UNDERGRADUATE THESIS DIFFICULTIES IN WRITING ESSAYSIN THE GENERAL ENGLISH 5 UNIT FORSENIOR ENGLISH MAJORS AT THE UNIVERSITY OFKHANH HOA

PEOPLE’S COMMITTEE OF KHANH HOA PROVINCE
UNIVERSITY OF KHANH HOA

UNDERGRADUATE THESIS
DIFFICULTIES IN WRITING ESSAYS
IN THE GENERAL ENGLISH 5 UNIT FOR
SENIOR ENGLISH MAJORS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF
KHANH HOA

STUDENT’S NAME: TRẦN THÚY QUỲNH
CLASS: ENGLISH LINGUISTICS K1
DEPARTMENT OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE
SUPERVISOR: Dr. TRẦN THỊ ÁI HOA

Khanh Hoa, June 2020



DECLARATION
I hereby declare that the study titled “Difficulties in writing essays in the
General English 5 Unit for senior English majors at the University of Khanh Hoa” was
bona fide research work accomplished by me from September, 2019 to June, 2020 and
conducted under the supervisor of Dr. Tran Thi Ai Hoa an instructor of English at
Department of Foreign languages, the University of Khanh Hoa.
This undergraduate thesis is not submitted to any other university or institution
for the award of any degree, diploma or published any time before.
TRAN THUY QUYNH


ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
From the outset of this report, I would like to extend my sincere gratitude to all

those who have helped me in this study. Without their active guidance, cooperation,
help, and encouragement, I would not have made headway in the study.
First of all, I would like to express my gratitude to the University of Khanh Hoa
Board and all teachers in the Department of Foreign language for creating good
conditions so that I could carry out and complete the graduate research, which will be a
big milestone for my study at school and for career development in the future.
I have special thanks to Ms. Tran Thi Ai Hoa who was my supervisor during the
research period with her friendliness and enthusiasm about supervising and supporting
me in completing the research work. I am eternally grateful to my associate supervisor,
Dr. Tran Thi Ai Hoa for extensive expertise and her tolerant perseverance with me in
the world of combustion research. It was only reason that her initial valuable guidance
and accurate judgement that I received to be able to drive my research work in a
respectable manner.
In addition, I would like to thank Ms. Nguyen Hoai Trang who is a lecturer of
the Department of Foreign language at the University of Khanh Hoa teaching General
English 5 Unit and thank all students in class English Lingustics K1 for their support
and encouragement me to complete the research work in a cheerful and in enthusiastic.
Further on, I would like to express my thanks to my best friends, Huynh Thuc
Khiem, Hoang Thi Thanh Huyen, Vo Thi Khuong Linh and Luu Thi Bao Khuyen for
their offered support and motivation and for their precious friendship and strong faith
in me through all the fluctuations of my study.
Last but not least, I would like to give all my thanks to my family for their
unconditional love and some my old friends who are the senior students in Ho Chi
Minh city for giving me motivation and love.


TABLE OF CONTENT
CONTENTS
DECLARATION ............................................................................................................ 3
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ............................................................................................. 4

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS........................................................................................ 8
ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................... 1
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION .......................................................................... 2
1.1.

Rationale ............................................................................................................ 2

1.2.

Significance of the study................................................................................... 2

1.3.

Aim and objective of the study ........................................................................ 3

1.3.1. Aim of the study............................................................................................. 3
1.3.2. Objectives of the study .................................................................................. 3
1.4.

Research question ............................................................................................. 3

1.5.

Structure of the study ....................................................................................... 4

CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................. 4
2.1.

Writing essays ................................................................................................... 4

2.1.1. Definition of an essay .................................................................................... 4
2.1.2. Structure of an essay ..................................................................................... 4
2.1.3. Types of essays ............................................................................................... 5
2.2.

Previous studies................................................................................................. 5

CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY .................................................................... 7
3.1.

Research approach and design ........................................................................ 7

3.2.

Research setting ................................................................................................ 8

3.3.

Research participants and sampling ............................................................... 8


3.3.1. Participants .................................................................................................... 8
3.3.2. Sampling ......................................................................................................... 9
3.4.

Data collection ................................................................................................. 10

3.4.1. Data collection instrument ......................................................................... 10
3.4.2. Data collecting procedure ........................................................................... 12
3.5.

Data analysis ................................................................................................... 12

3.5.1. Questionnaire ............................................................................................... 12
3.5.2. Interview ...................................................................................................... 12
3.5.3. Test scoring records .................................................................................... 13
3.6.

Validity and Reliability .................................................................................. 13

3.6.1. Validity ......................................................................................................... 13
3.6.2. Reliability ..................................................................................................... 13
CHAPTER FOUR: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION ............................................... 13
4.1.

Findings from Questionnaire ......................................................................... 13

4.1.1. Students’ background in learning English at school ............................... 13
4.1.2. Students’ difficulties in writing essays ...................................................... 15
4.1.3. Students’ essay writing learning and practicing ...................................... 28
4.1.4. Students’ strategies to solve difficulties..................................................... 31
4.2.

Findings from Interview ................................................................................ 32

4.2.1. Students’ interview ...................................................................................... 32
4.2.2. Teacher’s interview ..................................................................................... 35
4.3.

Findings from Test scoring records .............................................................. 37

4.3.1. The score of 25 essays ................................................................................. 39
4.3.2. The sub-scores based on the Table of Evaluation according to the
Rubrics for evaluating essays. The Rubrics consists of 5 criteria, which


contains from 1 point to 4 points each (Appendix C). The points were divided
into two groups such as 1-2 and 3-4 for analysis ................................................. 40
4.4.

Discussion ........................................................................................................ 42

CHAPTER FIVE: CONCLUSION ............................................................................ 45
5.1.

Recapitulation ................................................................................................. 45

5.2.

Implications ..................................................................................................... 46

5.3.

Suggestions ...................................................................................................... 47

5.4.

Limitation ........................................................................................................ 47

REFERENCES ............................................................................................................. 49

APPENDIXES .............................................................................................................. 50


LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
CAE: Certificate in Advanced English
GCSE: General Certificate of Secondary Education
IELTS: International English Language Testing System
EFL: English as a foreign language
TOEIC: Test of English for International Communication
TOEFL iBT: Test of English as Foreign Language internet Based Test
UKH: University of Khanh Hoa


LISTS OF TABLES
Table 3. 1: Partcipants of the research ........................................................................ 9

Table 4. 1: Descriptive statistics of writing essay score explained .......................... 39
Table 4. 2: Students’ difficulties in writing essays .................................................... 45


LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 4. 1: Students’ numbers of the years of having learned English ................. 14
Figure 4. 2: Purpose of learning English.................................................................... 14
Figure 4. 3: How to answer questions relating to the topic to develop ideas for the
essay ......................................................................................................................... 15
Figure 4. 4: How to construct an essay (including introduction, body and
conclusion) .............................................................................................................. 16
Figure 4. 5: How to write topic sentences .................................................................. 16
Figure 4. 6: How to write supporting sentences ........................................................ 17
Figure 4. 7: Practical knowledge about topic ............................................................ 17

Figure 4. 8: Word choice ............................................................................................. 18
Figure 4. 9: Grammar usage ....................................................................................... 19
Figure 4. 10: Spelling errors ........................................................................................ 19
Figure 4. 11: Sentence paraphrase ............................................................................. 20
Figure 4. 12: Linking words ........................................................................................ 20
Figure 4. 13: Literary mechanism .............................................................................. 21
Figure 4. 14: Large words in the paper ...................................................................... 21
Figure 4. 15: Writing sentence in context .................................................................. 22
Figure 4. 16: Coherence and cohesion ........................................................................ 22
Figure 4. 17: Essay writing guidelines ........................................................................ 23
Figure 4. 18: Interaction between the teacher and the student ............................... 23
Figure 4. 19: Unqualitied corrected-essays ................................................................ 24
Figure 4. 20: Materials ................................................................................................. 24
Figure 4. 21: Time limitation....................................................................................... 25
Figure 4. 22: Short-term memories ............................................................................ 25
Figure 4. 23: Spirits, mood and feelings ..................................................................... 26
Figure 4. 24: Negative attitudes .................................................................................. 26
Figure 4. 25: Group work in class .............................................................................. 27
Figure 4. 26: Self-study ................................................................................................ 27
Figure 4. 27: More time for practicing writing essays because of part – time jobs
.................................................................................................................................. 28
Figure 4. 28: Learning writing essay in class at General English 5 Unit ................ 28
Figure 4. 29: Learning writing in the General English 5 Unit at school ................. 29
Figure 4. 30: The pie chart shows the percentage of students being given writing
essays at homework................................................................................................ 29
Figure 4. 31: The essay correction at school .............................................................. 30
Figure 4. 32: Frequency of practicing writing essays after school .......................... 30
Figure 4. 33: Frequency of practicing writing essays after school per week ......... 31

Figure 4. 34: Frequency of practicing writing essays after schools per day on
which students spent time for their practice ....................................................... 31
Figure 4. 35: Strategies to solve difficulties ............................................................... 32



ABSTRACT
It can be said that language is considered one of the important factors in all
fields nowadays, especially diplomacy and communication. With the development of
industrialization and modernization of the country and integration of globalization,
learning foreign languages becomes more and more necessary. Internationally, English
is widely used all over the world. As we know, Listening, Speaking, Reading and
Writing are four important skills in English subject at high schools, in Europeanstandard training programs at colleges or universities and in international standards based assessments such as TOEIC for getting jobs, TOELF and IELTS for study and
settling abroad.
For English learners, writing skill is considered as one of the important skills of
the English learning. Of which, writing English essays is very important for learners of
English as a foreign language (EFL). Writing essays are obligated in writing programs
at colleges and universities such as writing in the final assessment tests, in the writing
sections of the tests to assess English proficiency according to international standards.
Through writing essays, it is possible to evaluate the ability to learn English. The essay
is also considered as a basic of developing other advanced forms of writing such as
thesis, blueprint, report, etc. However, it is not easy to write English essays well
because learners are prone to making linguistic mistakes and encountering several
obstacles.

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CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION
1.1.

Rationale

As learners of English as a major at the University of Khanh Hoa (UKH), even
though having learnt writing essays in General English 5 Unit following the textbook
English at level C1 Advanced, the senior English majors still had difficulties in writing
essays when learning and writing essays in final-term examinations. Actually, many
students said that they were not skillful at writing essays, therefore, they did not make
good or excellent points in their essays of the mid-term test and final exams. They
found it problematic write good essays with high marks in the mid-term or final
examinations. Thus, this study aims at investigating difficulties that students encounter
in writing essay and suggesting solutions to deal with the difficulties so that their
essays can become better in their examinations.
1.2.

Significance of the study

This study is significant in some aspects due to endeavoring contributions as
follows.
First, as a contribution to the EFL teaching methodologies, the result of the
study can be used as a document for teachers to organize planning and teaching
methods focusing on essay writing skill effectively, which helps to get high efficiency
in teaching English language. For the EFL learning methodologies, the study will show
considerations for difficulties in writing essays and give students some ways to cope
with, which can help to develop students’ abilities of writing essays in specific and
students’ writing skill in general.
Second, the findings of this study contribute to the process of promoting and
developing English learning skill for English learners at the University of Khanh Hoa
(UKH) who not only learn English for taking tests but also can use it in future jobs.
Third, this study brings students some advantages in improving their self-study

competence by raising their awareness of the importance of essay writing skill and
providing them with strategies and methods to enhance their abilities to writing essays.

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Third, the result of this study are also advantageous to English teachers in
introducing reference materials and providing students with methods of integrating
teaching essay writing skill in the General English 5 Unit, designing authenticity for
teaching methods and materials to be suitable to students’ abilities of writing English
essays.
Finally, the study may be a reference material for those who would like to
research to and develop the same the topic as this study. Moreover, it is a good chance
for student to have experience to carry out scientific research and improve English
writing skill.
1.3.

Aim and objective of the study

1.3.1. Aim of the study
The aim of this survey is to find out difficulties in writing essays that senior
English majored students faced in the General English 5 Unit. This will help to
recommend relevant solutions for the students in English Linguistics classes to advance
essay writing skill.
1.3.2. Objectives of the study
(1) To attain the opinions of the students and the teacher about difficulties in
writing essays, methods of learning and teaching writing essays at school and the result
of writing essays in general at school. Of which, finding difficulties that students faced
in writing essays is the main objective in this study.
(2) To cope with the difficulties senior English majors encountered in writing

essays.
(3) To grasp criteria and strategies for choosing and using the authentic
materials appropriate for the next General English 5 unit in the future.
(4) To pursue methods and strategies to enhance students' essays writing skill.
1.4.

Research question
Aim of this study is to answer the following question:

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What are difficulties which the senior English majors at the University of Khanh
Hoa (UKH) encountered in writing essays in the General English 5 Unit?
To answer this question, there are two problems to find out:
(1) Difficulties in writing essays
(2) Errors in essays
1.5.

Structure of the study

The study consists of three major parts. They are introduction, development and
conclusion. The introduction (Chapter one) presents the study rationale, significance,
aims and objectives and research questions. Next, the development includes three
chapters. They are chapter two, chapter three and chapter four. Chapter two presents a
review of literature with the issue regarding to writing essays and difficulties in writing
essays in previous studies. Chapter three shows the research methodology and
procedure for data collection and analysis. Chapter four reports the results of findings
and discussions. The final part is conclusion which carries sections of summary,
implications for learning and teaching methods, limitations and recommendations for

further study.
CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1.

Writing essays

2.1.1.

Definition of an essay

In general, an essay can be defined as a short piece of writing that expresses
information as well as the opinion of the writer. According to Zemach & Rumisek
(2005: 56), an essay is a group of paragraphs that is written about single topic and main
ideas. It includes at least three paragraphs; however, a five-paragraph essay is an essay
that has common length for academic essays.
2.1.2.

Structure of an essay

An essay comprises three main parts. The main points of the essays are
introduces in an introductory paragraph and supported in body paragraphs. The
conclusion is the last paragraph. The introduction paragraph is the first paragraph of an
essay. The introduction has two purposes consisting of introducing the topic of the
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essay as well and giving a clear idea of the writer’s opinion on the topic. A body of an
essay consists of one or more paragraphs which follow the introduction. Each of
paragraphs has the function of supporting the central idea of the essay. Each paragraph
of the body comprises one topic sentence and some supporting ideas. A conclusion

sentence draws the paragraph together. The conclusion paragraph is the last paragraph
of an essay. The function of the conclusion is summarizing the most important idea.
Moreover, the conclusion also gives opinions or solutions to a problem.
2.1.3.

Types of essays

Some common essays are descriptive essay, definition essay, compare &
contrast essay, cause & effect essay, narrative essay, argumentative essay, expository
essay, persuasive essay. The descriptive essay is a genre of essay that requires the
student to describe an object, person, place, experience, emotion and so on. This genre
encourages ability of students to create. Definition essay is the essay that explains what
a term means. Some terms have definite and concrete meanings such as things, animal,
plants and so on. In other words, definition essay provides an explanation of a general
principle or idea by using a number of well-chosen examples. Compare & Contrast
essay is the essay focuses on how two or more than items are similar and different to
each other. The items can be people, things or any events. Cause & Effect essay is the
essay that explains why or how things happen (cause) and what happens as a results
(effects). The narrative essay is the essay that tells the details of one main event. It is
also a story. It can be based on one of one’s own experience and it also communicates
a main idea or a lesson learned. The argumentative essay is a genre of essay showing
opinions about agreement or disagreement of the writers with a certain issue to
persuade the reader to accept or seriously consider. The expository essay requires the
student to investigate ideas, evaluate evidence, expound on the idea and set forth an
argument in a clear and concise manner. This can be accomplished through
comparison and contrast, definition, example, the analysis of cause and effect.
Persuasive essay is the kind of writing that depends on the reader’s reaction to what the
winter says. It can be said that the goal of persuasive writing is to make the readers
change from their viewpoint to writers’ viewpoint.
2.2.

Previous studies

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This chapter presents difficulties in writing essays which are found in domestic
and foreign studies as an overall review for the related research area.
For domestic research, there was the study "A Study on Students' Linguistic
Difficulties in TOEFL IBT Essay Writing and Sugguested Solutions” carried out by
Nguyen Thi Lien (2013) from Hanoi National University. The subjects of study were
learners and the TOFEFL iBT English certification exam takers. The research shows
the difficulties of students when writing TOEFL iBT essays and proposed solutions to
help learners overcome. The results of the research show that students encountered
difficulties in Writing Task 2 TOEFL iBT. They did not have the ability to rewrite
sentences, take notes, express ideas clearly, use academic vocabulary and develop the
body of essays. Some other problems that students faced are time limitation, limited
length of the essay, non-coherent essay structures and common spelling errors.
For the foreign studies, the study titled "EFL Students' Difficulties and Needs in
Essay Writing" (2009) carried out by Ariyanti and Fitriana at Widya Gama Mahakam
University in Indonesia, which pointed out five main issues that students encountered
when writing an essay. The main problems in studying writing essays are grammatical
coherent aspects, followed by dictionaries. In grammar, the researcher found that
writers often overlook the correct use of tenses, consensus between subject and
predicate, personal pronouns, word order, and usage of articles and auxiliary words and
sentence patterns in their writing. In addition, cohesion and coherence are the biggest
problems that astudent has. The students should rely on the thesis in forming topic
sentences in body paragraphs, but they do not include them in the introductory
paragraph to develop their ideas and most are not coherently connected. Besides,
students also encountered difficulties such as paragraph organization. Relating to

paragraph organization, most students did not start a paragraph with line rules.
Moreover, the length of the paragraph they write was inappropriate because many
students wrote too many sentences that make the paragraph too long and unreadable.
Another research topic titled "Problems faced by the English students in writing
a Descriptive essay" (2015) by Jefri from the University Studying in Jambi, Indonesia
has pointed out the difficulties of the writing writer describing "Descriptive essay".
This is one of the types of writing found in the Writing part of the B1 level in English
and Task 2 of the IELTS tests. Through the study, the author drew some conclusions
that students face grammatical problems in their essay structure, have difficulties that
6


avoid adding words and not using the right words. In general matters, students face
problems of lack of time, difficulty keeping word limits and lack of preparation before
writing. Having a preparation before starting to write will bring them positive effects in
writing an essay. But, implementing a number of strategies during and after writing an
essay has helped them reduce the mistakes of writing the essay and help them clearly
explain each body paragraph, while also giving the content consistent with essay topic.
Nyang'au Benard Nyasimi, from Kenyatta University, Kenya, East Africa
(2014) with titled “Challenges students face in learning essay writing skill in English
language on secondary schools in Manga District, Nyamira county, Kenya”, which
studied the challenges high school students encountered when learning essay writing
skills. The result of study showed that controlling content, using grammar and the
effects of the mother tongue were the biggest challenges faced by students. Other
common challenges pointed out include vocabulary limitations that result in loss of
spontaneity in English, limitations of adequate and insufficient teaching and learning
materials.
Most studies showed that learners have problems in grammar and the most spelling
mistakes. Learners are limited in using words for paragraphs. Interventions in the
mother tongue interfere with writing in English in finding ideas and answering

questions, solving problems in the topic. For groups of difficulties in expressing,
coherence and cohesion, it is a common group of difficult for those who do not master
the structure, skills and mechanisms. In addition, the group of facing difficulties in
time and lack of learning materials are also common difficulties affecting the result of
writing essays.
CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY
This chapter described the research methodology of the study. It consisted of the
research approach and design, research setting, research participants and sample, data
collection, data analysis, reliability and validity.
3.1.

Research approach and design

In order to satisfy the objectives of the study, the use of a quantitative survey is
a well-established approach in this study. The reason for occupying this approach was
that it takes into accounts the aims at finding out the difficulties that the students had
7


during writing essays, so it is necessary to discover the number of the participants’
answers on the questions.
Quantitative research is a means of testing objective theories by examining the
relationship between variables which can be typically measured on instruments,
according to John W. Creswell (2014; 295). The numbered data can be analyzed using
statistical procedures through polls, survey questionnaires or by manipulating preexisting statistical data using computational techniques. Quantitative research focuses
on gathering numerical data and generalizing the data across groups of people or to
explain a particular phenomenon (Babbie, 2010; Muijs, 2010). The two above
definitions are considered to be the basis of the present study design. In this study, the
information was collected, distributed and analyzed through survey questionnaire.
Personal interview conducted to the students and teacher to get their opinions about

teaching and learning writing essays with open ended questionnaire. This design was to
meet the objectives of the study. The result of questionnaire and interview will reveal
difficulties and suggest relevant to solutions.
3.2.

Research setting
The study was conducted at the University of Khanh Hoa in Nha Trang, Khanh

Hoa. The class English linguistic K1 belonging to the Department of Foreign language
is the first majored English class that approached the text book English Unlimited level
C1Advanced and writing essays in General English 5 Unit. Additionally, the students
in this class will attend the first CAE examination for the graduation at the UKH. It
means that it is suitable to do the research on essays of students in the class English
linguistic K1 to discover what difficulties that they have met.
3.3.

Research participants and sampling

3.3.1. Participants
To guarantee for the unity through the study, the participants of the study were
forty seven students (including group 1 and group 2) in English linguistics K1and a
teacher who taught General English 5 Unit in the class at the UKH. The University of
Khanh Hoa (UKH) is located in Nha Trang city, Khanh Khoa province. Nha Trang is a
famous coastal city and is one of the important tourist hubs of Vietnam. The number of
foreign tourists has been more and more increasing, which requires a human resource
8


with high level of English. This is also considered potential for the development of
English Linguistics at the University of Khanh Hoa (UKH). Thus, learning English is

very necessary for those who work tourism activities. For English majors at the UKH,
they have opportunities to work in various fields, of which translating – interpreting,
services and travelling fields include after graduation.
To creating identity and ensuring objectivity, forty seven participants are the
students whose majority is English linguistics. Almost students are 22 years old, except
one student is 24 years old. All students took the national examination for the
Graduation Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) and for university admission in
2016. Moreover, they come from both urban and rural areas, therefore they have
different conditions of learning English. The reason is that they are the first students
who have learning and writing essays in English General 5 Unit at the final school
year.
In this study, one teacher who was the instructor in class English Linguistics at
the University of Khanh Hoa was interviewed. The teacher taught English General 5
unit in both group 1 and group 2 of the class. The teacher is the Master in Approaches
and methods in TESOL.Therefore, it is homogenous and conformable enough to assess
general level of students at its true worth in writings essays.
Group

Participants

1

20

2

27

Total

47

Table 3. 1: Partcipants of the research
3.3.2. Sampling
The study examined on a sample of students’ essays of Writing part in the finalterm exam in General English 5 Unit. The reason is that the students learned and wrote
essays in the General English 5 Unit. In the final-term test, the writing part just
9


included writing essay task and the students wrote essays with the same topic. In this
study, twenty five essays of students were randomly chosen for testing.

Participants

Sample

Sample

25 students’ essays excerpted
from the final-term exam in
General English 5 Unit

47 students in class English
Linguistics

Diagram of sample population
3.4.

Data collection

3.4.1. Data collection instrument
To achieve more complete data information, survey questionnaire, interview and
test scoring records were used as research instruments.
3.4.1.1.

Questionnaire

A questionnaire is a research instrument consisting of a list of questions or other
types of prompts that aims at collecting information from a respondent, according to
Adi Bhat (2020), A research questionnaire developed in 1838 by the Statistical Society
of London is typically a mix of close-ended questions and open-ended questions.
Open-ended and long-form questions offer the respondent the ability to elaborate on
their thoughts. The collected data can be both qualitative as well as quantitative in
nature. A questionnaire may or may not be delivered in the form of a survey, but a
survey always consists of a questionnaire.

10


In this research, the survey questionnaire was distributed in order to have factual
data regarding with the students’ difficulties in writing essays and put forward some
ideas for suggestion. The purpose of the survey questionnaire is to preliminary survey
students’ difficulties in writing essays and what they want to improve in writing essays
and to inspect that whether the four year English majored student at the UKH
encountered difficulties in writing essays.
In the survey questionnaire, researcher established one open-ended question
regarding to the method of improving students’ writing essay for the purpose of
collecting ideas about writing essay on their own that students provided, which would
be the basis of research suggestion. Specifically, there were 19 sentences in the survey
form. The survey form was designed with both open-ended and closed-end questions in

bilingual for participants easily answer the questions. Of which, there were 18 closedend questions and 1 open-ended question. (Appendix A)
3.4.1.2.

Interview

For interview, personal interview was conducted to specify difficulties in
writing essays for students and get their appreciations of methods for improving based
on the survey questionnaire. After that, the researcher interviewed the teacher who
taught the General English 5 Unit to get teacher's appreciation regarding teaching
methods and the level of essays in writing essays in class English Linguistics K1. The
answers were saved as voice recording for document. Semi-structured interviews were
carried out to get information with 16 open-ended questions for students and 6 ones for
the teacher. Semi-structured interview is the kind of interview allowing the researcher
to develop in-depth accounts of information about experience and knowledge with
individuals, according to Cousin (2009: 71).
3.4.1.3.

Test scoring records

In the research, essays collected from the final-term test of the General English
5 Unit were analyzed based on Rubric for assessment of writing essays (Appendix C)
for examining record. An essay rubric can be considered a way to assess essay writing
by using specific criteria to grade assignments. In writing essays, essay rubric can be a
simple way used to grade essays. All of the criteria are listed and organized into one
convenient paper, therefore, essay rubrics save teachers and students time, and can
help improve students' essay writing skill. Besides, it can be said that essay rubric is a
11


useful tool to evaluate an essay because students and teachers can design an essay

rubric for their own to be easier to control and evaluate essays in writing and grading
essays. Essay rubric can be used to sore essays in some standardized tests like the SAT
or IELTS. This is reliable enough to use essay rubric for evaluate the students’ essays
in this study.
3.4.2. Data collecting procedure
First of all, survey questionnaire (Appendix A) was the instrument used to
collect the data from forty seven students in class English linguistics K1. After the
students had finished answering the questionnaire, the researcher interviewed ten
students in both group 1 and group 2 of the class in random to specify information and
interviewed one teacher to get her perception and opinions. The interview records were
wrote out for analysis. Finally, twenty five students’ essays were randomly collected as
the supporting data to confirm the result of the questionnaire.
3.5.

Data analysis

3.5.1. Questionnaire
In this research, the researcher analyzed the data from survey questionnaire after
filled by participants. To analyze the data, the researcher used descriptive statistics,
including charts, percentage and mean. Microsoft office Excel 2010 program was used
for this analysis. Microsoft office Excel 2010 is one of high fidelity tools used to
support presenting data. The purpose of using Microsoft office Excel 2010 program is
to describe the research question in quantitative by using descriptive statistics. There
were some steps of analysis the data by using Microsoft office Excel 2010. First of all,
the researcher entered the data into the Excel software. Then, the researcher cleaned
and checked the data before creating charts. After that, charts were created based on
the data and were used to analyze.
3.5.2. Interview
After collected, the data from the results of students’ interview and teacher’s
interview were summarized and filted. Then, the data were classified into topics

relating to the objectives of the study. The data of interview would be compared with
the data of survey form to clear and specify students’ difficulties and discover more
information about the objective of the study.
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3.5.3. Test scoring records
Twenty – five students’ essays were graded on the 20 grading scale based on
Essay Grading Rubric. After grading students’ essays, the essays were classified
following by the grades for bringing out appreciation of the result of writing essays
for the students, based on the criterions of the Essay Rubric.
3.6.

Validity and Reliability

3.6.1. Validity
According to Creswell (2012), validity is the degree that every evident points to
the intended interpretation of the test scores for the proposed purposes. Validity refers
how accurately a method measures what it is intended to measure. In this study, the
survey questionnaire made is valid and it can be used to find out difficulties writing
essays faced by senior English majors to answer the research question. The researcher
conducted the validity test to senior English majors in the class English Linguistics K1.
Microsoft Office Excel 2010 was used to measure the validity.
3.6.2. Reliability
According to Johnson and Christensen (2008), reliability refers to the consistently a
method measures something. If the results that are as same as to each one achieved by
using the same methods the similar circumstances, the measurement is considered
reliable. In this study, the analysis of reliability of survey questionnaire in this research
measured with Microsoft Office Excel 2010 program. The reliability of the
questionnaire was tested in the class English Linguistics K1 and measured the

reliability of the questionnaire by putting all the valid items into Microsoft Office
Excel 2010 programs.

CHAPTER FOUR: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
4.1.

Findings from Questionnaire

4.1.1. Students’ background in learning English at school
This category presents the number of years for which the students have learned
English and purpose why they have taken the university courses. These are the two
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