A CORRELATION BETWEEN STUDENTS’ GRAMMAR MASTERY AND THEIR PRACTICE INTENSITY TOWARDS THEIR WRITING ABILITY

Abstrak

The objective of this research is to identify whether or not there is a significant correlation between students’ grammar mastery and their practice intensity towards their writing ability. This study was particularly aimed to identify students’ grammar mastery, their practice intensity about grammar, their writing ability in descriptive paragraph, and to find out if there is a significant correlation between students’ grammar mastery and their practice intensity towards their writing ability in descriptive paragraph. The design of this research was correlational. Population of this research was 88 students of second year of English Department of Bung Hatta University Padang. In selecting the sample, cluster random sampling technique was applied. The data were collected through grammar test, questionnaire and writing test.

The result of analyzing data indicated that: in grammar mastery, the percentage of students in high level 23.33%, moderate level was 60%, and low level 16.67%. Their practice intensity in grammar 63% in high level and 37% in low level. Their writing ability to write the descriptive paragraph was identified 13% in high level, 26% in moderate level and 74% in low level. The result of hypothesis testing found that there is a correlation between students’ ability in grammar mastery and writing ability (0.49 :  0.05 df = n-2), the correlation between students’ practice intensity and their writing ability was very low correlation (0.15 :  0.05 df = n-2), the correlation between students’ grammar mastery and their practice intensity towards their writing ability was moderate correlation (0.55 0.05 df = n-2).

Based on the findings, it can be concluded that there is a positive correlation between students’ grammar mastery and their practice intensity towards their writing ability. Relating to this conclusion, it is suggested to the lecturers to have intensive practices in grammar mastery for the students in order to have a good ability in writing a descriptive paragraph. It is also suggested the students to comprehend grammar and do more practices, so they are capable to write descriptive paragraph.

Key Words : Grammar Mastery, Practice Intensity and Writing Ability.