An Analysis of the Second Year Students’ Ability in Writing Compound Sentences in Future Tense at English Department of Bung Hatta University

Abstrak

In this research, the researcher focused on the ability of second year students at English Department of Bung Hatta University in writing compound sentences in future tense. The researcher chose this problem because after the researcher tried to ask three students of second year at English Department of Bung Hatta University about their opinion of compound sentences in future tense, they were confused on using coordinate conjunction, and how to write compound sentences in one tense. The researcher chose future tense because future tense is a tense that is usually used in daily activity.

The researcher used descriptive design in this research. The population of this research was the second year students at English Department of Bung Hatta University.The total number of population was 24 students. They were distributed into one class. To select the sample the researcher used total sampling technique. The data were collected by asking the students to write compound sentences in future tense. The reliability of the test was .99.

The result of this study showed that in general the students’ ability in writing compound sentences in future tense was very good. In detail, the percentages of  students’ ability in writing compound sentences in future tense with several different expressions were 58.3 students had very good ability in expressing additional idea (and), 63％students had very good ability in expressing contrast (but), 37.5％ students had very good ability and 37.5％students had good ability in expressing contrast (yet), or in other word the percentage of students had very good ability was same with percentage of students had good ability, 58％students had very good ability in expressing reason (for), 75％students had very good ability in expressing two negative statements, 79％students had very good ability in expressing result (so), and 54％students that had very good ability in expressing a choice between two possibilities (or). But some points that the researcher found there was some students had mistakes in using punctuation and spelling word.

Based on the result of the research, it is suggested to the lecturer to put more emphasis on students about the importance of punctuation in the writing of compound sentences such as the use of comma and full stop. Some students were confused about how to use coordinating conjunction (yet) in writing compound sentences in future tense, so it suggests the lecturers to give more exercise in writing compound sentences in future tense especially expressing contrast with coordinating conjunction (yet).

 

Keywords: writing, compound sentence, compound sentence in future tense