THE EFFECTIVENESS OF TEACHING WRITING DESCRIPTIVE TEXT

BY USING CIRC AT TENTH GRADER OF

MA AL BAIRUNY SAMBONG

Akhmad Basuni
Abstract: Writing is an active or productive skill. Writing is the
representation of language in a textual medium through the use of a set of
signs or symbols (known as a writing system). This study has been
conducted to determine the effectiveness of teaching writing descriptive
text by CIRC. The general question to answer is Does teaching writing
descriptive text by using CIRC give significant improvement to the
students writing ability?. The design of this research was quasiexperimental non-randomized control group pre-test post-test design. The
population was the tenth grade students consist of 98 students of MA AlBairuny Sambong and the sample were X-1 consist of 25 students (10
males and 15 females) as the experimental class and X-2 consist of 25
students (13 males and 12 females) as the control class. In collecting data,
the instrument used was test. The data which is got from this research was
analyzed by using independent sample t-test with significant level 0,05 and
df 48. The result of t-value was 5,867 and t-table is 2,01. Because t-value
is higher than t-table (5,867>2,01), so, Ha is accepted. The result showed
that the students taught writing descriptive text by using cooperative
integrated reading and composition (CIRC) got better achievement than
those taught writing descriptive text by using conventional method. Based
on the result of research findings, the researcher concluded that there is
sinificant difference of students writing ability because t-value was higher
than t-table. It means that Ha is accepted. So, the using of cooperative
integrated reading and composition (CIRC) is effective in teaching writing
descriptive text at MA Al-Baeruny Sambong.
Key words: Writing, Descriotive Text, CIRC

Abstrak: Menulis adalah skil aktif. Menulis merupakan representasi dari

suatu bahasa melalui suatu simbol-simbol tertentu (sistem penulisan).
Penelitian ini dilakukan untuk mengetahui keefektifan dari pembelajaran
menulis descriptive teks dengan menggunakan CIRC. Desain yang
digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah quasi experimental non-randomized
control group pre-test post-test. Populasi dari penelitian ini adalah kelas
sepuluh MA Al-Bairuny dan sampelnya adalah kelas X-1 sebagai kelas
experimental yang terdiri dari 25 siswa (10 laki-laki dan 15 perempuan)
dan kelas X-2 sebagai kelas control yang terdiri dari 25 siswa (13 laki-laki
dan 12 perempuan). Dalam pengumpulan data, instrumen yang digunakan
adalah test. Data yang diperoleh dalam penelitian ini dianalisa dengan
menggunakan t-test independent sample dengan tingkat signifikan 0,05
dan df 46. Hasilnya menunjukkan bahwa nilai t-testnya adalah 5,867 dan ttable 2,01. Karena nilai t-test lebih tinggi daripada t-table (5,6>2,01), maka
peneliti menyimpulkan ada perbedaan yang signifikan dalam kemampuan
menulis siswa karena nilai t-test lebih tinggi daripada t-table dan Ha
diterima. Jadi, penggunaan CIRC efektif.

Kata kunci: Menulis, Teks Deskriptif, CIRC

INTRODUCTION
Writing is one of important skills that influence the learners in mastering
English. Fachrurrazy (2011:88) stated that Writing belongs to an active or
productive skill. It is clear that, writing is an important activity in any language
class, not only as the source of information and pleasure but also as a means of
consolidating and extending ones knowledge of a language. Writing is the most
difficult skill. Heaton (1975: 138) states that writing skill is complex, and difficult
to teach, requiring mastering not only of grammatical but also of conceptual
judgment elements. So, the teachers have to prepare a good strategies. It means
that English composition primary writing may be considered as the most difficult
of language skill. Therefore, if we want to use writing activity that we give to
students should have a purpose and meaning; students need to know why they
write.
Cooperative

Integrated

Reading

and

Composition

(CIRC)

is

comprehensive program for teaching reading and writing in the upper elementary
and middle grades (Slavin, 1995, 104). In CIRC, teacher use novels or basal
2

readers. They may or may not use reading groups, as in traditional reading classes.
Students are assigned to teams composed of pairs of students from two or more
different reading levels. Students work in pairs within their team soon a series of
cognitively engaging activities, including reading to one another, making
predictions about the materials needed, and also make a plan about the step of
making or using something.
It is very useful for teaching learning process and also for students. CIRC
can make a fun teaching learning because students can make an interaction with
their friends. They can discuss each other about topic. It practices the students
sociality. By CIRC, students are practiced to make an argument, giving opinion
and also try to seek a solving of the problem.
By using CIRC to teach writing in Senior High School seems to be one of
effective method and to make them interested in teaching learning process. The
researcher wants to apply the use of CIRC to teach writing to the students of the
class of tenth grade of MA Al-Baeruny, to know the effectiveness of using CIRC
in teaching writing. That is why the writer uses CIRC to teach writing.
The researcher attracted to conduct this research in MA Al-Baeruny
because some reason. Based on the information of the English teacher, the
students were lack motivation in learning. They did not concentrate well in the
class. The students also less active in the teaching learning process. Also they had
a lack of writing ability.
This research used to know the answer the question does teaching writing
descriptive text by using CIRC give significant improvement to the students
writing ability? and also to show whether there is any significance improvement
between the mastery of English writing of the tenth grade students of MA AlBaeruny before and after being taught by using CIRC.

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

Research Design
The design of this thesis is quasi experimental. The researcher used two
classes to be researched. The first is X1 as experimental class and the second is
X2 as control class. Quasi experimental design in this research used
nonrandomized control group Pre-test post-test design. The design is one of the
most widely used quasi-experimental researches. This design does not permit
random assignment of subject to the experimental and control group. Below is the
design of nonrandomized control group pre-test post-test.
Nonrandomized Control Group, Pre-test - Post-test Design (Ary, 2010 : 316).

Group

Pre-test

E
C

Y1
Y1

Independent
variable
X1
-

Post-test
Y2
Y2

In which:
E = experimental groups the group that taught by using CIRC in teaching
writing descriptive text.
C = the control group the group isnt taught by using CIRC in teaching
writing descriptive text.
Y = the measure of the independent variable, Y1 represent to measure of
the students writing ability before the experimental. Y2 represent the
measure of the students writing ability after the experimental.
X1 = treatment, the treatment is the research in using CIRC in teaching
writing descriptive text.
Population and Sample
The population of this research was the tenth grade of MA ALBAERUNY. There are three classes of the tenth grade in MA AL-BAERUNY.
Based on the information that have given from English teachers, the head master
suggested to use X-1 as experimental class and X-2 as control class because both
of them had similar average and also the number of students. So based on the
4

suggestion above, the researcher used X-1 consist of 25 students (10 male and 15
female) as experimental class, and X-2 consist of 25 students (13 male and 12
female) as control class.
Research Instruments
This research used

test as instrument for collecting data. The test

evaluation activities are intended to measure students ability and achievement. In

this research, the researcher conducted two tests, pre-test and post test. The pre
test conducted to know the students ability before giving descriptive material. And
the post test gave after treatment. Both of pre-test and post test are same in
question model.
Test is hold to get the data or information about teaching writing using
CIRC. Before pre test and post test are given to the students, the researcher had to
concern whether the test is valid or not. Valid means the instrument can be used
for measure what should be measured (Sugiyono, 2011: 173). By using valid
instruments in gathering the data, so the result of the research will be valid.
The researcher conducted a construct validity of questions. This validity
can use the opinion or the judgment of the professional man. It is called judgment
expert. The researcher consulted the instrument (test) to the expert to get validity
of judgment expert. (Sugiyono, 2011: 177). The researcher had consulted the
validity of the test to the two experts; they were Mr. Anang Soleman, S.Pd as the
chief of English teacher in that school and Mrs. Ira Rahmawati, S.Pd as the
English teacher in that school.
Data Collection
In this research, the primary technique that is will be used by researcher to
collect the data is observation and a test that is used to evaluate and to know the
student understanding. The data collection will be conducted as follows:
1. The research chose the classes that will be researched by suggestion of
the teacher and also based on the pre-test.
2. After got the class, the researcher make a lesson plan (see appendix 1)

3. Next, the researcher conducted the pre-test to know the prior knowledge
of students. The pre-test was done on August 25th, 2014.
4. Then, treatment was given to experimental class by using CIRC. The
treatment was done on August 27th and September 01st, 2014.
5. After that, post-test conducted to know the ability of students after giving
treatment. The post-test was done on September 03rd, 2014.
6. After got the data, researcher conducted the data in statistical formula in
order to the result of this researcher can appear.
7. Finally, the researcher concluded the result.
Data Analysis
Data analysis presents information about the steps in analyzing the data. It
means that in analyzing data, the researcher can present and get the process of
calculation of the score from the test given.
This research is quantitative, so the researcher uses observation and also
statistics technique to analyze the data. In this study researcher use pre test and
post test, then t-test data analysis to find out the significant of teaching writing by
using CIRC. The data analysis technique uses t-test formula (Arikunto, 2010: 354355):
t=

Mx My

X + Y2
1 1
.
+
2 N 2
N N

)(

In which: X 2= X 2
t
= t value (t-test)

2
Y = Y 2

Mx

= mean of experimental class

My

= mean of control class

X 2

= the sum of deviation square of experimental class

Y 2

= the sum of deviation square of control class

= number of students of each class

In this research, the researcher used SPSS program to calculate the t-value
to replace t-formula above. After calculating t-test, the researcher calculated the
degree of freedom that was by adding the number of each class and then
subtracting, using the following formula:
df= N1-N2-2

In which:
df

: degree of freedom

N1

: number of students in experimental class

N2

: number of students in control class

The researcher used degree of freedom 0,05 from t-table and compared it
to the result of the t-test. So the result would be bear the Ha will be accepted or
not. If t-test > t-table, Ha is accepted, in other hand if t-test < t-table, Ha is
rejected. So the result of this research of the effectiveness teaching writing
descriptive text by using cooperative integrated reading and composition (CIRC)
could be seen and could be done well.
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
Finding
After hold two test, pre-test and post-test, the researcher got some data.
Based on the results above, we can conclude that there were almost same average
between the pre-test of experimental and control class. It is proved by the SPSS
program to show the homogeneity between experimental class and control class.
So, those class are appropriate to be conducted quasi experimental research.
The average of post-test between control class and experimental class were
different. In experimental class, the average of post-test was 83, 7. Whereas in
control class, the average of post test was 75,2. The increase of mean score from
pre-test mean score of experimental group is 13,6 while the increase of mean
score of control group (in this case group which is taught using conventional

method ) is only 5,3. The increase of the mean score of teaching writing by using
CIRC method is higher than the conventional method group.
Analysis of test
After got data of pre-test and post-test in control class and experimental
class, the researcher tries to analyze the data with SPSS program to know the
significance difference between experimental class and control class by using ttest.
The next is calculate the significant difference in post-test between
experimental class and control class by using t-test formula and SPSS program
independent sample t-test to support the result.
Group Statistics
Method
post test

Mean

Std. Deviation

Std. Error Mean

CIRC

25

83.4000

5.63471

1.12694

Conventional

25

75.2000

4.13320

.82664

Independent Samples Test

Levene's Test for
Equality of
Variances

t-test for Equality of Means

Mean
Sig. (2-

F
post

Equal

test

variances

5.449

Sig.

.024

5.867

df

tailed)

Std. Error

Differenc Differenc
e

95% Confidence Interval

of the Difference
Lower

Upper

48

.000

8.20000

1.39762

5.38990

11.01010

5.867 44.028

.000

8.20000

1.39762

5.38334

11.01666

assumed
Equal
variances not
assumed

Based on the result, the mean of experimental class was 83,4 and the mean
of control class was 75,2 and the t-value was 5,867. After that the researcher has
to know the degree of freedom to know the t-table.
The pattern of degree of freedom is:

So the result is
24 + 24 2 = 46
Based on the significant level 0,05 and degree of freedom 48, the
researcher could find the value of t-table: 2,01.
The result of calculating t-value= 5,867. It means that t-value was higher
than t-table. According to the criteria of hypothesis, alternative hypothesis was
accepted because there was significance difference. It meant that there was a
significant difference to the students achievement in teaching writing by using
cooperative integrated reading and composition (CIRC).
Discussion
Teaching writing
In the problem of study in chapter one, there is one question whether
teaching writing descriptive text by using CIRC give significant improvement to
the students writing ability or not. The result showed that the students who are
taught writing by using CIRC had higher score than students who are taught
without CIRC.
The finding of this study is similar to the results produced by some other
study in previous study by Durukan, 2011 that focus on the effects of the
cooperative integrated reading and composition (CIRC) technique and the
traditional reading and writing. And the second was also supported by Anjarwati
(2013) who used CIRC in teaching reading by in quasi experimental design. But
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here was little different with this study, CIRC not only can be applied in reading
skill, but also can be applied in teaching writing skill.
Based on the result of implementing teaching writing descriptive text by
using CIRC could help students to make a good writing that seemed so difficult
for them. It is supported by the statement of Heaton (1975: 138) which states that
writing skill are complex, and difficult to teach, requiring mastering not only of
grammatical but also of conceptual judgment elements.
So, CIRC could improve the students writing ability because there was
influence to the students achievement in writing.
Cooperative integrated reading and composition (CIRC)
CIRC method is a way to make students reach a good achievement in
teaching reading and writing. In this case, students are asked to understand a text
first, so the students will know the content of the text and the structure of the text
is. So, it can be a stimulation to make a good writing. It is supported by Slavin,
(1995, 104) which states that the Cooperative Integrated Reading and
Composition (CIRC) is a comprehensive program for teaching reading and
writing in the upper elementary and middle grades.
The using of CIRC in MA Al-Baeruny was according to the schedule and
the activities of CIRC, the first the teacher open the class and giving the leading
question. After that the teacher explain the materials. After that the students are
asked to make a group consist of 4-5 students randomly. But here, there is a little
problem that some students didnt want to separate with their friend. So the
teacher made them sure it would be a better for them. Next, each group were
given a text and each group should comprehend the text by reading in a group. In
discussion, there are little students didnt active. So, the teacher ask them to be
active in their group. From this situation, the researcher knew that the students of
that school need a guiding in a teaching learning process. After discussion section,
each group should make a summary about the text they read.

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Using CIRC in MA Al-Baeruny can make a good students help the lower
students by combining them in a group so they can work together as a team. CIRC
can make a fun teaching learning because students can make an interaction with
their friends. They can discuss each other about topic. It practices the students
sociality. By CIRC, students are practiced to make an argument, giving opinion
and also try to seek a solving of the problem in writing.
Other finding is that teaching writing using CIRC in MA Al-Baeruny can
accommodate almost all students in the class to be active. Although there are a
little students were not active, but the teacher can make them more active by
giving a motivation. It is different from conventional teaching method that only
makes good students walk alone without help the lower students.
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION
Conclusion
Based on the previous chapter about research finding and discussion, the
researcher can conclude that the students who are taught by using CIRC had
significant improvement higher than those who are taught without CIRC in
teaching writing descriptive text. In addition, using CIRC can help the students in
writing descriptive text ability especially in making identification and description
of descriptive text, also making simple present tense and determining vocabulary
related to the topic.
Based on the calculation score of experimental class and control class
using t-test formula, the result t-value was 5,867 and t-table is 2,01. So t-value > ttable, and Ha was accepted. So, teaching writing descriptive text by using CIRC at
tenth grader of MA Al-Bairuny Sambong Jombang was effective.
Suggestion
Referring to the result of the research, there are some suggestions:
1. The first suggestion is addressed to English teacher to utilize CIRC in
teaching writing, because it has been positive result and it has been
tested in this research.

11

2. Students got various methods that can make them fun and enjoy the
teaching activities in the class.
3. For the further research, the researcher suggests for using CIRC in
learning various text.
Refferences
Anjarwati, Rosi. 2013. The Effectiveness of Using Cooperative Integrated
Reading and Composition (CIRC) in Teaching Reading to the Eleventh
Grade Students of MAN Genukwatu Jombang Indonesia.
Arikunto, Suharsimi. 2010. Prosedur Penelitian Suatu Pendekatan Praktek.
Jakarta: Rineka Cipta, Asdi Mahasatya.
Ary, D., (et all). 2010. Introduction to Research in Education , eighth edition.
USA: Wadsworth.
Durukan, E. 2011. Effects of Cooperative Integrated Reading and Composition
(CIRC) Technique on Reading-Writing skills. Educational Research and
Reviews,
Fachrurrazy. 2011. Teaching English as a Foreign Language for Teacher in
Indonesia. Malang: State University of Malang.
Heaton, J. B. (1975). Writing English Language Testing. Singapore: Longman
Group Limited.
Slavin, Robert E. 1995. Cooperative Learning Second Edition. United States of
America.
Sugiyono. 2011. Practical English Language Teaching. Singapore: The McGraw
Hill Companies. Inc.

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