AN ANALYSIS OF THE SECOND GRADE STUDENTS’ ABILITY IN WRITING A DESCRIPTIVE TEXT AT SMPN 1 BAYU PESISIR SELATAN

Abstrak

ABSTRACT

Writing is one of the skills that is very important especially for students who learn English as a foreign language in process of language acquisition. The purpose of this study was to know the students’ ability at SMPN 1 Bayu Pesisir Selatan in writing descriptive text. The population of this research was the second grade students of SMPN 1 Bayu Pesisir Selatan. The number of population was 72 students. The researcher used cluster random sampling technique to get sample of this thesis, the students are homogeneous. The researcher took one class of three classes. The sample was 20 students of VIII.1 class. The data of this study were students’ ability in writing descriptive text. The data were collected by using writing test. Before giving test to the sample, the test was tried out. To know the reliability of the test the researcher used inter-rater technique and content validity, based on teaching material and syllabus. It was found that the coefficient correlation was high (0.67). The result of the data showed that the students’ ability in writing descriptive text at SMPN 1 Bayu Pesisir Selatan was moderate. Based on findings above, it could be concluded that the ability of the second grade students of SMPN 1 Bayu Pesisir Selatan was moderate. The researcher suggests the students to practice their writing especially in descriptive text to increase their ability in writing descriptive text.

Key Words : Ability, Writing, Descriptive Text