Utari, Dian Asa (2011) Utilizing weblog to improve students' writing skills in developing descriptive essays at the State University of Surabaya / Dian Asa Utari. Masters thesis, Universitas Negeri Malang.
Full text not available from this repository.Abstract
English Language Teaching Study Program Graduate Program State University of Malang. Advisors (I) Prof. Bambang Yudi Cahyono M.Pd M.A. Ph.D. (II) A. Effendi Kadarisman M.A. Ph.D. Key words weblog writing skills descriptive essays Writing demands the ability of generating organizing and developing ideas and thoughts. Teachers failure in choosing appropriate and appealing activities in the classroom is an exigent problem in the teaching of writing in EFL contexts. Usually conventional teachers are not creative in designing activities for the lesson which turn into a boring atmosphere in the process of learning. This study tries to solve students problems in writing by implementing blogging strategy in the classroom context. The use of blog is intended to help students improve their writing skills in developing descriptive essays. Blogging is used as the strategy because it provides potential sources feedback and authentic audience to enhance students writing performance. It is also practical to apply whenever there is an internet connection. This study was conducted in the English department of State University of Surabaya. Third semester students who were taking Writing II course during the odd semester in the academic year of 2010/2011 were chosen for the subjects of this study. The research design was Action Research. There were 2 cycles implemented during this study. In the first cycle the students writing improvement did not show significant progress. There were only 4 students who could score 2 or 3 points for all subcriteria in the scoring rubric. Thus it did not meet the criteria of success. The failure of the strategy in improving students writing skills in Cycle 1 lies in the lack of time the difficulties in expressing ideas the insufficient knowledge of a good descriptive essay and the art of giving feedback. After the plan was revised students showed significant improvement in developing descriptive essays. There were 12 students who could score 2 or 3 points for all sub criteria in the scoring rubric. This number is regarded as 75% from the total number of students meaning that the criteria of success had been achieved. Based on the findings from both cycles the researcher drew a conclusion that blog helps students improve their writing skills in developing descriptive essays. However for the betterment of the implementation of blogging activity teachers and students must be technologically literate. Technical problems such as electrical failure or disconnected network connection may also occur during the implementation of the strategy thus the teacher should prepare for another way of providing an internet connection in the conventional classroom. Finally the results of this study are beneficial to English teachers students and other researchers. English teachers can refer to the strategy implemented in this study when they have similar problems in their writing classes. Students also can practice and improve their English skills through internet applications. Moreover the researcher is expecting that the results of this study will inspire other researchers to conduct further research related to the use of blog in classroom contexts with different topics subjects and settings.
| Item Type: | Thesis (Masters) |
|---|---|
| Subjects: | L Education > L Education (General) |
| Divisions: | Fakultas Sastra (FS) > Departemen Sastra Inggris (ING) > S2 Pendidikan Bahasa Inggris |
| Depositing User: | Users 2 not found. |
| Date Deposited: | 09 May 2011 04:29 |
| Last Modified: | 09 Sep 2011 03:00 |
| URI: | http://repository.um.ac.id/id/eprint/58485 |
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