Using Picture Series to Enhance Grade XII Students' Writing: A Case Study from SMA Negeri , Study Guides, Projects, Research of English

Download Using Picture Series to Enhance Grade XII Students' Writing: A Case Study from SMA Negeri and more Study Guides, Projects, Research English in PDF only on Docsity! i IMPROVING STUDENTS’ SKILLS OF WRITING EXPLANATION TEXTS THROUGH PICTURE SERIES FOR THE GRADE XII STUDENTS OF SMA NEGERI 2 SLEMAN IN THE ACADEMIC YEAR OF 2013/ 2014 A THESIS Submitted as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Attainment of the Degree of a Sarjana Pendidikan in English Language Education By: Nurika Desitawardhani 09202244039 ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM FACULTY OF LANGUAGES AND ARTS YOGYAKARTA STATE UNIVERSITY 2014 IMPROVING STUDENTS’ SKILLS OF WRITING EXPLANATION TEXTS THROUGH PICTURE SERIES FOR THE GRADE XII STUDENTS OF SMA NEGERI 2 SLEMAN IN THE ACADEMIC YEAR OF 2013/2014 First Consultant, Second Consultant, \ Dra. Jamillah* > M.Pd. NIP. 19630103 198803 2 002 NIP. 19770118 20112 2 001 v DEDICATIONS This thesis is dedicated to: My beloved mother and father My beloved sister and brother My self My true friends vi MOTTOS Lakum diinukum waliyadiin (Al-Kafiiruun: 6) A good attitude will make a big difference. (Anonymous) There are only two ways to live your life. One is as thought nothing is a miracle. The other is as thought everything is a miracle. (Allen Saunders) Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift of God, which is why we call it the present. (Albert Einstein) vii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In the name of Allah the Most Gracious and the Most Merciful, Alhamdulillah, praise be to Allah for the strengths and His blessing for me in completing this thesis. I would like to say my special gratitude to my first consultant, Dra. Jamillah, M.Pd., for her patience in guiding and supervising me during the process of my thesis writing, in the same manner as my second consultant, Dwiyani Pratiwi, S.Pd., M.Hum., for her patience in correcting this thesis. I also wish to acknowledge Dr. Agus Widyantoro, M.Pd. for his incredible support to me in finishing my thesis. Special appreciation goes to the big family of SMA N 2 Sleman especially to the English teacher, Dra. S. Tri Budiyati, for her guidance in doing the research in SMA N 2 Sleman and the students of Grade XII Science 1 for their participation during the research. My sincerest gratitude goes to my beloved mother and father who are always praying and staying there in my good and bad times. I thank them for teaching me about patience and optimism and for always reminding me to worship Allah SWT. And also for my beloved sister and brother for supporting me in every condition. I also thank my friends in class H of PBI ’09 (Arista, Novia, Nana, Yanuar, Fahmi, Dewi, Rara, Rizka, Vera, Ratna, Mawud, Pakdhe, Wisnu, Trimbil, Cecep, Anggi, Sondang, and Tridar) and the other friends that I cannot mention one by one for their prayer and moral support. I thank them all for the memories we have made. This acknowledgement also goes to my bestist d’exel: Sintia, Rayi, Dita, Ndel2, and Aghast. I thank them very much for the true-friendship. We have passed a lot of moments. They are going to be unforgettable memories that we can share to our children in the future when we get our success. I realize that this writing is still far for being perfect. Therefore, all criticisms and suggestions are appreciated. However, I hope this writing gives contributions for the field of study, especially for the English teaching and learning. x REFERENCES 120 APPENDICES 123 xi LIST OF TABLES Table 1 : Standard of Competences and Basic Competences of Writing Skill for Senior High School Students at the Grade XII Semester One Table 2 : Families of Text Types Table 3 : Scoring Rubrics of Writing Modified from Jacobs et al in Weigle (2002:116) Table 4 : The Conversion Table Table 5 : Problems in the English teaching- learning process in Grade XII Science 1 of SMA N 2 Sleman in the academic year of 2013/ 2014 Table 6 : The Urgent Problems to Solve Table 7 : The Urgent Problems and the Action to Solve Table 8 : The Students’ Writing Score after Cycle 1 Table 9 : The Comparison of the Students’ Writing Scores Before and After Cycle 1 Table 10 : Paired Sample Statistic – Pre-test and Cycle 1 Table 11 : The Students’ Writing Scores in Cycle 2 Table 12 : The Comparison of the Students’ Writing Scores in Cycle 1 and Cycle 2 Table 13 : Paired Sample Statistic – Cycle 1 and Cycle 2 Table 14 : The Results of Students’ Writing in the Research Table 15 : Students’ Mean Score in the Content Aspect Table 16 : Students’ Mean Score in the Organization Aspect Table 17 : Students’ Mean Score in the Vocabulary Aspect Table 18 : Students’ Mean Score in the Language Use Aspect Table 19 : Students’ Mean Score in the Mechanic Aspect Table 20 : The Students’ Mean Score of Writing in the Pre-test, Cycle 1, and Cycle 2 Table 21 : The Improvement of Students’ Writing Score in the Pretest, Cycle 1, and Cycle 2 Table 22 : The Comparison of the Students’ Writing Skills in the Pretest and the Cycle 2 xii LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1 : Cyclical Action Research Model by Kemmis and McTaggart Figure 2 : The Chart of Students’ Writing Score in the Pretest, Cycle 1 (Posttest1), Cycle 2 (Posttest2) 2 generating and organizing the ideas, but also in translating those ideas into a readable text. That statement is also supported by the Standard of Competency and Basic Competence of curriculum 2006 of English learning. According to the curriculum, the writing skill is placed in the last part after three skills namely listening, speaking, and reading. It can be said that the learners have to apply everything that they have got in the three stages before. So, writing can not be learnt spontaneously. One scope of English learning at senior high schools is that students can understand and produce a short functional text and short essays in the form of certain text types. They are procedure, descriptive, recount, narrative, report, news item, analytical exposition, hortatory exposition, spoof, explanation, discussion, and review (Depdiknas, 2006). In this research, the researcher focused on improving students’ ability in writing an explanation text because it is one of the texts which should be mastered by the twelfth grade students. The researcher also realized that writing an explanation text was not an easy thing to do. Through this research, the students were expected to be able to produce explanation texts appropriately. According to the previous explanations, the students have to master writing skill. However, based on the observation and interview conducted in SMA Negeri 2 Sleman, especially in Grade XII of Science 1, the researcher found some problems related to teaching and learning writing in the field. The problems are explained as follows. 3 The first problem was monotonous activity. Generally, the variation of classroom writing activities that could encourage students’ motivation in SMA Negeri 2 Sleman was limited. It was proven by the unvaried media like pictures or videos that the teacher used in teaching process. The next problem came from the students. The students said that they did not understand some components of an explanation text such as the generic structure and the language feature of the text. They informed that they did not really know how to produce an explanation text. In addition, the students still found difficulties to generate and develop the idea. They were confused about what they would write. It happened because usually they were only given an example of functional text. After that, they should write or produce their own text with limited guidance. Their problems were also related to spelling, punctuation marks, vocabulary, and grammar. By looking the problems above, the researcher applied media as a means to overcome the obstacles found in the field. According to Harmer (2008) media can effectively help students to improve their writing skills. One of media that can be used to improve the students’ writing skill is pictures. In this research, the researcher used picture series to improve the writing skill of the students. According to Wright (1992), picture series has two advantages. First, picture series is very useful to help the students retell or understand something since they can represent places, object, and people. Second, picture series helps the students to understand general context. The use of picture series was expected to solve the problems and to improve the writing skill for the students. 4 B. Identification of The Problem To identify the existing problems in the field, the reasearcher observed the English teaching and learning process in Grade XII Science 1 of SMA N 2 Sleman. The researcher observed the teacher, the students, and the situation during the teaching and learning process. Then, she interviewed the teacher and students there to get more supporting data. After doing that, she gained information about the sources of the problems. The problems are described as follows. The first problem was related to the teacher. Generally in teaching writing, the teacher must have four competencies to teach. They are technical competency, pedagogical competency, interpersonal competency, and personal competency (Brown, 2001: 430). However the researcher found some problems related to pedagogical and personal competency based on the observation conducted in SMA Negeri 2 Sleman. In pedagogical competency, the teacher must be able to decide the best technique and media that will be used in the teaching and learning process. She must be able to make the lesson plan and manage the class. In fact, the teacher rarely combined the teaching process with any interesting media like picture or video. Most of the activities of writing were dominated on using LKS. Therefore, the teaching and learning process seemed to be monotonous. The next competency is personal competence. The teacher should have a good quality in terms of their commitment, their moral, and their professionalism in teaching. Moreover, she has to be able to maintain an inquisitive mind in trying out new ways of teaching. According to the observation, the researcher found that 7 C. Limitation of The Problem In reference to the problems above, it was impossible for the researcher to deal with all the problems because of limited time. Considering the urgency of the problems and the ability of the researcher, she focused on improving the students’ skills of writing explanation text especially in five aspects of writing namely content, organization, vocabulary, language use, and mechanic. Through this research, the researcher also focused to improve the students’ motivation and participation during the actions. By implementing the visual media in Grade XII Science 1 of SMA Negeri 2 Sleman, teachers and students were expected to achieve the goal of the teaching that was producing explanation text appropriately. In this study, the researcher intended to know how picture series as visual media could be used to improve the students’ skills of writing explanation text. D. Formulation of The Problem Based on the background of the study, identification of the problem, and limitation of the problem, the problem of this study could be formulated as follows: How can picture series be implemented in the teaching and learning writing explanation text to improve Grade XII students’ writing skills at SMA Negeri 2 Sleman in the academic year of 2013/2014? 8 E. Objective of The Research Based on the formulation of the problem, the objective of this study was to improve Grade XII students’ writing skills in producing an explanation text at SMA Negeri 2 Sleman through picture series. F. Significance of The Research Findings This study is expected to be beneficial for: 1. English teachers in SMA N 2 Sleman that the findings of this study hopefully can be a valuable source of information to improve the quality of English teaching and learning process. 2. Other teachers in SMA N 2 Sleman that the findings of this study hopefully become one of useful references used to improve students’ learning achievement. 3. Other English teachers that the results of this study can be references for other English teachers in solving their problem on how to improve their students’ writing skills.. 4. English education students of Yogyakarta State University that the results of this study hopefully become one of considerable reading materials to enrich their reference in writing their thesis. 9 CHAPTER II THEORETICAL REVIEW AND CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK This study focused on the implementation of picture series to improve the students’ writing ability in explanation text. To strengthen the framework of the study, the researcher discusses some relevant theories which are related to the study in this chapter. It is divided into theoretical description, relevant studies and conceptual framework. The theory of writing, teaching writing, media and picture series will be highlighted in this chapter. A. Theoretical Description 1. Theory of Writing a. The Nature of Writing One of the most important skills that foreign language students need to develop is writing. It is the last stage in learning language after listening, speaking, and reading. In other words, it can be said that writing is an indicator of their achievement in learning language. Before they write, they should be able to listen, to speak, and to read. Writing skills are different from other skills like speaking and listening. Brown (2001: 334) states that trends in teaching writing of ESL and other foreign languages are integrated with teaching other skills, particularly listening and speaking. Writing belongs to productive skills rather than receptive one. It produces a message to communicate. Spratt, Pulverness, and Williams (2005: 26) state that writing and speaking belong to productive skills. They say that 12 because it can affect the shape of writing. The last is the content of structure; it deals with generating their ideas in writing. 2) Drafting The second stage of writing process is drafting. The students will focus on fluency of writing without paying much attention in grammatical accuracy. They are also encouraged to deliver their message to other, for example with their peer or classmates. 3) Revising In this stage, the writers usually read through what they have written before. They may find some errors in their writing, such as: the order of information is not clear enough and the meaning that will be delivered to the reader is still ambiguous. If there are still some errors in their writing, the students should revise it. So, the ideas of their writing are clearer for the reader. 4) Editing In the last stage, the students are engaged in tidying up their writing as they prepare the final draft to be evaluated by the teacher. The main activities of this stage are that the students edit their mistakes in grammar, punctuation, spelling, and vocabulary. From the explanations above, we can conclude that every step cannot be separated each other because it can give beneficial process for the students in producing their writing. In producing a good writing, the students also need a motivation from the teacher. The teacher should encourage the students to 13 create the right conditions for the generation of ideas, persuading them of the usefulness of the activity, and encouraging them to make as much effort as possible for maximum benefit. c. Aspects of Writing Skill There are three aspects of writing skill that have to be outlined in this discussion. The first aspect is about micro and macro skill of writing, the second is mechanical and components of writing and the last is cohesion and coherence of writing. The first aspect is micro and macro skill of writing. Brown (2001: 342-343) states a list of micro and macro skills for written communication which focuses on both the form of language and the function of language. The micro skills apply more appropriate to imitative and intensive types of writing task, while macro skills are essential for the successful mastery of responsive and extensive writing. Micro skills of writing mentioned by Brown are producing graphemes and orthographic patterns of English, producing writing at an efficient rate of speed to suit the purpose, producing an acceptable core of words and use appropriate word order patterns, using acceptable grammatical system (e.g., tense, agreement, patterns, and rules); expressing a particular meaning in different grammatical forms, and using cohesive devices in written discourse. Meanwhile, macro skills of writing have other components, such as: use the rhetorical forms and conventions of written discourse; appropriately accomplish the communicative functions of written texts according to form 14 and purpose; convey links and connections between events, and communicate such relation as main idea, supporting idea, new information, given information, generalization, and exemplification; distinguish between literal and implied meanings when writing; correctly convey cultural specific references in the context of the written text; develop and use a battery of writing strategies, such as accurately assessing the audience’s interpretation, using prewriting devices, writing with fluency in the first drafts, using paraphrases and synonyms, soliciting, peer and instructor feedback, and using feedback for revising and editing (Brown, 221:2004). In conclusion, we can say that the earlier micro skills apply more appropriate to imitative and intensive types of writing performance in which they tend to describe about the mechanical of writing and at the level of word, such as cohesive devices, past verb, and etc. On the other hand, the macro skill covered wider areas of writing, such as the form and the communicative purpose of a written text, main idea and supporting idea, the literal and implied meaning writing, etc. Thus, it is not only about a word but it is about the whole written text. Mechanical components are the second important matter of writing. Strakey (2004) addressed writing mechanics in terms of grammar, spelling, punctuation, and capitalization. Grammar is a key element not only in writing, but in language as a system of communication in general. Having a good knowledge of the parts speech, the structure of the language and its rhetorical devices, and knowing how to write comprehensively are what 17 should make sure that the students can get the beneficial of the learning to their future life. In relation to teacher’s roles in writing process, Harmer (2007:261- 262) mentions some information about teacher’s roles in teaching and learning process of writing. They are: 1) Motivator In teaching writing, the teacher has to be able to be a motivator for the students. The teacher should motivate the students by arranging the interesting learning task, creating a nice learning atmosphere, supporting students as they grow in their writing abilities, and encouraging the students to do their best in their writing so the students can get the optimal achievement. 2) Resource Besides being a motivator, the teacher should be able to give information and language needed by the students. The teacher should ensure the students that he/ she will always give them advice and suggestion in their writing process. The teacher also must facilitate the students by giving the exercise of writing skills. 3) Feedback Provider Being a feedback provider, a teacher should respond positively and encouragingly to the content of what the students have written. When offering correction, the teacher should choose what and how much to focus on based on what students need at the 18 particular stage of their studies and on the tasks they have undertaken. As summary, teachers hold importance roles toward the students’ success in learning writing so they have to be responsible in guiding and facilitating the students’ writing by being good motivators, resources, and feedback providers. b. Types of Classroom Writing Performance According to Brown (2001, 343-346), there are five principles categories of classroom writing performance such as imitative writing, intensive writing, self- writing, display writing, and real writing. They are explained as follows: 1) Imitative or writing down which leads students to simply write down English letters, words, or sentences in order to learn the conventions of the orthographic code. 2) Intensive or controlled which loosens the teacher’s control but still offers a series of stimulators. A common form of controlled writing is to present a paragraph to students in which they have to alter a given structure throughout. is note taking 3) Self –writing which leads students to write in an element of display writing or writing with only the self in mind as an audience. The activities of this category in classrooms are note- taking, diary, and journal. 19 4) Display writing which leads students to to write in an element of display writing. Written exercises and short answer essays are the examples of activities in this category. 5) Real writing which aims to communicate a message to an audience. This type of writing performance can occur in the academic, vocational or technical, and personal scope. Every beginner writer starts to write from the basic activity such as imitative writing. This kind of activity gets the students to make letters, words, and simple sentences. The next is intensive writing which focuses on grammar, vocabulary, or sentence formation, and not necessarily to convey the meaning. Then in next levels, the students are allowed to produce their written products in the form of texts of several pageswhich require better skill than the previous ones. c. Principal for Designing Writing Technique According to Brown (2001:346-348), there are a number of specific principles for designing writing techniques. They are: 1) Incorporate practice of “good writers” Teachers should consider the various things that efficient writers do and their technique should include some of these practices. For example, good writers should focus on a goal or main idea in writing, let their first ideas flow onto the paper, follow a general organisational plan as they write, utilize feedback on their 22 really suggested to involve in collaborative writing. They work in pairs or groups to share ideas that contribute to the success of the final product. The way of giving responses also has to be planned, whether the teacher has full autonomy or it also includes peer responses. Therefore, as a productive skill, writing must be taught in a comprehensive way. Langan (2008: 13) suggests that writing should be considered as a skill so that it can be learned like other skills such as driving and swimming. It means that a lot of practice will make a better writing. In other words, writing is something that can be learned. Thus, to be a good writer, the students must do a lot of practice. d. Assesing Students’ Writing Teachers who recognize the importance of writing as a learning tool understand that writing will help the students to connect their thoughts and communicate with others. Regarding to that point, the researcher realizes that the most important part to know the students’ writing ability is from their writing products. It can be assumed that if the students have a good writing ability, their writings also will be good and vice versa. So, the teacher has to be able to assess students’ writing in an appropriate way. However, to assess students’ writing product is not a simple thing to do. Urquhart & McIver (2005:26) argue that the most time- intensive part of teaching writing is assessment. Miller (Urquhart & McIver, 2005: 27) 23 defines that assessment as gathering information to meet the particular needs of a student. 1) How to assess The teacher has some responsibilities to the success of the students’ writing. The first responsibility is to provide opportunities for writing and encouragement for students who attempt to writing. The second responsibility is to promote students’ success in writing. The teacher does this by carefully monitoring students’ writing to assess strengths and weaknesses, teaching specific skills and strategies in response to students’ needs, and giving careful feedback that will correct students’ mistakes in writing. 2) Rubrics Teachers need to use an appropriate tool which helps them in assessing students’ writing performance. Rubric is an important tool to be prepared by the teachers to give an objective score. Urquhart & McIver (2005: 31) argue that rubrics are very effective assessment tools because they describe specific levels of performance. Besides, rubrics also explain the students’ performance clearly. Research also supports using rubrics because they clearly communicate expectation for both teaching and learning. There are four main types of rubrics, those are holistic rubrics, analytic rubrics, primary trait rubrics, and multi- trait rubrics. 24 However, in this study, the researcher only presents two of them; holistic rubrics and analytic rubrics. a) Holistic rubrics It assigns a level of performance by assessing performance across multiple criteria as a whole. The emphasis in holistic rubrics is on what a student does well. Weigle (2002: 112) argue that holistic scoring has an advantage to focus on the students’ attention on the strengths of their writing, not on their deficiencies. However, holistic scoring also has a disadvantage in the term of interpreting the scores. It is because in holistic scoring, raters do not use the same criteria to arrive at the same score. This idea is supported by Weigle’s explanation. According to Weigle (2002: 114), holistic scoring also has a disadvantage in which it is not always easy to interpret, as raters do not necessarily use the same criteria to arrive at the same scores. b) Analytic rubrics Analytic scales are divided into separate categories representing different aspects or dimensions of performance. For example, dimension for writing performance might include content, organization, vocabulary, grammar, and mechanics. Each dimension is 27 Table 1: Standard of Competency and Basic Competences of Writing Skill for Senior High School Students at the Grade XII Semester One Standar Kompetensi Kompetensi Dasar Menulis 6. narrative, explanation dan discussion secara akurat, lancar dan berterima dalam konteks kehidupan sehari-hari 6.1 Mengungkapkan makna dalam teks fungsional pendek resmi dan tak resmi dengan menggunakan ragam bahasa tulis secara akurat, lancar dan berterima dalam konteks kehidupan sehari-hari 6.2 Mengungkapkan makna dan langkah retorika dalam teks monolog dengan menggunakan ragam bahasa tulis secara akurat, lancar dan berterima dalam konteks kehidupan sehari-hari dalam teks berbentuk: narrative, explanation, dan discussion. From the table above, the researcher can conclude that the standard of competency of writing in senior high school is producing the meaning of simple writing production related to several text types in written form in the context of daily life and academic purposes to interact with the environment. In this case, the researcher focused on one text type that was explanation text. The important case of teaching writing in senior high school is also about the students’ age range. The age range of students in senior high school is between fifteen and eighteen that is also called as puberty (Brown, 2001:91). It makes them categorized into teenager learners who are in the age of transition, confusion, self-consciousness, growing and changing bodies and minds. They also have developed their attention 28 spans as the result of their intellectual maturation but those can be easily shortened sine there are many diversions within teenagers’ life. As the result, the characteristics of teenagers stated previously will become teachers’ concerns in teaching their students. According to Brown (2001:92), one of the most important concerns of the secondary school teacher is to keep self-esteem high by 1) avoiding embarrassment of students at all costs 2) affirming each person’s talents and strengths 3) allowing mistakes and other errors to be accepted 4) de-emphasizing competition between classmates, and 5) encouraging small-group work where risks can be taken more easily by a teen. In summary, the teaching of writing focused on the explanation text. The decision was based on the standard of competency and basic competence of the Grade XII in the first semester. The teaching of writing also focused on the psychological condition of the students. Thus, the teaching of writing can be done effectively. b. The Genre Approach (Text-Based Syllabus Design) In daily life, people cannot be separated with the text. When people are having a communication, they are producing a text. When they read or listen something, people try to grasp the information from what they read or listen. Thus, the text should be understandable. Text are where the symbols of language (both spoken and written), meaning (implicit and explicit), the knowledge and understanding of speakers, listeners, readers and writers all comes together. Linguist defines the word “text” as the 29 stretch of corrected spoken or written language that is capable of being discussed and analyzed as a single entity. (Eyres: 111) Text is needed to be taught in school. The text-types that the students study in school need to be linked and contextualised with the topics or real-life social activities which have direct relevance to student needs. According to Feez and Joyce (1998: 85- 86) in the Certificates in Spoken and Written English there are following families of text types. The families of text types are presented in the next page. Table 2: Families of text types Types of the Text Texts Exchanges Simple exchanges relating to information and goods and services Complex or problematic exchanges Casual conversation Forms Simple formatted texts Complex formatted texts Procedures Instructions Procedures Protocols Information texts Descriptions Explanation Reports Directives Texts which combine more than one of these text-type Story text Narratives Recounts Persuasive texts Opinion texts Expositions Discussion 32 4) Independent construction of Text (ICOT) In this final stage, students are ready to work independently to produce their own text within the chosen genre. Teacher can let students to work on their own. In other words, teacher should minimize their support, scaffolding and interference on students learning process. It will provides students with the opportunity to show their ability to create a text that has schematic structure, linguistic features and knowledge of the field in accordance with the genre that is being studied. 4. Media in Language Teaching and Learning Media has an important role in teaching and learning process. The teachers need to use a various types of media to help them teach more effectively. The media also brings the significant role in the success of teaching and learning for both teacher and student to cope with the gap between teachers’ explanation and students’ understanding. The media can be in the forms of audio recordings, video recordings, television, printed materials, real objects, computer programs, and etc. All of them are included in the instructional media because they provide messages with an instructional purpose which is to facilitate communication in the learning process. Smaldino at el (2005:9) mentions six media used in learning and instruction. They will be explained as follows: 33 a. Media is alphanumeric characters that are displayed in various types of formats. It can be in the form of book, poster, chalk board, and computer screen. b. Another media used is audio. Audio refers to the learning media that cover everything that we can hear. It can be in the form of a person’s voice, music, mechanical sound, and etc. c. The third type of media is visual. Visuals are highly used to promote learning. They will include diagrams on a poster, drawing on chalkboard, photographs/ pictures, graphics in book, cartoons, and so on. d. Another media is motion media. They are media that show motion including video-tape, animations, and so on. e. Manipulative are three dimensional media and can be touched and handled by the students. f. The last type of media proposed by Smaldino at el is people. The media includes teachers, students or subject-matter experts. One of the visual media commonly used in the teaching and learning process is pictures. Smaldino at el (2005:240) states that pictures are photographic representations of people, places and things in the form of two dimensional that sometime in the form of sequential pictures. Pictures are kinds of visual instruction materials might be used more effectively to develop and sustain motivation in producing positive attitudes towards English and to teach or reinforce language skills. 34 Through pictures, people are able to reach outside their minds. Pictures that they can see always lead to the reality of their minds. But the realities that have been presented by pictures depend on the types of the pictures. According to Betty Morgan Bowen (in John Pread, 1988: 12), there are some types of pictures as their shapes: a. Wall charts b. Wall picture is simply a large illustration of scenes or events. It is usually to be used with the whole of class. c. Sequence picture is a series of pictures of a single subject. The function is to tell a story or a sequence of events. d. Flash cards consist of word flash cards and picture flash cards The utilization of picture as media in teaching writing has some benefits. Following are some opinions concerning with the advantages of using pictures. According to Vernon, S. Gerlach (1980: 277): a. They are inexpensive and widely available. b. They provide common experiences for an entire group. c. The visual detail makes it possible to study subject, which would turn back to be impossible. d. They can help you to prevent and correct disconcertion. e. They offer a stimulus to further study, reading and research visual evidence is power tool. f. They help to focus attention and to develop critical judgment. g. They are easily manipulated. 37 text that deals with the processes involved in understanding and making explicit the how and/ or why of particular phenomena, events, and concepts occur in scientific and technical fields. Grammatical features in explanation text include passive voice, simple present tense, conjunctions of time and cause, noun groups and complex sentences. There are three steps for constructing a written explanation according to Anderson and Anderson (1997: 80). The first step is a general statement about the event or thing that will be explained. Then, a series of paragraphs that tell the hows or whys. In this paragraph, the writer tells the sequence of explanation text. The last step is a concluding paragraph as a closing. The writer concludes what he/ she has explained in this paragraph. To make a good explanation text, the students have to consider some grammatical features in composing the text. The first consideration is the using of simple present tense to explain why something happened. The verbs in simple present tense will change by adding ‘s’ if the subjects of the sentence are ‘she, he, it’; for example go becomes goes. The second consideration is the using of passive voice. It is often used when the object of the action is more important than those who perform the action. Next, the students have to consider the using of explanation text to give details about what, how and why something happened and the using of cause and effect words to show the explanation of phenomenon such as because, caused by, as a result of, and an effect of. 38 B. Relevant Study Marhaeni Siriwaji (2011) did a study through a series of pictures in teaching writing. A series of pictures is one of teaching media that can be involved in the process of teaching and learning. The researcher had found three results of the research. The first result is that students’ ability in constructing texts could improve by using a series of pictures. The second finding is that a series of pictures showed the effectiveness of the teaching and learning process. It could improve their motivation and passion to learn English writing. They were found more creative to produce their texts. The last result is that the cooperative learning among them could also improve by using a series of pictures. They got more chances to participate. They realized that they had responsibility and confidence when exploring their writing skills. Lesna Henny (2013) conducted a study on writing using picture series. She had a research about improving students’ skill of writing recount text by using picture series for the eighth grade students of SMP N 1 Seyegan in the academic year of 2012/ 2013. In her study, she analyzed the improvement of using picture series to teach writing. The result of the study proved that the utilization of picture series could improve students’ writing skills on recount text. Added to this, the activities during the teaching and learning process could improve the classroom interaction, students’ involvement, and students’ attention. 39 C. Conceptual Framework Writing is one of the four English skills that has to be mastered by the students in learning English. Writing is a complex process in which some requirements should be accomplished simultaneously. It means that the subskills of writing including grammar, diction, vocabulary, and generating the idea have to be mastered to reduce errors made by the students on their writing. As the result, the objective of English teaching and learning process is to improve the students’ writing ability. Although the objective of teaching writing has been set up, the teaching writing is not successful yet. Most of students agreed that writing was difficult skill to master. In order to help the students to be able to develop their writing competence, the selection media of teaching writing had to be considered effectively. From the information obtained by conducting interview and observation, the researcher found the similar problem to teaching and learning writing in SMA Negeri 2 Sleman. One of the problems came from the students. They still found difficulties in applying grammar, punctuation, vocabulary, and generating ideas. They also had low motivation to get involve in teaching and learning process. In addition, the media that the teacher used were not various because she just used LKS. It made the students feel bored and sleepy during the lesson. Then, the researcher decided to use picture series with a combination of rubric vocabulary lists as the solution of those problems. Picture series was 42 Figure 1: Cyclical Action Research Model by Kemmis and McTaggart Based on the figure above, the research was done in two cycles. In this research, the researcher and the English teacher as a collaborator formulated the problem related to the writing skill of the students based on the observation then identified the research problems. After that, they planned and carried out the actions, evaluated and reflected the actions implemented in the study. B. Setting of the Research This part consists of two issues. The first issue is the place of the research and the second issue is the schedule of the research. The research took place at SMA Negeri 2 Sleman. It is located in Brayut Pandowoharjo, Sleman. The senior high school has twelve classes which are divided into three grades consisted of 326 students. There are 43 teachers in this school included two English teachers. 43 The research was conducted in the middle of the first semester of the academic year 2013/2014. The observations were done on November, 1st 2013. Then, the action was conducted from November 6th to November 22nd 2013. C. Subject of the Research The participants of the research were the students of XII Science 1 class of SMA N 2 Sleman, the researcher, and the English teacher as a collaborator. There were 26 students in XII Science 1 class. They were 9 males and 17 females. The researcher chose this class as the subject of the research randomly because the all XII classes had equal competency. D. Data Collecting Techniques The data in this research are considered both quantitative and qualitative data. The quantitative data were presented in the students’ scores that were collected from pre – test and post – test. Meanwhile, the qualitative data is the description of the process during the actions in the form of field note and interview transcripts. The data were collected in some techniques. They are explained as follows. 1. Observation The researcher observed the teaching and learning process in Grade XII Science 1 and students’ progress in writing to get information needed in this research. Everything related to the students’ behaviour in learning writing, the teacher’s action in the class, and problems related to the teaching learning 44 process were noted. The purpose of the observation was to get some data about the effect of the actions that were implemented in teaching and learning of writing. The observation technique also provided field notes about the whole condition during the teaching and learning process. 2. Interview This technique was used to get the data related to the teacher’s and students’ behaviour while and after the actions implemented. It also covered problems found in the teaching and learning process. The researcher interviewed both teachers and students to get the data related to their perspectives before, during, and after implementing the actions and the effect of the teaching media used. 3. Writing pre – test and post – test Writing pre – test and post – test was also instruments used to get information about students’ writing skills. Writing pre – test was a test which was conducted in the beginning of the treatment. It gave information about the students’ writing ability before the actions. Moreover, post – test was to measure the students’ writing skills after the actions. Both tests measured how the actions improved the students’ writing skills. The following table shows the scoring rubrics of writing according to Jacobs et al in Weigle (2002: 116). 47 The rubric provides five aspects of writing namely content, organization, vocabulary, language use, and mechanic in which each of them is scaled from 1 to 4. Hence the maximum score is 20, while the minimum score is 5. By knowing the highest score and the lowest score above, the formulation of the ideal mean and the ideal standard deviation can be calculated as follows. Maximum score = C + O + V + L + M = (4 + 4 + 4 + 4 + 4) x 5 = 100 Minimum score = C + O + V + L + M = (1 + 1 + 1 + 1+ 1) x 5 = 25 Ideal Mean= 48 excellent, very good, good, fair, poor, very poor. The table is presented as follows. Table 4: The Conversion Table Class Interval Interpretation 87.5 – 100 Excellent 75 – 87.4 Very good 62.5 – 74.9 Good 50 – 62.4 Fair 37.5 – 49.9 Poor 25 – 37.4 Very poor Furthermore, there were two independent raters in assesing students’ writing. The first rater was the English teacher of Grade XII Science 1 who is qualified for assessing students’ writing and the second rater was the researcher herself. In evaluating the students’ writing, she and the collaborator gave an appropriate score in each aspect. The indicator of success could be seen from the increasing in the number of students who got good scores in Cycle 2. E. Data Collecting Instruments In collecting the data, the researcher used several instruments. There were in the form of interview transcript, field notes, and students’ scores. The 49 interviews were conducted before, during and after the teaching and learning process with both English teacher and some students of XII Science 1 class. It was aimed to get any information related to English teaching and learning process at SMA Negeri 2 Sleman especially in writing skill. It involved the teacher and the students as well. The interview transcript could help the researcher planning the actions to solve the problems related to the writing skill. The researcher also took a note during the English classroom in the form of field notes. It covered students’ behaviours and motivation in learning English. The researcher and the collaborator were able to see and take a note of students’ progress in the classroom. Field note was used to record anything happen in the classroom during the teaching and learning process and it could be used by the researcher to determine the best actions. The last instrument was the rubric score of students’ writings. It was used to assess the students’ writing ability in the pre – test and post – test. The rubric score focused on five aspects containing content, organization, vocabulary, language use, and mechanic in those test. The range of writing score of each aspect was 1 to 4 consisting different indicator. F. Data Analysis Technique This research is qualitative in nature. However, the data were analyzed both qualitatively and quantitatively. The qualitative data were taken from the field notes and the interview transcripts. The field notes stated everything that 52 c) Process validity Process validity means the dependability and competency of the research. The process validity was gained during the process of implementing picture series in writing class. The researcher collected the data by interviewing the English teacher and the students and making field notes to observe the teaching and learning process in Grade XII Science 1 at SMA N 2 Sleman. It includes the students’ behaviour and the students’ competency in achieving the materials. d) Dialogic validity To get the dialogic validity, the researcher had dialogues with the teacher as the collaborator in discussing what she did during the implementation of the actions. So, the researcher can make some reflections in order to get suggestions to improve the next action. The researcher also gave chances to the teacher and the students to give responses of the implementation of picture series. e) Catalytic validity The catalytic validity is related to how the stakeholders respond to the changes occurring to themselves (Burns, in Madya 2006: 43). The researcher got the catalytic validity through those two cycles of the observation, action plans, implementation, and reflection that were done at the Grade XII students of SMA N 2 Sleman. 53 In order to get rounded perspectives and to avoid the subjectivity in analyzing the data, the researcher used two kinds of triangulation; time triangulation and researcher triangulation (Burns, 1999:163) as follows: 1. Time triangulation The data of this research were collected over a period of time to identify the factors involved in the actions. The researcher obtained the data on the students’ improvement in writing by conducting pre – test and post – test. She also conducted interviews with the teacher and the students before, during, and after the actions. Moreover, the teaching and learning process was recorded in every meeting in the field notes. 2. Researcher triangulation The researcher asked another research member to help her in the reflection steps. It was done to avoid biased interpretations. Furthermore, the researcher also asked the teacher as the collaborator to observe the teaching and learning process so the teacher had much contribution in the process of documenting the field notes. H. Procedure of the Research 1. Reconnaissance Stage In the Reconnaissance stage, the data were about obstacles and weaknesses related to the English teaching and learning process. It was done to find the problems that needed to be solved through picture series. 54 They were collected through observations and interviews. The researcher observed all activities related to students’ writing skills which were detected during the English teaching learning process in the classroom. The results of the observation were recorded and presented in the form of field notes. To strengthen the data collected previously, the researcher interviewed the other research members. All of the data collected were presented in the form of identified field problems then were selected distinctively based on the level of difficulty, urgency, and feasibility. The problems which were considered having the medium level of difficulty, the more urgent level, and the most feasible would be overcome collaboratively. 2. Planning After doing observation and interview, the researcher and the English teacher made a planning to do the feasible actions that would be implemented. The planning covered the identified problem based on the result of observation and interview. The purpose of the actions was to improve students’ writing ability of Grade XII Science 1 through picture series. 3. Acting and Observing The action was conducted by the researcher whereas the English teacher observed the process. The purpose of this step was to solve the problem which was students' low writing skill by implementing picture series. The changes and obstacles of the students’ involvement were 57 who talked to their friends. Then, the teacher checked the students’ homework taken from LKS. They should write the answers in complete sentences based on the explanation text on the white board. When the teacher said “Any volunteer who wants to write down the answer?” there were few students who wanted to come in front of the class to write down the answer on the white board. So for the rest of the questions, the teacher should call their names. After that, the teacher checked the sentences one by one and identified the mistakes. While she was doing these activities, some students only talked with their friends and paid no attention to the teacher’s explanation. The teacher then explained the generic structures and language features of an explanation text without showing the model of the text. She said, “If you want to explain how something happens, you have to use simple present tense, cirinya harus memakai verb1.” “Contohnya verb1 seperti apa?” asked the teacher. Most of the students paid no attention to the teacher, it could be seen when teacher asked, some of them did not say anything until she repeated the question. Then the teacher gave the students writing tasks. She asked them to complete the text with suitable words. Then they had to identify the generic structure of the text. They could do the tasks with their partners. Some students got confused with the tasks given by the teacher. They also met difficulties in completing the text with the suitable words because they were not familiar with the words. So, the teacher asked them to borrow dictionary in the library. But they did not feel up to open the dictionary. When all students finished in doing the task, the teacher started checking the students’ answers. She called the students’ names then asked them to answer directly. When a student read the text and the answer, other students did not pay attention and were just busy with their own activity. After the students answered, the teacher used the white board as the media to write the additional information. It indicated that the students needed some media to engage their interest because they were not motivated to get involved in the teaching and learning process. When the teacher explained in front of the class, some students were busy with their friends. The teacher reminded them to be silent. However the students still made noisy. It indicated that the students’ involvement in the teaching and learning process was very low. (Field note 2, October 23rd, 2013) The field note shows that the activity during the process of teaching and learning was not quite successful to get the students’ interest. Most of them had no motivation to follow the lesson. It was indicated by the actions they did when 58 the teacher explained the materials. Some of them often talked to their friends. The rests also did not pay attention when the teacher asked their friends to read the text and answer the correct vocabulary. This situation brought them into a passive condition. Therefore, the students’ involvement during the teaching and learning process needed to be improved. To strengthen the findings, the researcher also held interviews with both the students and the teacher. By interviewing the English teacher, she identified the problems that supported the early condition above. The following interview transcript shows the similar condition in the vignette. P : Bagaimana kemampuan bahasa Inggris siswa secara keseluruhan Bu? (How are the students’ skills of English in general, Ma’am?) G : Jujur saja kalau disini itu anak- anaknya masih low ya mbak. Apalagi yang kelas XII IPA1 ini cukup ramai dibanding dengan kelas IPA satunya. Mereka sering mengobrol sendiri dengan temannya saat pelajaran berlangsung. Kadang kalau disuruh mengerjakan mereka hanya njagake jawaban temannya. (Honestly, the students’ skills are still low, especially for Grade XII Science1 students who are quite noisy than the students from the other science class. They often talk to their classmates during the lesson. When they are asked to do the task, sometimes they look at their friend’s works.) P : Bagaimana pembelajaran menulis di kelas Bu? (How the teaching and learning writing in class, Ma’am?) G : Saya cuman ambil materi dari LKS mbak, sebagai tambahan mungkin cuma dari buku yang ada di perpustakaan. Kalau menulis itu, biasanya anak saya suruh menjawab pertanyaan dengan kalimat lengkap dari bacaan. Kalau saya suruh menulis itu ya sulit sih mbak ngajarinnya. (I just take the materials from LKS or English book in the library. In the writing class, the students are asked to answer the questions from text. I find difficulties to teach the students if they are asked to compose a text.) P : Jika dalam menulis, siswa masih ada kesulitan atau tidak ya Bu? (In writing, do the students still find anydifficulties?) G : Iya mbak, memang untuk kemampuan menulis, rata-rata siswa di sekolah ini masih mengalami kesulitan. (Yes, they do. The students in this school still find some problems in writing.) 59 P : Berdasarkan pengalaman Ibu, sekiranya apa ya Bu penyebabnya? (Based on your experience, what are the causes?) G : Kalau menurut saya sih minat mereka dalam menulis itu kurang. Mereka pada umumnya juga kesulitan dalam vocabulary dan tenses gitu. Terus mereka juga kurang media sih ya Mbak. Paling sering kalau guru di sini ya pakai LKS Mbak. Jarang bisa menyiapkan media seperti gambar atau video atau music gitu. Hehee. Lalu mereka juga seperti bingung mau nulis apa. Bahkan tanda baca yang sederhana saja mereka juga masih suka salah. (In my opinion, they have less motivation in writing. They also have problems in vocabulary and tenses. In addition, they do not get any interesting media. The teachers here usually use the book only. They don’t have enough time to prepare media like pictures, video, or music. Hehee. They also do not have ideas to write. They even have problems in using simple punctuation marks.) P : Lalu kalau proses siswa dalam belajar writing sejauh ini bagaimana Ibu ( How about the students’ process in learning writing, Ma’am?) G : Masih banyak yang harus dibenahi Mbak. Ketika writing siswa terlihat malas-malasan. Kan kalau menulis itu mereka harus mikir begitu kan ya, berbeda dengan skill yang lain. Mereka terlihat lebih antusias. (It still needs to be improved. When writing, students seem not interested because they have to think when they write something. It is different from other skills. They seem more enthusiastic.) (Teacher-Interview 1, September 27th, 2012) The following transcript shows the conversation between one of the students and the researcher. The transcript shows that the students still had difficulties in choosing appropriate words, using the correct tenses and generating and organizing the idea. P : Apa kesulitan Adik dalam menulis? (What are the difficulties in writing?) S3 : Semuanya hehe. Ehm.. di kata kerjanya gitu. (Everything hehe. Ehm the verb.) P : Oh ya, di penggunaan tensenya ya? (Really? In the use of tense, right?) S3 : Iya. (Yes.) P : Kalo kosakatanya gimana? (How about the vocabulary?) S3 : Kosakatanya juga sulit. (The vocabulary is also difficult.) 62 6. The teacher sometimes did not give a warning when some students talked to the others. T 7. The teacher explained the materials without showing the model of the text. T 8. The English teaching and learning was teacher-centered. Tec 9. The teacher said that she had difficulties in teaching writing. Tec 10. The teacher just explained the materials based on the LKS. Tec 11. Most of the given materials were taken from the students’ worksheet (LKS). M 12. The media used by the teacher were not various and interesting. M S: Student T: Teacher M: Media Tec: Technique Based on the problems above, the researcher and the English teacher discussed the main problems that had to be solved. Those problems were determined by considering the urgency and the ability of the researcher. The formulations of the problems to be solved in this research are as follows. Table 6: The Urgent Problems to Solve No Problems Codes 1. The students had low motivation to get involved in teaching learning process. S 2. The students were not autonomous in learning. S 3. The students had low skills in writing. S 4. The English teaching and learning was teacher-centered. Tec 5. The media used by the teacher were not various and interesting. M After the problems were chosen, the researcher dicussed some plans with the English teacher to solve those problems in the field. In this case, she applied 63 picture series with combination of vocabulary lists needed to write. The implementation of picture series was very useful because it could be used to to encourage the students to explain something happens. It was easier for them to get the ideas through picture series. After they got the ideas, it was much easier for them to generate the ideas. It made the students able to put their ideas in written text and write them into a good organization. In applying the picture series, she also provided a vocabulary lists. She believed that the rubric can help the students to use an appropriate vocabulary in their writing. Furthermore, to meet the expectation, she also gave the students supporting materials containing tenses, vocabulary, punctuation, and capitalization. She discussed the plans to the teacher. The following table shows the urgent problems that needed to be solved with the action plans that had been designed by the researcher. Table 7: The Urgent Problems and the Actions to Solve N o Problems Codes Indicators Action Plans to Solve the Problems 1. The students had low motivation to get involved in teaching learning process. S • When the bell rang, many students were still outside the class. • When the teacher came to the class, the students were still not ready to study. • Students talked to each other when the teaching and learning activity was still going on. The researcher planned to give picture series to attract the students’ interest to the materials given, so their motivation and enthusiasm could improve during teaching and learning process. 64 2. The students were not autonomous in learning. S • Many students did not consult the dictionary. • Most of the students depend on their friend’s answer when the teacher asked them to do the tasks. The researcher planned to give picture series with various tasks that could be done by the students both in pairs and individually, so the students could share their understanding before they composed the text individually. 3. The students had low skills in writing. S • The students had low ability in using sentence structure or appropriate tense. • The students had difficulties in vocabulary. • The students had difficulties in generating and developing the ideas. • The students did not pay attention to punctuation and capitalization. The researcher planned to use the picture series to overcome those problems. Pictures could stimulate the students to get the ideas. It would also help the students in expressing the ideas become more readable text. 4. The English teaching and learning was teacher- centered. Tec • The teacher is dominated on the activities during the lesson. • She presented the materials by directly telling the students without giving a chance for students to get involved. The researcher planned to teach using genre based syllabus. The four stages could give a chance for both students and teacher to get involved during the lesson. So it made the students more active in the teaching and 67 The reseacher and the collaborator planned to continue the materials in the second meeting. In this meeting, the researcher planned to explain one of the language features of the explanation text that was passive voice. After explaining the materials, the teacher asked the students to change the active voice into the passive voice. They could do the task with their tablemate. For the next task, the researcher asked the students to arrange the jumbled paragraphs of explanation text with the series of pictures as the guideline. Then, they identified the generic structures and the language features of that text in order they could be familiar with those aspects. Then there would be a discussion and the researcher would correct the students’ mistakes directly. In the last meeting of the Cycle 1, the researcher and the collaborator planned to ask the students to write an explanation text as the the first post – test. The students did the post – test individually. They were asked to write an explanation text based on the picture series given. They also could use the rubric that consists of vocabularies to compose the text. 2. Action and Observation The researcher administered this cycle in three meetings. It seemed too short because one meeting consisted of 90 minutes. However, there was a consideration that had to be accomplished. There were so many agendas for the Grade XII students to prepare their National Examination. Therefore, the researcher was only given limited time to conduct the research. She prepared the materials according to the students’ needs, interest, and the curriculum applied in the school since they focused on the explanation texts. She preferred applying the 68 text-based syllabus design in the teaching and learning process. This syllabus led them to construct a text, to be able to work both in pairs and individually, and to enlarge their writing skills. The description of the actions is as follows. a. First Meeting The researcher conducted the first meeting on November 9th, 2013. She began the class by greeting the students. After she greeted them and had a little talk with the students, she then checked their attendance. Then, she gave them a picture about human respiratory system to stimulate the background knowledge of the students about the material. The researcher also gave some questions directly related to the picture. Then, she gave them an explanation text entitled Human Respiratory System. They firstly read the text by themselves. They had to look for difficult words. After they finished looking for the difficult words, they answered some questions based on the text. In this case, they worked in pairs. They looked serious in doing the task. It is described by the following field note. The next activity was to read a text entitled Human Respiratory System. The students had to find the difficult words and their meaning as well. They began to read by themselves. They opened their dictionary to help them in finding the words meaning. There were some students who asked the researcher when they did not find the meaning appropriately. (Field note 4, November 9th, 2013) After they finished answering the questions, there was a discussion on the answers. After it was done, the next activity was to have a discussion on the whole text. The students and the researcher studied the text together like identifying the tense that is Simple Present Tense and the generic structure of the 69 text. She led them to recognize explanation texts. The students were expected to be familiar with how to write the general statement, the explanation, and the closing. The transcript below showed how she explained the materials. R explained everything about explanation text then. R explained the social function, the generic structure, and the linguistic features. Most of the students were paying attention to the R. (Field note 4, November 9th, 2013) After the text was discussed, the researcher gave them another exercise. It was done in pairs. In this case, they focused on the use of simple present tense. There were some sentences that the verbs were wrong. They had to correct them into the appropriate forms. When the students were doing the task, she moved around them. She just intended to know whether the students have understood about the material. After they finished doing the task, they wrote their sentences on the whiteboard. A student wrote one of their sentences. There were twenty five sentences actually, while there were twenty-six students in the classroom. She did not point them one by one but she just directly offered the students to go in front. They were very enthusiastic to write down their answer on the whiteboard. After all sentences were shown on the whiteboard, she began to correct them one by one. She involved the students to correct the wrong sentences. Then, they corrected their own work on their own seat. The situation in the classroom was noisy by having this task. They had a discussion with their friends. The description of the situation is as follows. 72 works. She found that they made mistakes in changing the verb 1 into verb 3 and in changing subject into object. It explains in the following box. After they wrote their sentences on the whiteboard, R checked their answers. There were still some mistakes. It was about the changing verb 1 into verb 3, for example ‘read’ was written ‘readed’. Their mistakes also were about the using of appropriate to be and the changing of subject into object for example ‘he’ was written ‘him’. Their simple mistakes before were decreased like using capital letter in the middle of the sentence, using no period at the end of the sentence, and using no capital letter in the beginning of the sentence. (Field note 5, November 13th, 2013) The field note above performs that the researcher could manage the situation and the students’ work. She moved to the next task or activity. She showed the students a picture series of human blood circulation. The students’ job was to arrange the jumbled paragraphs about human blood circulation system related to the picture series given into a text. Then, they identified the generic structures and language features of that text. After they got the point, they did the activity enthusiastically. However, they did the task using a pencil because they were afraid of making mistakes. The following box explains the teaching and learning process. Some of the students were still confused the task that they should do. After getting explanation from R, they understood and started to do the task in pairs. The situation of class was busy because the students dicussed each other. When they did the task, R walked around to check the students’ work. The students did the task using a pencil because they afraid of making mistakes. (Field note 5, November 13th, 2013) From the field note, it is clear that the researcher checked the students’ work. This conclusion is also supported by the similar conclusion based on the 73 result of the conversation between the researcher and the student as presented below. After checking the students’ works, R asked them the number of the mistakes they did. Some of them said that they were not aware in identifying the language features including simple present tense and passive voice. When R asked them whether she should explain again the materials, they said that they already understood actually. They only needed to be more careful and focus on doing the task. (Field note 5, November 13th, 2013) That was the last activity on that day before they had the test for cycle one. She highlighted that they had to be aware of those materials. She also told them to prepare and study for the post – test in the next meeting. When the bell tinkled, the researcher thanked to their participation on that day and said “good bye” to them and left the classroom. c. Third Meeting The third meeting was conducted on Saturday, November 16th, 2013. She began the lesson by greeting the students. After she greeted them and had a little talk with the students, she then checked their attendance. In the third meeting, she asked the students to do the post – test 1 related to the materials that they had learned before. The researcher asked them to write an explanation text based on the picture series given individually. Firstly, she gave them a worksheet to do the post – test. Before she asked them to write, the reasearcher explained what they should do. The students were asked to write an explanation text about Human Digestive System based on the picture series given. They also could use the vocabularies that were in a rubric to help them in composing the text. They were 74 allowed to open the dictionaries. After all students understood what they had to do, they started to write. The researcher gave 35 minutes to do the task. When they were doing their task, the researcher walked around the class to make sure that they work individually. The following note told what happened in the classroom on that day. R walked around the class to make sure that the students worked individually and did not discussed with their friends. In the last five minutes, R alarmed them. Some of them had finished writing. Finally the bell rang as the sign that the time was up. They had to submit their writing. Some of them looked busy tidying their writing up. (Field note 6, November 16th, 2013) When the bell tinkled, a student helped the researcher to collect their works. Then, the researcher said good bye to them and left the classroom. She corrected their work and gave a mark as the post – test of Cycle 1. 2. Reflection The researcher and the teacher had a discussion about the influence of the actions to the students’ writing ability. The discussion based on the observations during the actions and the interviews with the teacher and the students. In this stage, the researcher and the teacher evaluated what happened in the first cycle. The reflection then would be used as a plan of the actions that would be implemented in the second cycle. The interview transcript is shown below. It will belong to the process validity. 77 In this stage, the researcher interviewed the students to know whether her explanation was clear. The following transcript describes what actually happened. This conclusion could be said as process validity. R: “Dek Lucy, ada gak kesulitan dalam belajar hari ini?” (Well Lucy, do you have any diffuculties in learning today?) S: “Masih ada sih Mbak” (Yes, I do.) R: “Apa itu Dek?” (What’s that?) S: “Ya suka masih bingung aja make simple presentnya.” (I am still confused simple present tense.) R: “Kalo penyusunan kalimatnya gimana?” (What about the structure of sentence?) S: “Ehm udah mending sih” (I know it better now.) (Students-Interview, November 13th, 2013) From the interview transcript above, it could be said that the explanation was clear. However, the students still found difficulties in using simple present tense. The conclusion is also supported by the following interview transcript. R: “Saya pengen tanya tentang explanation text ne. Ada kesulitan gak untuk pembelajaran hari ini?” (I’d like to ask you about the explanation text. What is your problem in learning today?) S: “Aku sih udah rada’ mudeng mbak.” (I think, I understood enough about the materials.) R: “Yakin ne Dek?” (Are you sure?) S: “Iya. Tapi masih bingung.” (Yes, but I am still confused.) R: “Bingungnya apa?” (What is that?) S: “Kalo pas nambahin s atau es itu.” (In using s or es in the verb.) (Students-Interview, November 13th, 2013) From the transcript above, they stated that the materials related to the explanation texts were actually understandable. However, they claimed that the difficult thing was in adding s/ es in the verbs in simple present sentences. 78 The researcher also interviewed them to know their opinion in which she could identify the changes before, during, and after the actions. From the interview, it was obvious that she controlled the class activity well. This conclusion could be said to have catalytic validity. R: “Tadi udah menulis pake gambar, ya kan?” (You wrote based on some pictures, didn’t you?) S: “Iya.” (Yes, I did.) R: “Ada gak bedanya pake dan gak pake gambar?” (Is there any differences in writing with picture or without picture?) S: “Tentu Mbak.” (Yes, of course.) R: “Apanya yang bikin beda?” (What makes writing using pictures different from writing using no pictures?) S: “Aku lebih punya ide kalo pake gambar.” (I have more idea with the pictures.) (Students-Interview, November 13th, 2013) From the interview it could be concluded that they had some progress by using picture series. They said that they got better understanding in generating ideas, in using tense, and in constructing sentences. At the end of Cycle 1, she collected the students’ works. She gave a mark as the post – test of Cycle 1. The following is an example of students’ writing. 79 (Appendix 7, Agrib’s work) From the student’s writing, it is obvious that his work was getting better. This conclusion is also supported by the similar results of interview between the researcher and the teacher as presented below. This conclusion can therefore be said to have outcome validity. 82 student), very good (4 students), good (9 students), fair (10 students), poor (0 student), and very poor (0 students). There were 15 students who had good writing skills and 10 students who had poor writing skills. From the scoring rubric, the researcher found that the ideal mean score was 62.5 and the ideal standard deviation was 12.5. In fact, the students’ mean score was 67.70. It was rather higher than the ideal mean score although it was better than the mean value in the pre – test. It means that their skills in writing still needed to be improved. Besides, the standard deviation was 9.49. It was lower than the ideal standard deviation. It means that their achievement was homogeneous. Some students have understood the materials well. However, some of them still found difficulties to write. The researcher also should improve the mean score of the students’ writing scores although it improved after Cycle 1. However, comparing the writing pre – test mean score with the writing post – test mean score at the end of Cycle 1, the researcher concluded that the students’ writing score increased because of the use of picture series. The frequencies on the good category increased from 5 students to 6 students. On the very good category, the frequencies increased from 0 student to 5 students. Meanwhile, the frequencies on the very poor decreased from 5 students to 0 student. Moreover, the mean score in the class increased from 9.67 to 13.54. The following is the result of students’ writing scores before and after the action in Cycle 1. 83 Table 9: The Comparison of the Students’ Writing Scores Before and After Cycle 1 Scores Category Pretest Cycle 1 Frequency Percentage Frequency Percentage 87.5 – 100 Excellent 0 0% 2 8% 75 – 87.4 Very good 0 0% 4 16% 62.5 –74.9 Good 7 26.92% 9 36% 50 – 62.4 Fair 5 19.23% 10 40% 37.5 –49.9 Poor 8 30.76% 1 4.17% 25 – 37.4 Very poor 6 23.07% 0 0% Mean 48.36 67.70 SD 13.56 9.49 Table 10: Paired-Sample Statistic - Pretest and Cycle 1 Paired Samples Statistics Mean N Std. Deviation Pair 1 Pretest 48.36 26 13.56 Cycle 1 67.70 26 9.49 After the researcher conducted Cycle 1, there was a better improvement on their writing skills. In addition, the researcher analyzed the result of their writing and concluded that there were improvements in writing aspects, namely generating idea, using tense, using correct spelling, using correct capitalization and punctuation and slightly improvement on the sentence structure and vocabulary. She tried to improve the students’ writing skills by conducting actions in Cycle 2, especially to make the mean score higher than in this cycle. 84 3. Summary In this cycle, there were some improvements and weaknesses after picture series were implemented in the teaching and learning process of writing. The improvements and weaknesses of Cycle 1 are presented as follows. a. The improvements of Cycle 1 1) Using picture series was successful to stimulate and gain the ideas to write. It could be seen from the students’ works that consisted of more sentences compared to their works before picture series were implemented. This possibly happened because picture series are two dimensional media that enabled the students to write and express everything that they had seen in the pictures into readable written text. 2) Using pictures series increased the students’ motivation in the teaching and learning process of writing because it attracted the students’ interest to the materials given. As the result, they became motivated and enthusiastic when they wrote a text individually. 3) The students actively participated in writing because picture series and other supporting activities were selectively chosen to make the students more active in doing their activities. 4) Picture series work in provoking students’ imagination or creativity so that they can write a text. Harmer (2004: 67) explains that some situations, particularly related to grammar and vocabulary work can be presented by pictures. Furthermore, they could also be used to provoke the students to