IMPLEMENTATION OF GENRE-BASED APPROACH IN THE TEACHING OF DESCRIPTIVE TEXT WRITING.

A THESIS

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for a Master Degree in English Education

By

EFRITA MARTHALENA BR. SARAGIH SUMBAYAK 1204683

ENGLISH EDUCATION PROGRAM

SCHOOL OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

INDONESIA UNIVERSITY OF EDUCATION

School in Kabanjahe, Karo Regency, North Sumatra)

Oleh

Efrita Marthalena Br. Saragih Sumbayak S.Pd STKIP RIAMA Medan, 2004

Sebuah Tesis yang diajukan untuk memenuhi salah satu syarat memperoleh gelar Magister Pendidikan (M.Pd.) pada Fakultas Pendidikan Bahasa dan Seni

© Efrita Marthalena Br. Saragih Sumbayak Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia

Juni 2014

Hak Cipta dilindungi undang-undang.

Tesis ini tidak boleh diperbanyak seluruhya atau sebagian,

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS iv

LIST OF TABLES ix

LIST OF FIGURES xi

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1Background of the Study 1

1.2Purpose of the Study 4

1.3 Research Questions 4

1.4 Scope of the Thesis 5

1.5 Significance of the Study 5

1.6 Definition of the Key Terms 6

1.7 Organization of the Thesis 7

1.8 Conclusion 7

CHAPTER II: LITERATURE REVIEW 8

2.1 Genre-Based Approach 8

2.1.1 Definition of Genre 9

2.1.2 Basic Principles of GBA 10

2.1.3 Curriculum Cycle of GBA 11

2.2 Teaching Writing 14

2.3 Genre Based Approach to Teaching Writing 15

2.4 Types of Texts in Junior High School 20

2.4.1 An Overview of Descriptive Text 21

2.4.2 Social Function of Descriptive Text 21

2.4.3 Schematic Structure of Descriptive Text 21

2.5.2.1 Affective (Emotional) Component 24

2.5.2.2 Behavioral Component 25

2.5.2.3 Cognitive Component 26

2.6 Previous Study 26

2.7 Conclusion 28

CHAPTER III: RESEARCH METHOD 29

3.1Research Design 39

3.2Research Site and Participants 33

3.3 Data Collection 33

3.3.1 Classroom Observation 35

3.3.2. Students’ Writing Tests 36

3.3.3. Samples of Students’ Texts 36

3.3.4. Questionnaire 37

3.3.5. Focus Group Interview 39

3.4 Data Analysis 40

3.4.1 Data from Classroom Observation 40

3.4.2 Data from Students’ Writing Tests 41

3.4.3 Data from Samples of Students’ Texts 42

3.4.4 Data from Questionnaire 42

3.4.5 Data from Focus Group Interview 43

3.5 Criteria of Success 43

3.7 Conclusion 44

CHAPTER IV: TEACHING PROGRAM 45

4.1 Problems of Teaching Writing in the Research Site 45

4.2 Solutions to the Problems 46

CHAPTER V: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 54

5.1 Preliminary Phase of the Teaching Program 54

5.1.1 Analysis of Students’ Test Scores 55

5.1.2 Analysis of Students’ Texts in Pre-Test 56

5.1.2.1 Low Achiever (Group 1) 57

5.1.2.2 Middle Achiever (Group 2) 58

5.1.2.3 High Achiever (Group 3) 60

5.1.3 Reflection of Preliminary Phase 61

5.2 Implementation of the GBA: First Cycle 62

5.2.1 Planning 62

5.2.2 Action and Observation 64

5.2.2.1 Meeting 1: Building Knowledge 64

5.2.2.2 Meeting 2: Building Knowledge 66

5.2.2.3 Meeting 3: MoT 67

5.2.2.4 Meeting 4: JCoT 69

5.2.2.5 Meeting 5: ICoT 71

5.2.2.6 Meeting 6: ICoT 72

5.2.3 Analysis of Students’ Test Scores 72

5.2.4 Analysis of Students’ Texts in Post-Test 1 76

5.2.4.1 Low Achiever (Group 1) 76

5.2.4.2 Middle Achiever (Group 2) 77

5.2.4.3 High Achiever (Group 3) 79

5.2.5 Reflection 80

5.3 Implementation of the GBA: Second Cycle 82

5.3.1 Re-Planning 82

5.3.2 Action and Observation 83

5.3.2.1 Meeting 7: Building Knowledge 83

5.3.2.6 Meeting 12: ICoT 87

5.3.3 Analysis of Students’ Test Scores 88

5.3.4 Analysis of Students’ Texts in Post-Test 2 91

5.3.4.1 Low Achiever (Group 1) 91

5.3.4.2 Middle Achiever (Group 2) 93

5.3.4.3 High Achiever (Group 3) 94

5.3.5 Reflection 96

5.4 Post-Action Phase 97

5.4.1 Questionnaire Analysis 97

5.4.1.1 Affective Component of Attitude 99

5.4.1.2 Behavioral Component of Attitude 100

5.4.1.3 Cognitive Component of Attitude 100

5.4.2 Focus Group Interview Analysis 101

5.4.2.1 Implementation of GBA in the Teaching Descriptive

Text Writing 102

5.4.2.2 Students’ Attitude towards the Implementation of GBA 104

5.5 Discussion 104

5.5.1 Research Problem 1: Improvement of students’ ability of writing

descriptive text through GBA 105

5.5.2 Research Problem 2: Students’ attitudes towards the implementation of the GBA in teaching descriptive text writing 108

5.6 Conclusion 111

CHAPTER VI: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 112

6.1 Conclusions 112

6.2 Limitation of the Study 113

APPENDIXES 3 Observation Checklists 145

APPENDIXES 4 Rubric 148

APPENDIXES 5 Results of the Writing Tests 151

APPENDIXES 6 Map of Questionnaire 154

Table 3.2 Data Sources 34

Table 3.3 Map of the Statements in the Questionnaire 37

Table 3.4 Data and Analysis Approaches 40

Table 4.1 Activities in the Implementation of GBA through CAR 52

Table 4.2 Research Schedule 53

Table 5.1 Activities in Preliminary Phase of the Teaching Program 54

Table 5.2. Descriptive Statistics of Pre-Test 56

Table 5.3 Analysis of Text 1 Written by Low Achiever 58

Table 5.4 Analysis of Text 1 Written by Middle Achiever 58

Table 5.5 Analysis of Text 1 Written by High Achiever 60

Table 5.6 Activities in the First Cycle 63

Table 5.7 Descriptive Statistics of Post-Test 1 73

Table 5.8 Paired Samples Statistics of Pre-Test and Post-Test 1 75 Table 5.9 Paired Samples Correlation of Pre-Test and Post-Test 1 75 Table 5.10 Paired Samples Test of Pre-Test and Post-Test 1 75 Table 5.11 Analysis of Text 2 Written by Low Achiever 76 Table 5.12 Analysis of Text 2 Written by Middle Achiever 78 Table 5.13 Analysis of Text 2 Written by High Achiever 79

Table 5.14 Activities in the Second Cycle 82

Table 5.15 Descriptive Statistics of Post-Test 2 88

Table 5.16 Paired Samples Statistics of Post-Test 1 and Post-Test 2 90 Table 5.17 Paired Samples Correlations of Post-Test 1 and Post-Test 2 90 Table 5.18 Paired Samples Test of Post-Test 1 and Post-Test 2 90

Table 5.19 Analysis of Text 3 Written by Low Achiever 91

Table 5.20 Analysis of Text 3 Written by Middle Achiever 93 Table 5.21 Analysis of Text 3 Written by High Achiever 94 Table 5.22 The Results of the Five-Point Likert-Scale Questionnaire 98

Figure 2.2 Tri Componential View on Attitudes 24

Figure 3.1 Balanced Model of Action Research Design 31

Figure 3.2 Action Research Cycle 32

Figure 4.1 Cycles and Stages of Learning 47

Figure 5.1 Improvement of Mean Score of Students’ Texts in First Cycle 74 Figure 5.2 Improvement of Mean Score of Students’ Texts in Second Cycle 89 Figure 5.3 Improvement of Mean Scores of Students’ Texts 107

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether the Genre-Based Approach (GBA) can help improve students’ ability in writing descriptive texts of a class VII in a state junior high school in Kabanjahe, Karo Regency, North Sumatra. Moreover, the study also aims to explore the students’ attitudes towards the implementation of GBA in teaching descriptive text writing. The research was designed as a Classroom Action Research carried out in two cycles for twelve meetings. It was conducted through the first semester of 2013/2014 education year. In practice, this CAR employed a mixed method approach where data were gathered using quantitative and qualitative method. The qualitative data were collected through classroom observations, samples of students’ texts and a focus group interview whereas the quantitative data were gathered from students’ writing tests and a questionnaire. The analysis of the data was split into two phases: the analysis during data collection (on-going analysis) and the analysis after data collection. In the analysis of qualitative data, content analysis and linguistic analysis were employed. Meanwhile, in the analysis of quantitative data, statistical analysis by using the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) 20.0 was employed. The findings obtained from classroom observations, students’

writing tests, students’ text analyses and a focus group interview prove that GBA can help improve students’ ability in writing descriptive texts as reflected in

students’ writing achievement. Furthermore, the findings from the questionnaire and the focus group interview indicate that the students have positive attitude towards the implementation of the GBA in the teaching of descriptive text writing since most of the students give positive responses and comments after the GBA was implemented in teaching and learning writing. This result is supported by the findings from the classroom observations showing that the students were more active in doing their writing assignments and engage in teaching and learning process. Thus, it is recommended that further study of the GBA should be conducted in various contexts and levels to examine the effectiveness of this approach in helping students enhance their writing skills and other skills.

This chapter discusses the main issues involving the background of the study, the purpose of the study, the research question, the scope of the study, the significance of the study, the definition of key terms, and the organization of the thesis.

1.1 Background of the Study

Writing is one of the four language skills which students must acquire in order to be able to demonstrate competence in the use of English language. It also plays an important role in communication. By means of writing, students are able to explore thoughts and ideas, and make them noticeable and concrete, encourage thinking and learning, motivate communication and make thought available for reflection (Elashri, 2013). However, writing skill is difficult not only to master but also to teach. It is considered as the most difficult skill because it requires the application of the knowledge of the other three skills. Moreover, this skill is deemed to be the most difficult skill to accomplish for most students, whether they are first or second language speakers of English (Richards, 1990; Williams, 2005).

Furthermore, the teaching of writing has always been a challenge to teachers, because it is possibly the hardest skill to teach effectively and the one probably most neglected in ESL/EFL classrooms that are not exclusively dedicated to writing (Brown, 2001). According to Alwasilah (2011), there is a tendency among the English teachers in Indonesia to neglect teaching writing. In addition, the teaching of English writing in Indonesia needs improvement for two reasons, the lack of time and the lack of practice in writing a complete coherent text in various genres as it is said by Emilia (2005). teaching writing is challenging. After doing a short observation and unstructured interview, the researcher identified the problems mentioned above in the school where the research was conducted. The first problem found is the students' inability to

express their idea through writing. Most of the students did not enjoy writing and had a lack of confidence in writing on their own. As a result, most students were still unable to communicate with others through written language. Understandably, it was reasonable that the students in this school found it difficult to communicate in English through written language. They did not know how doing free writing, and they even did not possess the strategies for composing texts independently. Many of them organized their ideas in Indonesian, and then translated them into English when they write. This led to the weak structural organization and improper use of language. It was also perceived that many of the students in that school relied on teacher centred learning and lack of confidence in their own skills.

English teachers in this school neglected teaching writing. They had provided students with less opportunity to practice writing skill. In other words, the teachers had concentrated more on teaching of other skills, like reading, speaking, listening, and language components, such as vocabulary and grammar. The teachers are still dominant in the classroom and they tended to use a traditional approach, especially in teaching and learning writing. Most teachers still prefer using the translation method and the students do not actively engage in class and do not have much opportunity to practise this skill. The teacher asked the students to read a text, translate the text by using a dictionary, and rewrite the translation. The students were not asked to practice their writing ability. Furthermore, the teacher never makes a variation in teaching and learning process. This situation made the students’ motivation and attitude in writing decrease.

Indeed, in order to overcome these difficulties, teachers should adopt an effective approach to teach writing that provides useful supports for students to learn writing. This becomes important because teaching students with appropriate approach is related to the success of students themselves. To solve the aforementioned problems, the researcher suggests one way to address this situation is to adopt a Genre-Based Approach to the teaching of writing in the research site.

This approach has already been adopted in some English curriculum used in Indonesia, namely 2004 and 2006 curriculum (Emilia et al., 2008) and even in the last curriculum, 2013 curriculum. The adoption of Genre-Based Approach (henceforth mentioned as GBA) in English curriculum for junior high schools in Indonesia was a way to overcome the difficulties in teaching and learning writing (Permendiknas No. 22, 2006; Emilia et al., 2008). By adopting this approach, it is hoped that the difficulties encountered by the teacher and the students in teaching and learning writing can be partly solved.

GBA has considered an effective approach in teaching writing (Emilia, 2005, 2010, 2012; Emilia et al., 2008). GBA is effective for some reasons. First, in GBA, students are given more freedom to write about their real life. As a result, the products they produce should be more meaningful and communicative. Second, this method does not emphasize the rhetorical conventions of English texts. It is selected as language seen in context and presented to the students as part of a complete text and not as unrelated sentences. The approach offers a teaching methodology enabling teachers to present explicit instruction with respect to its forms and functions in highly systematic and logical ways (Feez and Joyce, 1998; Hyland, 2007; Emilia, 2010), which are factors that the researcher believes would assist students with the cognitive organisation of information.

Although this approach has been adopted in English curriculum in Indonesia, in practice, the implementation of this approach in the research site had not been maximized especially in the research site because the English teachers did not understand how to implement this approach properly. Even, some of the English teachers in the school did not know or hear what the GBA is. Realizing these facts, the teaching of English writing in the research site needed improvement for three reasons, insufficient time for the teaching and learning writing, lack of practice in writing a complete coherent text in various genres and the fact that the teaching of writing still follows the “traditional one-off writing

task” (Gibbons, 2002: 67).

A number of research studies related to the implementation of GBA in teaching writing have also been conducted in different settings and for different

reasons (Emilia, et al., 2008; Tuan, 2011; Ahn, 2012; Pribady, 2012; Elashri, 2013). Most of the studies found that the GBA is helpful and effective in improving student writing. However, very few studies discuss the practical details of how this approach can be introduced by teachers in a low learning achievement EFL context, especially in Indonesia. Moreover, it is recommended by Emilia et al. (2008) in their research review to identify the effectiveness of the GBA and the challenge in its application in the schools with lower learning achievements. Additionally, there are still few studies discussing about students’ attitude towards the implementation of the GBA in teaching writing, especially in Indonesia.

Due to the above reasons, the present research was conducted in a state junior high school (SMP) in Kabanjahe, Karo Regency, North Sumatra. It is a school in a suburban area with limited facilities and lower learning achievements. This study intended to investigate the implementation of Genre-Based Approach to teaching writing skill, especially descriptive text and to find out the students’ attitude towards the implementation of GBA in the teaching of writing.

1.2 Purpose of the Study

This study was aimed to investigate whether the GBA can help improve

students’ ability in writing descriptive text. Moreover, the study also intended to

explore the students’ attitudes towards the implementation of the GBA in the teaching of descriptive text writing.

1.3 Research Question

With regard to the background and the purposes of the study above, by implementing the principles of Classroom Action Research (CAR), these two research questions were addressed:

1. Can the GBA help improve students’ ability in writing descriptive text?

2. What are the students’ attitudes towards the implementation of the GBA in teaching descriptive text writing?

1.4 Scope of the Study

This research was limited to investigating the teaching of writing skill by implementing the GBA and the students’ attitude towards the implementation of the GBA in the teaching of writing in the research site, a State Junior High School in Kabanjahe, Karo Regency, North Sumatra. This research focused on the teaching writing of descriptive text and planned activities that were linked around some particular topics.

Since a descriptive text is one of the text types taught in the seventh grade, this research was conducted in a class of seventh grade at the school. To solve the problems arising in this study, a procedural framework was developed by the researcher based on concepts related to Classroom Action Research. Classroom

Action Research is a “self-reflective, critical and systematic approach to explore a

teacher’s own teaching context” (Burns, 2010: 2). In this kind of research, a problematic situation which is worth investigating is identified and certain actions

are taken to “intervene in a deliberate way in the problematic situation in order to

bring about changes, and even better, improvements in practice” (Burns, 2010: 2).

1.5 Significance of the Study

This study is significant for several reasons. Theoretically, this study will provide a reference in the study of teaching and learning writing based on the Genre-Based Approach at Junior High School level in Indonesia, especially in low learning achievement context. Furthermore, this study will become preliminary inputs for the readers or other researchers to further studies in similar areas of research with different interests. The finding of this study will also be useful for other researchers to conduct similar research in order to obtain deeper and better results.

Practically, this study provided general guidance for improving the practice of teaching writing descriptive text and as a guide for teachers in selecting, designing, and using appropriate methods in teaching English writing. The result of this study might also give input on the implementation of GBA in teaching writing to the English teachers so that they are able to implement this approach

orderly and to reflect their own practices and to develop their ability in teaching English skills, especially writing. Moreover, teachers may put their capacities into practice and gain experience to facilitate and guide their students in learning to write by using the GBA.

Professionally, pertaining to the present English curriculum used in Indonesia, the results of this study are hopefully beneficial for students and teachers, especially in teaching and learning writing. The results of this study are important for English teachers in junior high school in Indonesia to enable them to implement the GBA in their classroom. It is also hoped that this study will enlighten and inspire other English teachers to explore Classroom Action Research as a powerful tool for professional development. Classroom Action Research is not an additional burden of what we do as teachers. It is fundamental and the core of accomplished teaching.

1.6 Definition of the Key Terms

Several key terms are used in explaining, discussing and reporting the results of this study. There are four key terms used in this thesis, i.e. Genre Based Approach, Descriptive Text, Attitude, and Classroom Action Research.

Genre Based Approach is “the way to language and literacy education that combines an understanding of genre and genre teaching together in the writing class” (Hammond and Derewianka, 2001).

Descriptive Text is a text about a particular person, thing, or place (Martin, 1985

cited in Emilia, 2010; Gerot and Wignell, 1995).

Attitude is “a predisposition to respond in a favorable or unfavorable manner

with respect to a given attitude object” (Oskamp and Schultz, 2005: 9).

Classroom Action Research is “simply a form of self-reflective enquiry undertaken by participants in order to improve the rationality and justice on their own practices, their understanding of those practices and the situations in which the practices are carried out” (Carr and Kemmis in Nunan and Bailey, 2009: 226-227). In this study, Classroom Action Research is defined as a process of investigating problems about teaching and learning descriptive text writing by

implementing GBA that is undertaken in a systematic way by a teacher-researcher who want to better understand her own work.

1.7 Organization of the Thesis

This thesis organized into six chapters. Chapter I is an introduction. This chapter elaborates background of the study included the background of the study, the identification of the problem, the purpose of the study, the research questions, the scope of the study, the significance of the study, the definition of key terms, and the organization of the thesis. Chapter II discusses some theoretical concepts and some findings underlying this study. This chapter presents some concepts relating to Genre-Based Approach, teaching writing, an overview of descriptive text, and concept of attitude. Chapter III describes the methodology that was used to conduct this research. It outlines the research methods including research design, research site, participants, data collection, and data analysis. Chapter IV discusses the problems of teaching and learning writing in the research site, the solutions to overcome the problems based on the theory of the GBA, the design of the teaching program and the research schedule. Chapter V presents the implementation of the GBA, the findings and the discussions of research problems. Chapter VI, finally, summarizes the findings and the discussion, specifies how the findings answer the research questions, points out the main limitations of the study and provides recommendations for further research.

1.8 Conclusion

This chapter has presented the introduction of the whole study which includes the background of the study, the purpose of the study, the research questions, the scope of the study, and the significance of the study, and the definitions of key terms. The following chapter will present the theoretical foundation that frames the study.

This chapter discusses the components of research method of the present study including the research design, the research site, the participants, the data collection, the data analysis, the criteria of success and the research schedule.

3.1 Research Design

This study was designed as a Classroom Action Research (henceforth mentioned as CAR). CAR as an integral part of Action Research, deals with educational research as a social practice. Action Research has been defined by Carr and Kemmis (in Nunan and Bailey, 2009: 226-227) as:

a form of self-reflective enquiry undertaken by participants in order to improve the rationality and justice on their own practices, their understanding of those practices and the situations in which the practices are carried out.

Meanwhile, CAR is defined as an inquiry which is conducted systematically to inform practice in a particular situation. Through CAR, teachers discover best practices in their own classroom situation. Thus, teachers will make decision about teaching based on empirical evidence (Mettetal, 2003). A very specific characteristics of CAR is that it is conducted in the classroom and the focus of the study is the interaction between the researcher and the participants. The researcher involves as much as possible in the process and experience of the participants.

In this study, CAR is defined as a process of investigating problems about teaching and learning descriptive text writing by implementing GBA that is undertaken in a systematic way by a teacher-researcher who want to better understand her own work. The teacher-researcher conducted a research study to help her improve her teaching practice and the learning of her students.

In practice, this CAR employed a mixed method research design. According to Lim (2007), a mixed methods research design is most applicable in action research since this design involves the collection and analysis of both quantitative

and qualitative data in a single study (Creswell, 2005). The collection of quantitative data is critical to this study because it is a part of the triangulation. The quantitative data helped determine the impact of the effectiveness of the GBA in the teaching of writing and in students’ writing achievements. The collection and analysis of the data were done separately and the findings were then combined.

Cohen et al. (2007) say that the CAR takes place when a single teacher works with his/her own class as he/she feels the need to improve his/her teaching and learning experiences. This study also took advantage of the AR format which allowed the researcher to take his/her role as a teacher in the classroom (Mills, 2007), enact a specific teaching methodology, and directly observe the effects of the teaching methodology on student attitudes towards the teaching program. The researcher was the teacher who directly taught the students and collaborated with the students and the classroom teacher as the observer. By doing it collaboratively, it was hoped that this can bring benefits to the teacher–researcher, classroom teacher and the students by providing them with new understandings that could help change the status quo from both a teaching and a learning perspective (Creswell, 2002). The design of the AR implemented in this study is shown in Figure 3.1 below.

Figure 3.1. Balanced Model of Action Research Design Adopted from Lim (2007: 9)

The CAR was conducted in two cycles (see Nunan and Bailey, 2009: 227) each of which consisting of four-stage method in action research as proposed by Kemmis and McTaggart (1988), i.e. planning (developing a plan of action or

Identifying

Identifying a research problem

Sensitising

Understanding the problem through literature review and/or analysis of collected data (both quantitative and qualitative)

Strategising

Developing an action plan

Implementing

Carrying out the action plan

Validating

Investigating if the action plan has been successful in solving the research problem through analysis of collected data (both

quantitative and qualitative)

Reporting

intervention), action (putting the intervention in place), observation (documenting and recording the effects of the intervention), and reflection(evaluating the observations and using them as the basis for further action). The cycle is dynamic in that these four stages are interlinked and iterative, so that the research typically results in a spiral of cycles. The cycles are described in Figure 3.2 below.

Figure 3.2. Action Research Cycle Adopted from ProDAIT (2011)

In the planning stage, the lesson plans, the research instruments, and the criteria of success were prepared by the researcher and the classroom teacher. There were 12 lesson plans prepared, six for each cycle. The instruments used in the teaching program were texts, realia, pictures, observation notes, and observation checklists. In the action stage the researcher conducted what had been designed in the lesson plans. In the observation stage, the researcher and the observer observe the teaching and learning process during the action stage. In the reflection stage, the researcher decided whether or not the results of the each cycle achieved the criteria of success.

Furthermore, this study also implemented two research phases in action research–the pre-action phase and the post-action phase (see Lim, 2007: 8). Overall, there were three phases in this study, the pre-action phase (preliminary phase, the action phase, and the post-action phase. The implementation of these three phases will be presented in Chapter V.

3.2 Research Site and Participants

The study was undertaken in a seventh grade classroom at a State Junior High School in Kabanjahe. It is located in a small town in Karo Regency, North Sumatra. This school has 15 classes which consist of five clasess of seventh grade, five classes of eighth grade, and five classes of ninth grade. For this study, the researcher chose Class VII 1 which the classroom teacher voluntarily participated in this research as an observer.

There were several reasons for choosing this school as a site for this study. First, implementing the Genre Based Approach was considered as a new thing in this school. Second, the researcher had an easy access to this school since the researcher is one of the English teachers at that school for more than 8 years. Third, by having this access, it is hoped that the feasibility of this research was increased (Emilia, 2005; Emilia et al., 2008).

The main participants of this research were the researcher as a participant- observer, a classroom teacher as the observer and a class of 28 students in Class VII 1, aged between 12 and 15, 13 boys and 15 girls. For the , nine students from the class representing low, mid, and high achievers were selected and their texts were analyzed. The three categories were identified by the teacher-researcher and another after the students wrote their texts in writing pre-test.

3.3 Data Collection

The techniques of collecting data in this research were focused on the purpose of the research. To fulfill the purpose of this study, the researcher used both quantitative and qualitative data collection methods. The collection of both type of data collections methods is related to the triangulation of the data.

Triangulation was used in the study in order to avoid information bias during the research. Typically in action research, a wide variety of data were collected during the study in order to achieve triangulation, which is highly recommended while carrying out this type of research (Nunan, 1994; Cohen and Manion, 1994; Burns, 1999). The use of different data sources helps the researcher to “validate and crosscheck findings” (Patton, 1990: 244).

Overall, there were five sources of data in this CAR, three qualitative and two quantitative. Qualitative data were collected through classroom observation, samples of students’ texts and focus group interview. The quantitative data were gathered from students’ writing tests and questionnaire. In this way, data were triangulated to ensure validity. Different sources gathered different types of information as shown in Table 3.1 and Table 3.2.

Table 3.1 Research Questions and Data Collecting Techniques

Research Questions Data Collecting Technique 1

Data Collecting Technique 2 Data Collecting Technique 3 Data Collecting Technique 4

1. Can the GBA help

improve students’ ability

of writing descriptive text? Classroom Observations Video Records Students’ Writing Tests Samples of Students’ Texts Focus group Interview

2. What are the students’ attitudes towards the implementation of GBA in the teaching descriptive text writing? Classroom Observations Video Records Question naire Focus group Interview

Table 3.2 Data Sources

Researcher Observation Notes Video Records Students Video Records Writing Tests Samples of Texts

Questionnaire Interview

Classroom Teacher

3. 3.1 Classroom Observation

Regarding the research questions, classroom observation was the main data source in this study. It plays an important role in AR (Koshy, 2005; Burns, 2010). The classroom observation was chosen as it allows information to be recorded as it occurs in a particular setting and enables the actual behaviour of the teachers and the students. Mills (2007) asserts that “observation is considered a valid and true representation of the action”. Observation can be an effective means of identifying and reflecting on the classroom since it can take a number of forms.

The classroom observations were carried out in this present research with the objectives to identify how GBA is implemented in the teaching and learning process. Apart from that, it also provided an insight on knowing how the students react or behave, specifically their attitude towards the implementation of GBA in teaching writing performed by the teacher. The classroom observations in this study comprised twelve observations over four weeks. The classroom observations were done in the second week of November to mid-December 2013. Each observation lasted for 80 minutes (2 x 40 minutes).

The data from the classroom observations were collected by using observation notes and observation checklists by looking at the implementation of GBA in teaching and learning writing process and students’ attitude towards the implementation of the GBA. The researcher made the observation notes as soon as after each session of the observations finished when the memory of the observations was still fresh as proposed by van Lier (1988). While the observation checklists were filled in by the classroom teacher as the observer who observed the teacher-researcher activities during the implementation of GBA in the teaching process.

In conducting the observation, a video camera was used to gain a record of the teaching and learning process. The reason for this activity was to avoid reactivity. Reactivity is when the participants do not behave normally because of the presence of the researcher (Alwasilah, 2009). The video camera was also used to capture the pictures of the physical environment of the classroom. One of the advantages of video recording is that it allows the researcher to observe an activity

afterwards by watching the video, without the disruptions of the classroom or time constraints. All activities in the classroom observations were discussed in detail in Chapter V.

3.3.2 Students’ Writing Tests

Quantitative data of this study were obtained by looking at the results of pre-test, post-test of first cycle (post-test 1) and post-test of second cycle (post-test 2) conducted in the classroom. The pre-test was designed to collect the data about students’ baseline status of writing achievements while the two post-tests were planned to explore the impact of the implementation of GBA on the students’ writing achievements, which were given at the end of each cycle.

The test required the students to produce a piece of descriptive text writing about a topic. The scoring of the test is based on a analytic scoring rubric adapted from Widodo (2006). According to Hyland (2003), rubric is a form of commentary usually used on the final product as an assessment. One of the advantages of using rubric is that they indicate more explicitely what aspects of the assignment are being assessed. The scoring rubric was developed based on the need of scoring descriptive text writing. The consideration of using scoring rubric for writing test is because it provides simple and clear criteria of each aspect.

3.3.3 Samples of Students’ Texts

The samples of students’ texts were one of qualitative data collection techniques used in this study. This technique was done by choosing nine students’ descriptive texts from twenty eight texts collected from pre-test, post-test cycle 1, and post- test cycle 2. These nine students represented different levels of achievement: low, middle, and high. The samples of students’ texts provided evidence of the types of writing produced in the observed meetings, the level of competence demonstrated and the type of assessment teacher used to grade the students’ works.

3.3.4 Questionnaire

At the end of the teaching program, an attitude questionnaire was administered to 28 students who enrolled in the class. The purpose of the students’ questionnaire was to elicit each individual student’s attitude towards the implementation of GBA in teaching descriptive text writing. The questionnaire was originally generated in English but translated into Indonesian at the time of administration in order to prevent a language barrier of the students. Responses were given in a five point Likert scale format ranging from strongly disagree (1) to strongly agree (5) to examine the students’ attitudes. The questionnaire was anonymous.

On the whole, there were 25 items concerning language attitudes in terms of affective, behavioral, and cognitive aspects of attitude (Oskamp and Schultz, 2005). The questionnaire was divided into three themes. The first themes of the questionnaire was used to find out the students' attitude towards writing. The second theme was conducted to notice students’ attitude toward teaching writing. Finally, the last theme was used to explore students’attitude towards the implementation of the GBA in the teaching descriptive text writing based on the stages of the GBA. The map of the statements in the questionnaire is displayed in Table 3.3 below.

Table 3.3 Map of the Statements in the Questionnaire

Aspects Themes Statement

Numbers

1. Affective 1.1 Writing 1

1.2 Teaching Writing 2

1.3 Implementation of GBA in teaching writing

1.3.1 Building Knowledge 3, 4

1.3.2 MoT 5, 6

1.3.3 JCoT 7

1.3.4 ICoT 8, 9

2. Behavioral 1.1 Writing 10

1.2 Teaching Writing 11

1.3 Implementation of GBA in teaching writing

1.3.1 Building Knowledge 12

1.3.2 MoT 13, 14

1.3.4 ICoT 16

3. Cognitive 1.1 Writing 17

1.2 Teaching Writing 18

1.3 Implementation of GBA in teaching writing

1.3.1 Building Knowledge 19

1.3.2 MoT 20

1.3.3 JCoT 21, 22, 23

1.3.4 ICoT 24, 25

As described in Table 3.3, all the statements in the questionnaire divided into three sections based on the aspects of the attitude: affective, behavioral, and cognitive. First, the statements of the affective aspect related to like and dislike of the object, for example: I like writing various types of texts (Statement 1); I like learning learning descriptive text writing (Statement 2); I am happy when the descriptive text I wrote is evaluated/corrected by the teacher or friend (Statement 9).

Second, behavioral statements connected with how the students behaved when they experience the emotions they feel towards the object are marked. This aspect is marked by statements like Writing is a very important way for me to express my feeling (Statement 10); My English teacher always teaches us how to write descriptive text (Statement 11); Writing a descriptive text individually grows my self confidence (Statement 16).

Finally, cognitive statements which related to the belief that has led to the underlying reason for the emotion towards the object or event can be seen in the statements such as I understand how to arrange a good descriptive text after I had learnt and analyzed others’ texts (Statement 20); I understand that writing a text should be done in several stages and need several times of revision (Statement 22); After learning descriptive text writing by using texts and writing activities in this research, I think writing is important for me to be learned (Statement 24). The complete map of the statements in the questionnaire and the form of the questionnaire for the students are presented in Appendix 6 and 7.

3.3.5 Focus Group Interview

The last source of the data in this study was interview. Interview is as a set of questions directly pointed to participants to get the required information (Alwasilah, 2009). According to Mills (2007), the interview is a useful tool to collect data about the participants from their perspective. The interview is also said as a classic way in research to conduct a conversation that explores the focus area (Burns, 2004).

In this research, the researcher used a focus group interview. The main purpose of conducting focus group interview is to gather responses which are richer and more informative than questionnaire data (Koshy, 2005). It was employed to elaborate those data from classroom observation and questionnaire. This is because when a researcher conducts an interview, the researcher will have a chance to paraphrase the questions that might be not comprehensible. Moreover, a researcher is able to propose follow-up questions.

In conducting the focus group interview, the researcher used guided or semi-structured interview as suggested by Burns (2004). Regarding this, Merriam (1998) says that the use of semi-structured interview is more flexible since it has a big possibility to get deep information by using less structured questions. The guided or semi structured interview was conducted by the researcher at the end of the study. Ten semi-structured questions designed to evaluate the implementation of GBA in teaching writing and students’ attitudes toward the implementation of GBA to the teaching descriptive text writing. The interview questions were somewhat similar to the questions in the questionnaire in terms of the topics, i.e. writing, teaching writing and implementation of GBA.

The interview with the students lasted 20 minutes. In this case, nine students were selected for the focus group interview based on their writing results, three high achievers, three middle achievers, and three low achievers. They were interviewed together. This was done to reduce students’ nervousness and to promote the students’ expression (Alwasilah, 2002). The interview was conducted in Indonesian language to allow participants express their ideas in a more elaborated way. In the interview, the researcher used a recorder with the

agreement of the students to avoid the loss of the data and enable the researcher to transcribe it later. Tape-recording also makes it possible for the researcher to give full attention to the context of the interview (Koshy, 2005). Thus, it was enabled the researcher to analyze the data in depth (Silverman, 2005).

3.4 Data Analysis

Data analysis in this study was conducted during (on-going) and after the teaching program of the study. The on-going data analysis and interpretation were based on data mainly from observation notes, observation checklists, students’ writing tests and samples of students’ texts. After the completion of classroom observations, the data collected from questionnaire and focus group interview were analyzed. The analysis of the above data were drawn on three major approaches: content analysis, statistical analysis and linguistic analysis. The analysis of each data source will be presented in a form of descriptive explanation in Chapter V. The procedure of each data analysis is discussed below.

Table 3.4 Data and Analysis Approaches

Data Analysis Approaches

Classroom Observations Focus Group Interview

Content Analysis Students’ Writing Tests

Questionnaires

Statistical Analysis

Sample of Students’ Texts Linguistic Analysis

3.4.1 Data from Classroom Observation

In analyzing the data from the classroom observation, the researcher conducted it based on observation notes, observer checklists and video records. The data were analyzed based on content analysis. Based on the research problems, there are two central themes analyzed in this study. The first theme is the implementation of the GBA in the teaching of writing and the second theme is the students’ attitude towards the implementation of the GBA in the teaching of writing. In addition, the analysis was also based on the theory and principles of the GBA and the teaching cycle.

In analyzing the data from the classroom observations, the following activities were carried out. First, the observation notes from each meeting were coded and categorized based on the themes. Second, the observation checklists from each meeting were summarized. Third, the both the researcher and the observer watched the video records for several times. It was aimed at getting more information and clear picture to complete the data from the observation notes and the observation checklists.

3.4.2 Data from Students’ Writing Tests

The results of the three writing tests were marked tests by the researcher herself and another rater by using a rubric adopted from Widodo (2006). The results of the tests are displayed in Appendix 6. The students’ writings were rated in terms of their content, organization, language use, mechanic and style by the researcher and another rater. The writing pretest and post-test scores were then analyzed by using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) for Windows version 20.0. The SPSS was used to analyze the data quantitatively. Then, the data collected from tests in two different sections were analyzed by paired t-test.

A paired samples t-test is a test that is useful when two interval/ratio variables from the same people (student) in a sample are measured exactly in the same way. A paired samples t-test can be used to compare the scores on the two variables. The most common use of this test is for pre- and post-test scores for a sample when they are exposed to some intervention in between the pre- and post-tests. The reason a paired samples t-test is used instead of an independent samples t-test is because the scores are for the same people, which suggests there is an underlying relationship between the scores.

The scores were compared to find out whether there were significant improvement or not. In the statistical analysis used in the research, the level of significance was accepted to be 0.05. The descriptive statistic and the paired sample t-tests of all the students’ writing tests will be presented and discussed in Chapter V.

The paired-samples t test (sometimes referred to as the correlated-samples t test or matched-samples t test) is similar to the independent-samples test in that both procedures involve comparing two samples of observations, and determining whether or not the mean of one sample significantly differs from the mean of another (O'Rourke et al., 2005). With the independent-samples procedure, the mean scores are completely independent (i.e., an observation in one sample is not related to any observation in the other)

3.4.3 Data from Sample of Students’ Texts

The analysis of students’ descriptive texts was conducted in three steps. First, the texts were analyzed of the schematic structure. Second, the texts were analyzed of linguistic features. Finally, the texts were analyzed whether it have reached the social purpose of descriptive text. The students’ names were removed before scanning the texts. The scanned texts were displayed in Appendix 3. The analysis of the samples of students’ texts was presented in Chapter V. Thus, the work on genre analysis is to identify how text type (schematic/rhetorical structures of texts) and its linguistic features used to realize the communicative purpose of that genre.

3.4.4 Data from Questionnaire

The main aim of administering the questionnaire was to obtain students’ attitude towards the implementation of GBA in teaching descriptive writing. The data from the questionnaire were examined using quantitative analysis technique, specifically statistical analysis. The responses given by the respondents were counted for frequency per question items and converted into percentages. The responses were then summarized. All analyzed responses were then used for reporting the students’ attitude and for providing support to the research findings. The collected data were analyzed by the SPSS Program aiming to answer the research questions quantitatively. The students’ responses to the questionnaires were coded and keyed into the SPSS program 20.0 for statistical analysis. The analysis of quantitative data and the average of the grades were

calculated. In the statistical analysis used in the research, the level of significance was accepted to be 0.05.

3.4.5 Data from Focus Group Interview

The data from focus group interview were focused on content analysis. The data from focus group interview were transcribed and categorized and then interpreted to answer the research questions. During the transcription stage, students’ names were replaced with a pseudonym (Silverman, 1993). The next step, the transcripts were given back to the participants to confirm that it was reflected exactly what the students said and meant. Furthermore, the students’ responses for each question were translated from Indonesian to English and then the data were analysed to identify recurring themes.

The transcripts were then condensed into briefer statements in which the main sense of what is said paraphrase into a few words (Kvale, 1996). Finally the data were coded and categorized by using thematic data analysis. In this sense, the researcher categorized students’ comments into problems that had become the focus of the study, i.e. the implementation of GBA in teaching descriptive writing and students’ attitude towards the implementation.

3.5 Criteria of Success

The treatments of this research were terminated when these criteria of success were achieved. The criteria of success in this study were:

 The mean score of students’ writing texts reach 70 as the Minimum Mastery Criterion (Kriteria Ketuntasan Minimum) score in this school.

 There are significant improvements in students’ writing achievements in each cycle which is measured statistically.

 There are improvements in students’ writing texts based on the analysis of schematic structure and linguistic features of the texts in each cycle.

3.6 Conclusion

This chapter has provided of the methodology used in this study. This included the research design, the research site, the participants, the criteria of success, the data collection and the data analysis. The next chapter will concern with the description of the teaching program done by the researcher.

This chapter presents the review on how the GBA implemented in the research site context and the findings of the study resulted in three phase of the CAR. Then, the analysis and interpretation of data in relation to the overarching research problems posed in this study are presented as a discussion in last section.

5.1 Preliminary Phase of the Teaching Program

As was asserted in Chapter III, there are three phases that should be conducted in doing the CAR, i.e. pre-action phase, action phase, and post-action phase (see Lim, 2007). Considering this, the researcher decided to conduct a pre-action phase (preliminary phase) by doing observation and preparation in relation to the implementation of GBA before the study was conducted in the research site. The activities are as follows:

Table 5.1 Activities in Preliminary Phase of the Teaching Program

Day/Date Activities

Monday/

11 November 2013 

Meeting the Headmaster to ask for

permission and give the research letter to the Headmaster

Wednesday/

13 November 2013 

Observing the class and asking students about how they were taught English especially writing skill before the research conducted. This activity was done because the researcher did not teach in the class. Thursday/

14 November 2013 

Observing the teaching and learning process before the research conducted.

 Communicating with the teacher and discuss about the research, the material and how it will be conducted.

Friday/

15 November 2013 

Administering a diagnostic writing test (pre-test)

 Informing the students with the research and the teaching program

Before the students were taught the writing skill developed through GBA, the students were given a writing pre-test (Appendix 5). This pre-test was aimed

to find out the students‟ levels in writing achievement. The students were given 40 minutes to do the writing pre-test with “my classroom” as the theme. After the pre-test results were submitted, the researcher and another rater scored the texts based on the rubric adopted from Widodo (2006). The results of the evaluation are displayed in Appendix 5.

Afterwards, the students were informed and given a general explanation about the research. It was necessary to explain about the research since the researcher was not their regular classroom teacher. The researcher also carried out a discussion with the classroom teacher about the research, the theme and how the research will be conducted. This information was important to be given since

“what is to be learned should be made clear to the students” (Feez, 2002; Cope and Kalantzis, 1993).

5.1.1 Analysis of Students’ Test Scores

This section discusses the result of students‟ test scores in the pre-test. Based on the statistical analysis by using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) for Windows version 20.0., the descriptive statistic of the pre-test is presented in Table 5.2. below.

Table 5.2 Descriptive Statistics of Pre-Test Pre-Test

N Valid 28

Missing 0

Mean 22,5893

Std. Error of

Mean 3,14703

Median 20,6250

Mode 6,25

Std. Deviation 16,65252

Range 56,25

Minimum 5,00

Maximum 61,25

Sum 632,50

The result of the pre-test shows that the mean score of the pre-test is 22.59 (SD 16.65). Generally, students‟ scores on the pre-test are found relatively low. The maximum score is 61.25 and the minimum score is 5.00. This result confirms that the problems encountered in the initial observation proved true. Most students did not have sufficient ability to write. Therefore, an appropriate approach, such as GBA is needed to improve their writing skills. In other words, the implementation of GBA in the teaching of writing in this study was expected to overcome this problem. The scores of students‟ writing test were expected to improve after the GBA was applied in the teaching of descriptive text writing.

5.1.2 Analysis of Students’ Texts in Pre-Test

This section presents the analysis and interpretation of three samples of

students‟ texts from three categorises: high achievers, middle achievers, and low achievers. From each category, one student‟s text is analyzed and interpreted as a representation of the categories. The analysis is focused on exploring the schematic structure, the linguistic features and the achievement of the social

function of the text as proposed by Gerot and Wignell (1995), Derewianka (2004), and Knapp and Watkin (2005).

In terms of schematic structure, a descriptive text , as have been explained in Chapter II, should consist of two main elements, i.e. identification and description. Furthermore, the linguistic features which are typically used in the descriptive texts, i.e. present tense, action verb, linking verb, etc (Derewianka, 1990; Gerot and Wignell, 1995; Knapp and Watkin, 2005). The social function of discussion text is to give information about a particular person, place or thing (Derewianka, 1990; Gerot and Wignell, 1995; Knapp and Watkin, 2005).

The analysis of the three student‟ texts gained through the pre-test are displayed in the following sub-sections. Pseudonyms are assigned to protect the identity of the students. Yogi represents low achievers, Fira represents middle achievers and Nadia represents high achievers. The results of the analysis are closely described below.

5.1.2.1 Low Achiever (Group 1)

The first text to be anlyzed is Yogi‟s text gained through the pre-test as the representative of low achievers (Group 1). The text, as can be seen in Table 5.3, was written in one paragraph. This suggests that the writer at this stage did not yet meet the schematic structure of a descriptive text which should have the Identification and Description (Derewianka, 1990; Gerot and Wignell, 1995; Knapp and Watkin, 2005). In his text, Yogi did not include the Identification. He only included the description. Additionally, the text that Yogi produced during the pre-test was minimal and commented only on the things in the clasroom. It suggests that the student tried to describe the things in the classroom but he was not able to describe them in a complete sentence. It may be that, the writer has limited understanding of writing and its purpose, as John (2002) reports. Similar to this student, the texts of students in Group 1 were short and underdeveloped.

Table 5.3 Analysis of Text 1 Written by Low Achiever

Schematic Structure

My Classroom Linguistic Features Identification

Description My class is floor, door, wall, book, frame, vase, window, table, pail, eraser, blackboard, chalk, bench, pencil, ruler, waste basket, calender, lamp, days, week, ordinal number, picture, bag, student.

Specific participant: my class

Linking verb: is

In terms of linguistic features, Yogi shows his struggle to write a successful descriptive text as he made grammatical mistake (My class is floor, door, wall

…) and misspell word (calender) in the text. In addition, this text has not achieved the social function of the descriptive text that is to describe the classroom to the readers. Indeed, Yogi has shown his understanding of descriptive text since he wrote the words “ My class …” and the things in the classroom that actually he can used to describe his classroom.

Overall, the pre-test results of Group 1 writers did not acquire the necessary knowledge of the genre to describe the classroom. Some of the students in this category could not even write complete sentences in English. Furthermore, the results of the analysis above suggest that the students in this group really needed scaffolding from the teacher in terms of grammar and control of the schematic structure of a Descriptive text. For this reason, in the action phase, writing should be taught as a process (Gibbons, 2002). The students should be given time to revise, to edit and to proofread their writing (Gibbons, 2002) .

5.1.2.2 Middle Achiever (Group 2)

The second text to be anlyzed is Fira‟s text as the representative of middle achievers (Group 2). The text that Fira produced during the pre-test is better than the text written by low achiever as display in Table 5.4 below.

Table 5.4 Analysis of Text 1 Written by Middle Achiever

Schematic Structure

My Classroom Linguistic Features Identification It is class seven-one.

in the class room has blackboard, a chair, a door, a vase, a lamp, a table, a celender, a window, a broom. my class room the is flower teacher in the my school the are kind time teach. I have many friend‟s be rona, jelita, saina, geres, lia

Specific participant Linking verb: is

Description Linking verb: is, are,

has, have

Although Fira wrote her text in one paragraph, it has shown the schematic structure of a descriptive text. Fira started to introduce her class by identifying it in the first sentence of the paragraph (It is class seven-one). In the next sentences, she described about the things found in her class, the teacher, and her friends. These sentences consider as Description of the text (Derewianka, 1990; Gerot and Wignell, 1995; Knapp and Watkin, 2005).

In terms of linguistic features, this text has applied some linguistic features of descriptive text, such as the use of specific participant (class seven-one) and linking verbs: is, are, has, and have. On the other hand, Fira shows her immaturity in English grammar, spelling and punctuation as she still made some mistakes, for examples: in the class room has blackboard, a chair, a door,…; my class room

the is flower teacher in the my school the are kind time teach, etc.

As the social purpose of such genre is to give information about a particular person, place or thing (Derewianka, 1990; Gerot and Wignell, 1995; Knapp and Watkin, 2005), the student seemed to have some effort to improve her writing

since writing can not be done „at one sitting” (Gibbons, 2002: 67).

To sum, the students in Group 2 presented lists of facts about the classroom in vague order as illustrated above. The writing characteristics of Group 2 suggests that they have little knowledge about descriptive text. The writers in this category still need some help in creating a successful descriptive text.

5.1.2.3 High Achiever (Group 3)

The discussion and analysis presented in Table 5.5 below are taken from

Nadia‟s text as the representative of a high achiever.

Table 5.5 Analysis of Text 1 Written by High Achiever

Schematic Structure My Classroom Linguistic Features Identification This is a class seven-one.

In the class seven-one there is a door, window, blackboard, chair, table, picture. State my classroom very calm, colour a wall my class is with, colour a door is blue.

In the my class there is various picture. Among other picture vegetables, animal, flower, etc. in the class we study by ordely. In the my class I have friend that good. When a teacher no enter we study at the same moment.

Specific Participant

Linking verb: is, have

Adjectives: white, blue, calm, good

Present tense: study, enter

Description Description

Nadia‟s text obtained from pre-test was also written in one paragraph. However, it had followed the stages of the schematic structure required by a descriptive text (Derewianka, 1990; Gerot and Wignell, 1995; Knapp and Watkin, 2005). This text suggests that the students at this level had a good control of the schematic structure of a descriptive text which should have Identification and Description. The introduction begins with a general statement, “This is a class seven-one” and was continued by descriptions of the things in the classroom.

Nadia shows her capacity in applying the linguistic features of descriptive text, such as: specific participant (class seven-one), present tense (study, enter), linking verbs (is, have), adjectives (calm, blue, good). However, in terms of English grammar, Nadia still made some mistakes. For example: State my classroom very calm, colour a wall my class is with, colour a door is blue.

A clear social purpose of the text is identified in the writing: describing the classroom, what class was described and the things found in the classroom. The classroom is presented as the focus of the description. In addition, the student

included more information about the class. These characteristics suggest that Nadia already had an understanding of some of the features of the genre before the GBA was implemented.

In conclusion, the writing characteristics of the students in Group 3 show that they have enough knowledge about descriptive text. However, the writers in this category still need help in creating a successful descriptive text.

5.1.3 Reflection of Preliminary Phase

From the results obtained in this phase, the researcher and the classroom teacher made a reflection. According to Somekh (1995), the most important element in action research is reflection; it lies at the core of action research. Reflection in action research is “the moment where the research participants examine and construct, evaluate and reconstruct their concerns” (Grundy, 1986: 28). Reflection includes the pre‐emptive discussion of the teacher and the observer to identify a shared concern or problem. In this reflective stage, the teacher and the observer decided what the outcomes tell them and try to see new or revised issues for further investigation in the next cycle of action research (Mills, 2007; Burns, 2010).

The results of the reflection of this phase would be used in planning the action phase. First, it was realized that the results of the pre-test of students‟ writing test were extremely low. As shown in Table 5.2, the mean score of the pre-test is 22.59. The maximum score is 61.25 and the minimum score is 5.00. This indicates that the students‟ achievements in writing need to be improved.

Thenceforth, it is found from the analysis of students‟ texts that more than half of the students were considered as very poor writers. Although they had learnt lots of English words and phrases, they were not able to use them to make a correct sentence or a complete English sentence. A lot of students still made basic grammaticl mistakes in their text which suggests their need for more scaffolding in terms of grammar. The following are the typical of the students‟ mistakes found in their pre-test results:

 Class I am colour white.

 At it the my class, in class I are window.

 At in the My class, be are calender, vase, window, door, blackboard ...

 I am class seven one on deep class to be many image, map, globe, blackboard, eraser, bench, and calender.

 And it is classroom are table‟s, chair‟s, broom‟s, floor‟s.

In terms of schematic structure of descriptive text, most of the students had not had good control of the text structure. This confirm to the researcher and the observer that the modelling stage as suggested by genre-based pedagogy, including explicit teaching about the schematic structure, was important for the teacher to achieve a good control of the genre.

Based on the reflection above, the researcher and the classroom teacher decided to act upon all the matters above and implement the stages of teaching cycle proposed by Hammond et al. (1992), Gibbons (2002), Emilia et al. (2008), and Emilia (2010, 2012) in the teaching of descriptive text writing.

5.2 Implementation of the GBA: First Cycle

Having conducted the preliminary phase to identify the problems of teaching writing in the research site and the baseline of students writing achievement, the researcher carried out the first cycle of the CAR. The researcher collaborated with the English teacher of the class in designing the lesson plans, determining the criteria of success, observing the teaching and learning process, and doing the reflection. In the following is a description of activities in the planning, action and observation, and reflection phases that took place in the first cycle.

5.2.1 Planning

In planning stage, the researcher made several plans by considering the reflection results of preliminary phase. First, after marking and analyzing the

students‟ texts, the researcher and the classroom teacher discussed the theme that should be taught in the classroom. The theme for the teaching program is “School

Life”. For the first cycle, the researcher decided to implement six lesson plans were prepared for the teaching program based on Kurikulum Tingkat Satuan Pendidikan (KTSP) or 2006 curriculum since the new curriculum, 2013 curriculum, has not implemented yet in the school. The lesson plans were designed with the teaching and learning cycle of the GBA in mind. The researcher did modification and adaptation for the BKoF, MoT, JCoT, and ICoT which was expanded into listening, reading, speaking and writing skills. The activities conducted in this cycle are displayed in Table 5.6 below.

Table 5.6 Activities in the First Cycle

Meeting Day/Date Number of hours

Stages Skill

1 Thursday/

21 November 2013

2 Building Knowledge of the Field

Listening 2 Friday/

22 November 2013

2 Building Knowledge of the Field

Reading and Speaking 3 Saturday/

23 November 2013

2 Modelling of the Text Reading and Listening 4 Thursday/

28 November 2013

2 Joint Construction of the Text

Writing 5 Friday/

29 November 2013

2 Independent

Construction of the Text

Writing

6 Saturday/

30 November 2013

2 Independent

Construction of the Text

Writing

Second, the researcher also prepared observation checklist for the observer to observe the activities of the teacher in teaching and learning process whether it was in line with the lesson plans which had made before or not. The researcher prepared observation notes to observe the activities of students during the teaching and learning process. In addition, the researcher prepared the post-test for the class to collect the data in order to recognize the students‟ improvement scores from pre-test to post-test in this cycle. After that, the texts, student worksheets and figures were prepared as they were necessary materials for students in the teaching and learning process.

Third, in conducting the observation, a video camera was used to gain a record of the teaching and learning process. The reason for this activity was to avoid reactivity (see Alwasilah, 2009). The video camera was also used to capture the pictures of the physical environment of the classroom. By video recording, the researcher can observe an activity afterwards by watching the video, without the disruptions of the classroom or time constraints. The video records were used to help the researcher to get additional data that can not collected by observation note.

Finally, in terms of classroom physical environment, the researcher planned to change the seating arrangement of the students during the research project. Before the research project, the seats were like a theatre with all the students looking towards the teacher. In order to avoid being the focal point of the interaction, the teacher should arrange the desks in the classroom in such a way that the students can look directly at one another, therefore maximizing interaction among the students. For this reason, the students sat in the U shape during the instruction. The researcher consulted this plan with the classroom teacher and she agreed with this. Then, the classroom teacher asked the students to change the seating arrangement before the first meeting was begun.

5.2.2 Action and Observation

There were four stages of instruction conducted in this phase: Building Knowledge of the Field (BKoF), Modelling of the Text (MoT), Joint Construction of the Text (JCoT), and Independent Construction of the Text (ICoT). These stages were intended to accommodate the stages in the Curriculum Cycle of the GBA (see Chapter II and Chapter IV). They were implemented flexibly to ensure that the activities and assignments the students engaged were appropriate and relevant.

5.2.2.1 Meeting 1: Building Knowledge

This stage is to develop students‟ background knowledge about the topic

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