A.

Improving Students’ Writing Skills in Report Text By Using Peer Review (A Classroom

Action Research to the Eleventh Grade of MAS Darul Ulum Kubu Raya in Academic

Year 2018/2019)

B. Research Background

Writing can be the most difficult skills to be achieved in English since it needs many

requirements. Taylor & Francis (2009) states that the learners should bring experience and

knowledge to their writing (p. 93), this means that the ideas of the writing shall be clear. In a

same lane, it states that there are many elements (grammar, mechanics, etc) of the writing

and lots of different kinds of writing (text types). That is why writing is not only requires the

ideas to be clear but also the rules to be written as it instructed by the grammar and its

mechanical.

Since writing needs a lot of classification to be categorized as a good writing, there

are many problems faced by the learners during their writing task or assignments. Among the

four skills, writing needs the most comprehensive knowledge, the strongest application, and

the most difficult training (Fengjie, Jia, Hongyi, 2016, p. 20). This is supported by Dwivedi

and Chakravarthy (2015) as they state that the main problems of learners in their writing is

because they are not adequately familiar with English language and they do not have enough

practice of it (p.27). However, practicing writing skills means the learners need to know

about the rules of writing as well. Beyond this level, the writer must be able to structure and

integrate information into cohesive and coherent paragraphs and texts (Younes & Albalawi,

2015, p. 7-8). In conclusion, writing is not only about the ideas but also the mechanical of

writing such as the capital, comas, period, grammar, etc.

 In this research design, the writer and the English teacher have discussed and observe

students writing skills condition of eleventh grade students in MAS Darul Ulum Kubu Raya

in academic year 2018/2019. It is found that many students have similar problems. First,

students have lack of knowledge in grammar-building. Second, there is less of time or

opportunity which used for the students to practice or exercise their writing assessment in

which then students become lack in practice. And the last, students still have no comprehend

about the cohesive and coherent in writing.

To overcome those problems, the writer and the English teacher have discussed and

agreed to use Peer Review Writing Task as a teaching technique to help students to

improving their writing skills. This technique has some advantages in use to improve writing

skills as it has been proved by some similar research findings. Cote (2014) pronounces that

the used of peer review improves the process of writing extend to 70% (p. 67). In addition,

relation with these findings in which students benefit from a combination of peer and teacher

feedback as much as they do from teacher feedback only (Enginarlar & Demirel, 2016, p.

665). Moreover, Sotoudehnama & Pilehvari (2016) says that students’ peers review essays to

provide feedback improved their writing abilities more than ones who used the received

feedback to revise those essays (p. 41).

This research design is aimed to improve students’ writing skills. The writer and

English teacher decide to use classroom action research since the purpose is improving

students writing skills. It is appropriate based on the school syllabus and teacher’s lesson

plan. This research is believed to be the reference to the future similar research conducted.
C. Research Question

1. General Question

How does Peer Review improve students’ writing skills in report text?

2. Specific Questions

a. How does the use of Peer Review help students to improve their writing skills in

report text?

b. How does the impact of Peer Review revisions on students writing skills

development?

c. How does the use of Peer Review help students to comprehend the cohesive and

coherent of the text?

D. Research Purpose

1. To describe how does Peer Review improve students’ writing skills in report text.

E. Action Hypothesis

The action hypothesis in this research shows that Peer Review improves students’ writing

skills in report text. It helps and gives students opportunity to practice their writing and check

others’ writing.

F. Research Significance

This study is important for several reasons:

1. For the students

a. Through Peer Review, students will have a lot of time practicing and reviewing their

writing.

b. Students will encourage their participations in the teaching and learning process since

they have a lot of job in the lesson.

 2. For the teacher

a. Teacher can use this technique to increase students’ writing skills in report text easier

and more effective.

b. Teacher will get innovative technique to teaching report text

G. Terminology

a. Writing Skills is the act of producing the output knowledge in form of written sentences,

paragraphs, or texts.

b. Report Text is a text in which it is telling the past experience or events.

c. Peer Review is a technique of teaching in which students will have an opportunity to

check their friends’ jobs and share their opinion inside.

d. Classroom Action Research is a method of finding out the best works in the classroom so

that teacher can improve student learning.

e. Eleventh grade students of MAS Darul Ulum in which located in Kubu Raya are the

subjects of this research. They are consist of 25 female and 11 male.