chapter ii literature review a. writingrepository.ump.ac.id/1831/3/chapter ii_ninda...

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CHAPTER II

LITERATURE REVIEW

A. Writing

1. Definition

Writing is one of the four language skills where the other three are

listening, speaking and reading (Harmer, 2004). Ramelan (1992) states

that writing is an important tool for communicating ideas in written or

printed symbol, as found in books, newspaper, magazines and letters.

While Pamella (1986) state that writing is always somebody write

(writer) saying something (text) to somebody else (the reader). The

writer is someone who is interested in a particular form of writing,

while the reader is one of who is interested in the writing (text). So

there are the text or the message and the reader.

Oshima and Hogue (1993) state that academic writing takes study

and practice to develop this skill. For both native speaker and new

learners of English, it is important to note that writing is a process not

a “product„„. This means that a piece of writing, whether it is

composition for the English class or lab report for our chemistry class

is never complete, that is, it is always possible to review and revise,

and review and revise again. And it includes the activities that help the

learner to generate ideas for the writing assignment.

In addition, Gillett (2009) says, “Writing is one of the main ways

that human beings communicate: it is a social practice.” It can be

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explained that writing is used in human„s life for daily social purposes,

such as writing letters, composing e-mails, making recipes, sending

invitations, etc. Thus, people are able to communicate among one

another through written text.

2. Types of Classroom Writing

According to Brown, there are a number of writing performances

in the classroom (Brown, 2001):

a) Imitative or writing down

At the beginning level of learning to write, students will simply

“write down” English letters, words, and possibly sentences in

order to learn the conventions of the orthographic code. Dictation

falls into this category, although dictation can serve to teach and

test high-order processing as well.

b) Intensive or controlled

Writing is sometimes used as a production mode for learning,

reinforcing, or testing grammatical concepts. This intensive writing

typically appears in controlled, written grammar exercises. A

common form of controlled writing is to present a paragraph to

students in which they have to alter a given structure throughout.

c) Self-writing

A significant proportion of classroom writing may be devoted

to self-writing. The most silent instance of this category in

classroom is note-taking, where students take notes during a lecture


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for the purpose of later recall. Diary or journal writing also falls

into this category.

d) Display Writing

Writing within the school curricular context is a way of life.

For all language students, short answer exercises, essay

examination, and even research reports will involve an element of

display.

e) Real writing

The two categories of real and display writing are actually two

ends of a continuum, and in between the two extremes lay some

combination of display and real writing. Three subcategories

illustrate how reality can be injected: academic, vocational/

technical and personal.

3. Criteria of Good Writing

Harmer (1983) states that there are special considerations to be

taken into account which include the organizing of sentences into

paragraph, how paragraphs are joined together, and the general

organization of ideas into a coherent piece discourse. According to

Hedge (1998) there are some criteria of a good writing:

a) grammatically correct,

b) choice of words,

c) meaningful punctuation,

d) accurate spelling,


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e) good mastery of sentence structure,

f) clear ideas,

g) good organization of the content.

4. Skills in Writing

According to Heaton (1975), there are four important skills that

should be noticed in writing activity. They are:

a) grammatical skill is the ability to write a correctly based on the

good grammatical,

b) stylist skill is the ability to use the language effectively, such as

in finding the appropriate vocabulary,

c) mechanical skill is the ability to import a conversation or ideas

into written form using the appropriate punctuation and

spelling,

d) judgment skills is the ability to select, organize information and

write them for particular purpose appropriately.

5. The Process of Writing

McCrimmon (1984:10) says that there are three essential steps

of the writing process, namely planning, drafting, and revising.

a) Planning

Planning is also called pre-writing. In this step, learners are

expected to be able to formulate the purpose, and then organize

the message. Selecting something to write about is very much


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needed, because most of the learners often spend their time

before doing activity. It is better for them to make planning in

order that they can write easily. In the pre-writing step, the

learners begin digging for the basic raw materials they need.

First, they must look into their mind about the subject that

becomes a topic because selecting the topic is very important

for giving the first description of what to write. In pre-write,

the learners experiment with all kinds of ideas. They only

concern to find subject that is going to be written.

b) Drafting

Drafting is a procedure for determining whether the ideas

which have been discovered during planning, can be shaped

into a successful piece of writing. It enables the students to

experiment with possible arrangements of one topic. In this

stage the students have to examine the ideas, arrange, and

rearrange them in order that they can shape them into a

coherent first draft. The first draft is also called discovery draft

because the student will discover something new about the

subject, audience, and purpose. The discoveries will help the

students to learn more about what they want to say and how

they will say it. Then, the students construct a formal outline.

The formal outline is an exact plan of organization that breaks

the topic into major units and subdividies these major units into


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minor units (McCrimmons, 1984). The best way to construct

the formal outline is to layout the major divisions before

worrying about the various subdivisions. After examining the

formal outline then, the students should revise it.

c) Revising

The last step in writing is revising. Revising is the process

of seeing again, or discovering a new division for the writing

the student produce during planning and drafting. There are

two steps in revising. In the first stages, the students should

employ various reading strategies to help them rethink, reorder,

and rewrite substantial portions of what they have been written.

In the next stages, the students should fix the sentence, phrases,

and words.

B. Speaking

1. Definition

McDounough and Shaw (2003) in state that speaking is not the oral

production of written language, but involves learners in the mastery of

a wide range of sub-skills, which added together, constitute an overall

competence in the spoken language. Speaking is an interactive

communication between the speaker and listener. In the process of

speaking, the speaker delivers information orally. It is emphasized by

Brown (1994), Burns & Joyce (1997), who says that speaking is an


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interactive process of constructing meaning that involves producing,

receiving and processing information.

According to Cunningham (1999), speaking requires that learners

not only know how to produce specific points of language such as

grammar, pronunciation, or vocabulary (linguistic competence), but

also that they understand when, why, and in what ways to produce

language (sociolinguistic competence). The indicators of speaking are:

a) Pronunciation is about how a speaker pronounces words or sounds,

including intonation and stress.

b) Grammar (Grammatical Accurate) is with the structure of the

speaker‟s utterances.

c) Vocabulary is the appropriate words used by the speaker and the

ability of the speaker in replacing inappropriate words with other

suitable words.

d) Fluency in this aspect is the speaker should have the ability to

continue (keep going) the speaking performance.

e) Content is the art in receiving the audience‟s meaning. Speaking is

not only a way of communication by the speaker, because in the

process of speaking the listener receives something and gets input

from what the speaker is saying.

2. Element of Speaking

Harmer (2001) writes two elements of speaking; language feature

and mental or social processing.


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a) Language Feature

1) Connected Speech; effective speakers of English need to be

able not only to produce the individual phonemes of English

but also to use fluent „connected speech‟. In connected speech

sound are modified (assimilation), omitted (elision), or

weakened (through contractions and stress pattering)

2) Expressive device; native speakers of English change the pitch

and stress of particular parts of utterances, vary volume and

speed, and show by other physical non-verbal (paralinguistic)

means how they are feeling (especially in face to face

interaction). The use of this devise contributes to the ability to

convey meanings.

3) Lexis and grammar; spontaneous speech as marked by the use

of number common lexical phrases, especially in the

performance of certain language functions. Teacher should

therefore supply a variety of phrases for different functions

such as agreeing or disagreeing, expressing surprise, sock or

approval.

4) Negotiation language: effective speaking benefits from the

negotiatory language we use to seek clarification to show the

structure of what we are saying.

b) Mental or Social Processing


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1) Language processing: effective speakers need to be able to

process language. In their own heads and put it into coherent

order so that it comes out in forms that are not only

comprehensible, but also convey the meanings that are

intended. Language processing involves the retrieval of words

and phrases from memory and their assembly into syntactically

and proportionally appropriate sequences.

2) Interacting with others: most speaking involves interaction with

one or more participants. This means that effective speaking

also involves a good deal of listening, an understanding of how

the other participants are feeling, and knowledge of how

linguistically to take turns or allow other to do so.

3) Information processing: quite apart from our response to

others‟ feeling, we also need to be able to process the

information they tell us the moment we get it.

c) Characteristics of a Successful Speaking Activity

According to Littlewood (1981), there are some characteristics

of activities that make judge in successful speaking; learners talk a

lot, participation is even, motivation is high, and language is often

an acceptable level.

1) Learners talk a lot. As much as possible of the period allotted

to the activity is in fact occupied by learner talk.


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2) Participation even. It means that a minority of talkative

participants does not dominate the classroom discussion: all get

a chance to speak, and contribution is fairly evenly distributed.

3) Motivation is high. It is regard to the learners are eager to speak

because they are interested in the topic and have something

new to say about it, or because they want to contribute to

achieving a ask objective.

4) Language is of an acceptable level. It means that learners

express themselves in utterances that are relevant, easily

comprehensible to each other, and of an acceptable level of

language accuracy.

C. “English Club” Extracurricular

1. Definition

In the Government Regulation no 19/25 on National Education

Standards, it is stated that every school can give an opportunity to

develop its students‟ competence by having an extracurricular

program. Extracurricular is a program which is not part of the course

that a student is doing at a school, different schools may have different

extracurricular program. The main reason of the establishment of

extracurricular program is to accommodate or give opportunity for

students in developing their talent and interest.


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As Mulyasa (2007) states that an extracurricular program is a

certain program held outside the school regular time for supporting and

improving students‟ competence. One of the extracurricular programs

is English club. Since it is not a compulsory subject, students have

right to join it or not. English club is a group activity that generally

takes place every week to practice. It is less formal than the regular

class in school. During the English club time, the students are engaged

in fun activities such as singing songs, doing others enjoyable

activities in English, and make things such as puppet or pictures that

related to the topics they are learning about in English.

The materials for English club are from English textbook or the

teachers can develop their own materials that are appropriate with the

students‟ needs and goals.

2. The aim of taking “English club” extracurricular activity

The point of the “English club” extracurricular held by school is to

give students chance to improve their English and have more

exposures and time in learning English, because they do not get extra

time in regular class. The activities in the English Club also can help

the students to improve the students‟ ability in English.

In an English club for much time is given supervise practice and

far too little to theory. Learning by practice is the way to master a

subject, especially to English subject.


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An “English club” extracurricular is a small class, teachers, the

frequently of meeting, learning resources, environment, and the

students motivation. Small class will be more successful than the big

class because the number of the learners in the extracurricular English

club is smaller than those in the school. By taking extracurricular

English club, the students have a higher frequently to learn English.

They have four hours from the school and some hours from their

“English club” extracurricular.

3. English Club in SMP Negeri 1 Sampang

English club has been in SMP Negeri 1 Sampang which is located

at Jalan Tugu Barat No. 34, Sampang, Kabupaten Cilacap, Jawa

Tengah for 11 years. This extracurricular was formed in 2006. There

were around 15 members for the first year, and recently the

membership of this extracurricular runs between 30 to 40 students.

Currently this extracurricular has 28 students. English club is held

every Thursday from 2.00–3.30 p.m with Endang Sri Mulyani S.Pd

and occasional visiting teachers as their tutors. The activity focuses on

writing and speaking skills, and it is less formal than the regular class.

During the English club time, the students are engaged in fun activities

such as singing songs, doing others enjoyable activities in English, and

make things such as puppet or pictures that related to the topics they

are learning about in English. The main goal of this extracurricular is

increasing the students‟ ability in speaking and writing skills.


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D. Conceptual framework

The “English club” extracurricular gives contribution to the

students‟ writing and speaking ability. Theoretically, the students who

take the “English club” extracurricular have more capabilities in

writing and speaking than those who do not. It is because they have the

higher frequently of English learning process. They have much time to

improve their writing and speaking both in school and in the “English

club” extracurricular. If they find the difficulties in writing and

speaking that they get in school, they can get the detailed information

from the “English club” extracurricular. The students who take the

“English club” extracurricular have more chance to learn faster than

those who do not take “English club” extracurricular.

E. Hypothesis

According to explanation of the conceptual framework, the

hypothesis of the research is “there is a difference between the writing

and speaking ability of the students who take the “English club”

extracurricular and those who do not take the “English club”

extracurricular”.


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