and picture series. Brown (2004) proposed those kind of
pictures that are integrated with some clues of questions namely picture-cued
tasks. Picture-cued tasks are good for stimulating students’ written responses
(Brown, 2004). It means picture-cued tasks can stimulate students to write
anything. Students will have some ideas when they are seeing a picture. Thus, it
can stimulate students’ willingness in writing. Considering the explanation above,
I am interested in knowing the implementation of picture-cued tasks in writing
class.
Statement of the Problems
In language learning, the first thing that students must learn is about four
basic skills in English language; speaking, listening, reading, and writing. From
those skills, writing is the hardest skill to be learned. Based on my observation
during the internship program that was held at SMA Muhammadiyah 4
Yogyakarta, there were several problems that were faced by the students in their
writing such as; lack of practice, problems in using correct grammar and
5
vocabulary, and problem in teaching-learning process. The first problem was
lacking of practice. There were many students who could not write anything. Most
of them had difficulties in expressing their ideas into a writing. There were also
students who had no idea at all. That problem was caused by lacking of practice.
Besides, the lack of practice session that was given by the teachers also became
the students’ problem in writing. Therefore, both of the students and the teacher
should provide more time to practice the students’ writing skill.
The second problem came from the using of correct grammar and
vocabulary. There were many students who had difficulties in determining the
word choices and grammar used. Aydogan and Akbarov (2014) also emphasized
their statement on the difficulties of writing skills as a follow:
Writing is the productive skill in the written mode. It, too, is more
complicated than it seems at first, and often seems to be the hardest of the
skills, even for native speakers of a language, since it involves not just a
graphic representation of speech, but the development and presentation of
thoughts in a structured way. (p. 674)
It means that writing is the hardest skills in language. It is because people must
pay attention to the unity and coherence elements when they are writing. It is
different from speaking skill which just pays attention to the message that will be
delivered.
The third problem deals with teaching-learning process. I saw that some
teachers in the research’s place rarely encourage the students to write. They only
asked the students to pay attention to the teacher’s explanation and did some
6
assignments. I saw that some teachers only focused on the cognitive aspect
without giving the students opportunities to practice their skills. That statement is
in line with Ariningsih (2010) who stated that the teacher has not given chances to
the students to train and improve their writing and has not given right treatment to
solve the students’ writing problem. Thus, based on those problems, writing is
very important to be learned because it is considering that writing is the hardest
skill in English language.
Therefore, based on those problems, the strategy that is appropriate to use
in overcoming the students’ problem in writing is using picture-cued task. Besides
picture provides a real-life situation, pictures can also provide many tasks.
Therefore, it will be easier to use in the teaching-learning process. Thus, I want to
know the implementation of picture-cued tasks as a strategy in teaching writing.
Scope of the Problems
The scope of the research is limited to discuss about the implementation of
picture-cued tasks in writing narrative texts. I chose narrative text because it was
appropriate with picture-cued tasks which was about telling a story. Then, it was
also based on the syllabus. In addition, students have studied narrative text since
junior high school. Thus, it will be easier for the students because they have
familiar with narrative text. In addition, the respondent of this research was also
limited to 11th grade. The meeting for doing the research was limited to four times
meeting. It was because the time’s restriction to do the research.
7
Research Questions
Based on the background above, the research questions addressed in this
study are:
1. How do picture-cued tasks help solve the students’ writing problem?
2. What are students’ responses on the use of picture-cued tasks in writing
class?
Purpose of the Study
There are some purposes of this research that related with the research
questions above. Here are the goals of this research:
1. to see the implementation of picture-cued tasks whether it helps solve
the students’ problem in writing.
2. to find out the students’ responses toward the implementation of
picture-cued tasks in writing class.
Significance of the Study
There are several benefits of this study that can be used by the teachers,
the students, the researcher, and future researcher. The significance of this study is
described as a follow:
The teachers. This research can be the reference for the teacher to find the
interesting teaching strategies for teaching writing. This research can also be the
reference to use different strategies in teaching writing by using picture-cued
tasks.
The students. For students in the research’s place, this research will
motivate the students to write and encourage the students to improve their writing
8
ability. Besides, for English Education Department students, this research can be a
reference for teaching writing in the internship program.
The researcher. I can get new experience in teaching writing using
picture-cued tasks and explore more interesting teaching strategies for teaching
writing.
Future researchers. This research can be a reference for the future
researcher to do the same research in different place. This research can also be a
reference for the research of the future researcher.
Outline of the Research
This research encompasses five chapters. In the beginning of the research,
I discussed about the background of the study which told about the reason why
this research should be conducted and the basis of the problem in this study. I also
gave the scope of the study to limit the study that was researched. In the next
chapter, I gave an overview of writing skill, process of writing, problems in
writing, types of texts, and narrative text. Besides, I also discussed about the
picture-cued tasks, the varieties of picture-cued tasks, and picture-cued tasks in
teaching-learning activities. In the third chapter, I focused on the methodology
that was used to collect the data of the research. The next chapter discussed about
the finding of the research that will answer the research question. The last chapter
concluded the whole research including reiterating the findings of the research.
The suggestion for the teachers, the students, and the further researcher were also
discussed in this chapter.
9
Chapter Two
Literature Review
This chapter deals with the basis theories that emphasize the use of picture
cued task to improve students’ writing ability. This chapter will cover the
description of writing and picture-cued tasks itself. Those theories are explained
as follow.
Writing Skill
There are four basic skills in language. They are speaking, listening,
reading, and writing. Harmer (2001) divided the language skills into two
categories. Reading and listening skills belong to receptive skills, while speaking
and writing belong to productive skills. Receptive skills mean the ways in which
people receive information from the discourse they see or hear (Harmer, 2001). It
means that people only receive the information without producing it. In contrast,
productive skills are the ways in which people receive information and produce it.
It other words, people produce what they have got in speaking or writing way.
Among those four skills, writing is one of the productive skills which
produce language in a written form. It is also supported by Aydogan and Akbarov
(2014) who stated that writing is the productive skill in a written mode. In other
words, by writing, people can express their feeling or ideas without seeing directly
to the reader. In addition, Wuzaro (2012) stated that writing is the way people
express their ideas of what they saw, heard, and felt into a form of text.
10
Besides, writing is the hardest skill in language learning. As said by
Barkaoui (2007), writing is the hardest skill for second language learners because
it needs the mastery of linguistics, cognitive, and sociocultural competencies. It is
also supported by Nunan (1989) who stated that in writing, people must be able to
organize and integrate ideas into cohesive and coherent paragraph. It means that
writing is not merely conveying a feeling or ideas in a written mode, but people
must deal with language features. Therefore, to have a good writing, people
should pay attention to the structure of the writing’s content.
Process of Writing
Producing an effective writing cannot be done in a short time. There are
several steps to do in order to produce a good writing. According to Harmer
(2004), there are four main stages in writing such as; planning, drafting, editing,
and final version. The description of each stages is explained as follow.
Planning. This stage deals with the ideas that will be written. In the
planning stages, the writers must consider three things such as purpose, audience,
and content structure. First, before they write something, they must consider the
purpose of their writing. It will influence several things including the type of text
that they will produce, the language they use, and the information they will
choose. The second is audience. It will influence the language that will be used by
the writers. The last thing that the writers must consider is the content structure. It
deals with the construction of the ideas. Considering the three things above that
the writers must consider, brainstorming can be a way to plan a writing.
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Drafting. In this stage, the writing has been produced. However, this is
not the final version of the writing. The form of drafting is a piece of writing
which is incomplete. Drafting usually is a process of explaining some points that
has been arranged in the planning stage. In the drafting stages, a writer should be
focused only on the content that want to explain. The writing aspect like grammar,
organization, and spelling can be checked in editing stage.
Editing. After the writers produced a draft, then they should read through
what they have written. Perhaps there is some information which is not clear.
Some ambiguous and confusing sentences are also happened in writing.
Therefore, the writers should do an editing after they write their draft. Besides,
reflecting and revising from other readers are also needed to make a better
writing. In editing stage, not only the content that should be checked, but also the
grammar, spelling, and organization of the content itself.
Final version. This stage is also known as final draft. It means that this
stage has overstepped the drafting and editing process. After the writers make
change to the draft, the writers can produce their final version. The final version
means that it is the fix version of the writing. The final version of a writing can be
published in a printed or online version.
Moreover, Brown (2001) framed a writing process into three stages, such
as pre-writing, drafting, and revising. The detail information of each stage is
described as follow.
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Pre-writing. This stage is related to generating an idea. In this stage, a
writer tries to discover some ideas that will be expressed into a writing. In
generating idea, a writer can do some ways such as, reading a passage,
brainstorming, discussing a topic in a group, and free writing.
Drafting. This stage is a core of writing process. It is because in this stage
a writer is getting started to write. A writer writes their content of writing in this
stage. In this stage, the writing has been produced but it is not in a final version.
Revising. In this stage, a writer will do an editing. Here, the content of the
writing has been finished. A writer will edit his writing by reading through his
writing. This stage can be done by doing some ways such as, peer-reviewing for
content, editing for grammatical errors, and proofreading.
Producing a writing is not always following the stages above. However, it
will be better if the writers can follow every steps in writing in order to make the
writing become more effective. Following the stages also make easy the writers to
produce a good writing.
Problems in Writing
Writing is one of productive skills which is very challenging for some
students. Writing becomes a challenging skill because there are many difficulties
in doing writing activities. In writing, there are many problems that are faced by
most students. Those problems are lacking of motivation, lacking of grammar
knowledge, lacking of vocabularies, hard to generate and develop ideas, and lack
of practice. Those problems are described below.
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Lack of motivation. The biggest problem in writing that almost students
faced is laziness. As I have experienced, I found that many students were very
lazy when they were asked to write. It can be caused by lacking of motivation.
Students did not have enough motivation to write, thus it makes them lazy to do
the writing activity. It is supported by Mettaningrum, Dantes and Suarnajaya
(2013) who said that, “students are not only lack of ability in writing, but also lack
of motivation to write.” It clears that students also have an internal problem which
is related to the students’ motivation.
Lack of grammar knowledge. Grammar also becomes the problems in
writing. It is because writing cannot be separated with the grammar context. A
good writing is not only seen from the content itself, but also it can be seen from
the grammar used. Therefore, grammar becomes a frightening thing since it is
difficult to learn. As said by Huy (2015), there are some basic mistakes in the
writing tasks that students frequently did such as grammar, spelling, punctuation
and organization. It means that students have inadequate grammar knowledge. It
is also supported by Farooq, Hassan and Wahid (2012) who said that the writing’s
difficulties that students often faced are the use of correct sentence structure and
paragraph development to create a coherent form. Therefore, it can be said that
lack of grammar knowledge is a problem in writing that students frequently faced.
Lack of vocabularies. Vocabularies is basic knowledge in learning
English. Although it is a basic thing, but there are many students who still have
limited vocabulary mastery. It is supported by Adas and Bakir (2013) who said
that English language learners frequently repeat the same word in their writing
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because they still have limited vocabulary. It means that students often use the
same word because they cannot develop their vocabulary. That problem can affect
the students’ writing ability. It is because the vocabulary’s restriction may affect
the message that will be conveyed by the writers in their writing. According to
Seyabi and Tuzlukova (2014) based on their research’s result, lack of vocabulary
also becomes the second biggest problem for school students.
Deciding how to start. Starting to write becomes one of the problem in
writing that faced by almost students. Most of the students are confused on how to
start writing. According to Seyabi and Tuzlukova (2014), they found that deciding
how to start writing becomes the biggest problem for school students. It is clear
that deciding how to start writing becomes the one of the problem in writing.
Hard to generate and develop ideas. Writing is related to conveying a
message or ideas. Then, generating and developing ideas also becomes the
problem in writing. Almost students frequently hard to generate idea about one
topic in writing. They do not know what they are going to discuss in their writing.
Moreover, almost students feel hard to develop their ideas. Although they have
many ideas to write, it does not mean that they have not any problem in writing.
Developing the ideas that they have got also becomes their problem in writing.
Most of them have a problem in developing the ideas into a good paragraph. It is
also supported by Mettaningrum, Dantes and Suarnajaya (2013) who said that
students have problem in finding idea and developing the ideas into a good
coherent paragraph. Then, generating and developing ideas are also the problems
that students faced in their writing.
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Lack of practice. From many problems that students faced in their
writing, there is one problem that causes they have a low writing ability. That is
lacking of practice. Almost students realize that they have low ability in writing
and they have many problems in their writing, but they rarely practice to improve
their writing ability. It can be caused by the students have no motivation in
writing or there is not enough time to practice. It is supported by Huy (2015) who
said that the students have not enough time to practice their writing in their high
school. Thus, it can be said that lack of practice in writing being one of problem
for students in writing.
Those are the problems that students commonly faced in their writing.
Those problems may affect the product of the students’ writing. Therefore, writing
can be said as the challenging skill since there are many students who faced those
problems.
Types of Text
Many types of texts have been learned since elementary school. According
to Gerrot and Wignell (1994) as cited in Akmalia (2011), there are thirteen types
of text in writing. They are narrative, recount, spoof, descriptive, procedure, news
item, explanation, discussion, analytical exposition, hortatory exposition, review,
repot, and anecdote. The first is Narrative text. Narrative text is a text that has a
social function to amuse the reader and deals with a real experience, imagination,
or crucial phenomenon in the past. There is some example of narrative text such
as folk tale, legend, fable, myth, and short story. The second one is recount text.
Recount text is a text that is reporting an event or activity of one’s experience to
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inform or amuse the reader. The example of this text is incident report, newspaper
report, articles, letter, and journal. Thirdly, spoof is a text that is related to a funny
story. Actually, spoof text has a similarity with narrative text, but this text usually
adds some humor in the end of the story. Then, descriptive text is related to
describing someone, thing, or place in a specific way. The form of this text can be
a description of something, biography, or autobiography.
The fourth type of text is procedure. This text is telling about steps or
instructions in doing something through a sequence of steps. Recipes and manual
instruction are the example of procedure text. The next is news item. News item is
a text that informs readers about an important phenomenon or event of the day.
The events should be newsworthy. The form of this text can be a news or
informative articles. Then, explanation text is a text that is discussing about theory
that is related to the natural phenomena. The form of explanation text can be an
articles or report.
The next type is discussion text. Discussion text is a text that identifies pro
and contra about one argument. This text usually gives a recommendation in the
end of the text. Then, analytical exposition is also known as argumentative text.
This text is discussing about opinion between pro and contra. This text only
contains an argument or opinion about something. Besides, hortatory exposition is
related to discussing one problem that becomes a controversy. Hortatory
exposition usually contains a sentence that persuades the reader to agree with the
writer’s statement. Hence, this text is also known as persuasive text. The next type
is review text. Review text is a text that discusses and analyzes about one’s
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creation. The review of a movie, book, or music is the example of review text.
The next type is report text. Report text is a text that discusses about the result of
observation or research about thing, animal, person, or place. The last type is
anecdote. Anecdote is a genre of text that tells about unusual or amusing incident.
From those thirteen kinds of text, this research focused on the students’
narrative writing. It was because narrative text was suitable with the media used.
Besides, students have been studied narrative text since junior high school. Hence,
it will be easier for the students because they have familiar with narrative text.
Narrative Text
Narrative text is one of the text types that students have familiar with.
Narrative text is a text that tells about real event or imagination that happen in the
past. In addition, Karolina (2006) stated that narrative text is a text that tells about
interesting story which has a purpose in amusing and entertaining the reader.
Narrative text has a structure. According to Anderson (1997) as cited in
Karolina (2006), the generic structure of narrative text is orientation,
complication, sequence of event, resolution, and reorientation. The first is
orientation. In orientation, there is an introduction to the character and setting of
the story. The next is complication. Complication tells the problem of the story
and how the main characters solve the problem. Then, sequence of event tells how
the characters react to the complication including the character’s feeling and
action. The forth is resolution. In resolution, the problem has been resolved. The
outcome can be better or worse. The last is reorientation. Reorientation is the
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ending of the story. It can be used or not because reorientation is an optional
closure of the event.
Narrative has some characteristics of language feature. Hakim (2010)
divided the language feature of narrative text into six such as; focus on specific
participant, use noun as personal pronoun, use past tense, use time conjunction,
use action verbs, and use saying verb. From those characteristics, the prominent
characteristics of narrative text are the use of past tense and action verbs.
Picture-Cued Tasks
Picture is one of medium in teaching language. As a medium in teaching
language, Raimes (1983) argued that picture provides a stimulating focus for
students’ attention. Pictures are able to get the students’ attention in order to make
them more focus on the teaching-learning process. There are many pictures that
can be used in teaching-learning writing such as picture series, picture sequences,
maps, and others. Those kinds of picture are called as picture-cued. According to
Brown (2004), picture-cued may be very simple or sometimes more complex. He
also argued that picture-cued is designed to elicit a word or a phrase and
composed of a series that tells a story.
In teaching-learning writing, teachers can use picture-cued tasks as the
activities in the classroom. Picture-cued tasks are one of the way to assess
students’ writing ability that use picture as a medium. It is called as picture-cued
tasks because those kinds of picture-cued are integrated with some clues of
questions. Picture-cued tasks separate reading and writing connection and
proposing a nonverbal means as a substitute to stimulate written responses
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(Brown, 2004). It means that, picture-cued tasks can arouse the students’ written
reaction without a verbal means.
Varieties of Picture-Cued Tasks
As explained above, picture-cued tasks are a strategy to assess students’
writing ability. Picture-cued tasks have varieties of task. The varieties of task are
based on each language skill. For writing skill itself, there are three varieties of
picture-cued tasks based on Brown (2004); picture-cued sentence writing, picturecued story description, and picture-cued story sequence.
Picture-cued sentence writing. The picture that is shown in this task is a
picture that draws a simple action. This task asks students to write a brief sentence
based on picture that they have seen. The sample task of picture-cued sentence
writing can be seen below.
Figure 2.1 Picture-cued sentence writing task according to Brown (2004)
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Picture-cued story description. The picture that is used in this task may
be more complex. The students asked to write a sentence that is more complex.
For example, the sentence that students should write in this task such as a cat
under the table, books and pencils on the table, or chairs around the table. In this
task, the students are asked to describe the picture using a preposition; on, over,
under, next to, around, above, and others.
Picture-cued story sequence. The picture shown in this task is a picture
that describes a sequence of three to six pictures in a story line. It means that
among the pictures must be related each other. For example, teacher gives a
picture sequence and a simple question related to the picture. Then, students are
asked to write down the answer by paying attention to the grammatical features.
This research used this type of picture-cued tasks because it was suitable with the
type of the text that was used in this research which was using narrative text. The
nature of narrative text is telling a sequence of story. Thus, this type was suitable
with the research. The sample task of picture-cued story sequence can be seen
below.
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Figure 2.2 Picture-cued story sequence according to Brown (2004)
Picture-Cued Tasks in Teaching and Learning Writing
In teaching and learning writing, picture-cued tasks are one of teaching
strategies that use picture as a medium. Sometimes, integrating picture in teaching
learning process is necessary. Pictures have an important role in teaching-learning
process, especially in teaching-learning writing. There are three main points that
make picture must be integrated in teaching-learning writing.
First, pictures can be a stimulus in gaining students’ attention. As we
know, students usually do not pay attention to their teacher. It is only the rest of
them who care about the teacher’s explanation. Students do not want to pay
attention to the classroom if the learning process is very boring. Therefore, it is
important for the teacher to find how to get students’ attention. According to
Wright (1989), pictures make students pay attention and take part in the classroom
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activity. It is because pictures provide a real-life situation. When teacher shows a
picture about an activity in the street, students will feel that they are taking part in
that picture. It is supported by Ariningsih (2010) that pictures bring the outside
world into the classroom like in real-life. Thus, students will give their full
attention in the classroom activity if the teacher uses visual media in the teachinglearning process.
Second, pictures can be a stimulus for gaining and exploring students’
ideas. Researcher has observed an EFL class when they had a writing task. The
teacher just gave them a topic of the writing, then the students is asked to write a
story related to the topic. It was about ten percent who can explore their idea quite
easily. The rest of the students have a difficulty in expressing their idea. It
happened because there was no treatment or stimulus when the teacher gave the
task. As the visual media, pictures can be a stimulus for the students’ imagination.
Picture can make students imagine about what happen in the picture. It is line with
Munadi (2008) as cited in Sa’diyah (2011) who stated that people can catch ideas
and information from pictures which the information conveyed in the pictures is
clear more than expressed verbally.
The last role is pictures provide many tasks. Using picture can be an
interesting media in teaching writing because there are a lot of tasks that can be
done by using picture. According to Raimes (1983, p.27), “A picture can be the
basis for not just one task but many, ranging from fairly mechanical controlled
compositions, sentence-combining exercises, or sequencing of sentences to the
writing of originals dialogs, letters, reports, or essays.” It means that one picture
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can propose many different tasks. For example, teacher gives a picture about
Audy’s activities in the evening. The teacher can apply some tasks regarding to
that picture like question and answer, sentence combining, paragraph completing,
and many others. Therefore, pictures have an important role in teaching-learning
writing. It is because they propose many tasks that can make students more
enjoyable to the class activities.
Based on those explanations, pictures have an important role in teachinglearning writing. Considering those roles, I used pictures for this research. It can
be the interesting medium in learning writing for EFL students and can be the way
to improve their writing ability.
Previous Study
This research is supported by previous study. Nisa (2013) conducted a
research entitled “The Effectiveness of Using Picture Cued Task to Improve
Students’ Speaking Skill in Narrative Text of the Eleventh Grade Students of
SMA Negeri 1 Comal in the Academic Year 2013/2014.” Based on her research
picture-cued tasks can be an effective way to teach narrative text. In this research,
she made some limitations, such as she used one of the type of picture-cued tasks
which is named picture-cued elicitation of future tense and she want to examine
the students’ speaking skill in narrative text by using that media. She used an oral
test in measuring the students’ speaking skill. Based on the result of her study,
picture-cued tasks have a significant result to improve students speaking skill in
narrative text. After being taught using picture-cued tasks, students are able to
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express their ideas of the story orally. Thus, picture-cued tasks can be used as a
good way in teaching and learning process.
The similarity of her study and my study is using picture-cued tasks as a
strategy in teaching-learning process. I also used picture-cued tasks in this study.
However, I focused on the implementation of picture-cued tasks in writing class. I
only want to know whether picture-cued tasks are good to be implemented or not
without knowing the students’ writing achievement. Nisa’s study could be used as
a reference that supports this study. Therefore, for this research I saw whether
picture-cued tasks can solve the students’ problem in writing or not.
Another study that is in line with this research was conducted by
Ariningsih (2010) entitled “The Effectiveness of Using Picture Series to Improve
the Students’ Writing Skill Viewed from Their Learning Motivation (An
Experimental Study in the Seventh Grade of SMPN 1 Tanjunganom in the
Academic Year 2008/2009).” I used this study because the restrictiveness of the
research that is using picture-cued tasks. This previous research can support my
research because this research used one of picture-cued varieties. In her research,
she assessed picture series in improving writing skill. However, in her research,
she compared whether picture series is more effective than translation. She also
examined whether the technique that she used in her research influenced the
students’ motivation. Based on the result of her research, picture series is an
effective technique to teach writing. In addition, the used of this technique also
improved the students’ motivation.
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The similarity of Ariningsih’s research with my research is using picture
in teaching writing. Although her research was not using picture-cued tasks, but
her research used picture series that is one of picture-cued varieties. However, I
only focused on the picture-cued tasks without comparing with the other teaching
strategies. I also did not examine the students’ motivation. I only focused on the
implementation of the picture-cued tasks. Considering that my research used the
same media, Ariningsih’s research could be a reference for my research.
Conceptual Framework
There are a lot of problems that faced by the students in writing. Three of
them are lack of vocabularies, lack of ideas and lack of grammar knowledge. This
research focused on solving the students’ problems in writing especially the
problems in vocabulary mastery, gaining an idea and using of grammar. In
writing, there are a lot of text types that can be learned by the students. One of the
text types that the students familiar with is narrative text. Narrative text is always
learned by the students since they were in primary school. Narrative text is a text
that discusses about a real or imagination story that happens in the past. To
overcome the problems that faced by many students, teachers should have an
interesting strategy in teaching writing. One of the strategy to teach writing is
using picture-cued tasks. This research conducted in a cycle. There were three
cycle in this research which in each cycle included four steps; planning, acting,
observing, and reflecting. In this research, each cycle involved the process of
writing which is pre-writing in the first cycle, writing in the second cycle, and
editing in the last cycle.
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Subsequently, this research has two variables. Using picture-cued tasks as
an independent variable and writing as a dependent variable. Picture-cued tasks
are called as independent variable because picture-cued tasks can stand alone and
can influence writing ability which stands as dependent variable in this research.
Besides, writing can be called as dependent variable because writing is influenced
by picture-cued tasks which stand as independent variable in this research.
There