(Skkn rất hay) applying genre based approach in teaching 12th graders’ writing skills in ha huy tap high school

NGHE AN DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION & TRAINING
--------------------

TEACHING INNOVATION
APPLYING GENRE-BASED APPROACH IN
TH
TEACHING 12 GRADERS’ WRITING SKILLS
IN HA HUY TAP HIGH SCHOOL
GROUP: ENGLISH

Năm học: 2022 - 2023

0


NGHE AN DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION & TRAINING
HA HUY TAP HIGH SHOOL
--------------------

TEACHING INNOVATION
APPLYING GENRE-BASED APPROACH IN
TH
TEACHING 12 GRADERS’ WRITING SKILLS
IN HA HUY TAP HIGH SCHOOL

Tác giả : NGUYỄN PHAN QUỲNH TRANG
Tổ bộ môn : Ngoại Ngữ
Số điện thoại: 0944211987

Năm học : 2022 - 2023

1


TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART I: INTRODUCTION

3

1. Rationale of study

3

2. Aims and objectives of the study

3

3. Research questions

3

4. Scope of the study

4

5. Methods of the study

4

6. Significance of the study

4

PART II: CONTENTS OF THE STUDY

5

CHAPTER 1: THEORERICAL BACKGROUND

5

1.1. A definition of writing and its importance

5

1.2. Different approaches to teach writing

5

1.3. The Genre-based approach

5

1.3.1. Definition of genre

5

1.3.2. Genre-based approach

6

CHAPTER 2: AN OVERVIEW OF TEACHING AND LEARNING
WRITING SKILLS IN HA HUY TAP HIGH SCHOOL

8

2.1. Teachers

8

2.2. Learners

8

2.3. The textbook

8

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY

9

3.1. Rationale of using action research

10

3.2. Participants of the study

10

3.3. Data collection instrument
3.3.1. Pre-test and post-test

10

3.3.2. Pre-questionnaire and post- questionnaire

10

3.4. Data analysis procedure

11

PART III: FINDING AND DISCUSSION

12

3.1.Problem identification

12

3.2.Preliminary investigation

12
1


3.2.1. Analysis of student’s preliminary questionnaire

12

3.2.2 The results of the students’ pre-tests

14

3.3. Hypothesis

15

3.4. Intervention

15

3.5. Evaluation

16

3.5.1. The results of the students’ post- test

16

3.5.2. The results of the questionnaire for student after taking part in
action research

20

3.6. Discussion
3.7. Survey for the necessity and the possibility of solutions

21

22

PART IV: CONCLUSION

24

4.1. Conclusions of the study

24

4.2. Suggestions for further study

24

REFERENCES
APPENDICES


2


PART I: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale of the study
The Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training has reformed English
textbooks concentrating on the four skills: reading, speaking, listening, and writing.
Of the four skills, many teachers and students alike consider writing to be most
difficult and complicated to teach and to learn. In fact, there are a variety of
reasons for this problem, and therefore finding appropriate techniques and methods
for teaching writing effectively to students requires long serious research. English
is a required subject for high school students in Vietnam nowadays. But most of

important tests including graduation and university entrance exams do not have a
writing component. As a result, students only focus on learning grammar and
vocabulary. They have considerable difficulty in learning the writing skill.
At Ha Huy Tap High school, the dominant approach to teach writing is
process approach which focuses only on process of writing. As the teacher of
English at Ha Huy Tap High school, when teaching my students in writing lessons,
the author realized that my students did not seem to be interested in learning
writing and had some difficulties to learn writing better.
It appears to me that I need to make some changes. And the question was
raised that “How can teacher help students to make an improvement in learning
writing?”. Through reading the literature, the writer was impressed with the idea of
teaching writing through a genre-based approach. I decided to experiment this
approach to my teaching writing to my own students in my school. The aim of this
action research is to examine whether a genre-based approach to writing is helpful
to students or not. In what follows I shall concentrate on: “APPLYING GENREBASED APPROACH IN TEACHING 12TH GRADERS’ WRITING SKILLS
IN HA HUY TAP HIGH SCHOOL”
At this paper, teacher observations and student surveys were collected to
determine the effectiveness of using this approach. The research results of the
study become a reference for the process of teaching, testing, assessment and
developing the capacity of students in high school.
2. Aims and objectives of the study
This study is designed with an aim to improve students’ writing performance
of English by applying genre-based approach to teach writing skill to students.
In order to achieve this aim, the following objective was set out for the
study: To examine how genre-based approach to teaching writing affected
students’ writing performance.
3. Research questions
My theme focuses on making clear about:
- What is genre-based approach?
3

-

How is genre-based approach applied?

Does applying genre-based approach help improve the quality of my
students’ writing?
4.

Scope of the study
Because of the limitation of a minor study, the research is only conducted at
Ha Huy Tap High School in order to recognize the problems in learning writing
skills of the 12th grade students with the textbook “Tieng Anh 12” by Pearson,
Vietnam Education Publishing House. The study mainly focuses on application of
genre-based approach in teaching writing.
The research scope includes the two classes, namely class 12A4 and class
12A5 at Ha Huy Tap High school, Nghe An province. In total, more than 70
students take part in this study.
5. Methods of the study
The researcher decided to adopt action research because this type of research
is aimed at improving a situation. After a preliminary investigation had been
carried out, a writing instruction course was designed, and then implemented in the
school year 2022-2023 with the participation of more than 70 students from two
classes 12A4 and 12A5 at Ha Huy Tap High school. The data was then collected
through survey questionnaires. Questionnaire responses were analyzed by means of
descriptive statistics. In addition to the questionnaires, students’ writing were
collected through pre-test and post-test and analyzed to measure the students’
progress in their writing performance.
6. Significance of the study

Theoretically, the study systemized the theory of a genre-based approach in
teaching writing, together with its advantages and disadvantages. The study also
provides suggestions for successful application of the approach into teaching
composition in real classroom.
Practically, the research provides language teachers and learners with a
number of activities and exercises using the genre-based approach in all stages of
writing.

4


PART II: CONTENTS OF THE STUDY
CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
1.1. A definition of writing and its important
One way of viewing writing, called cognitive view, is to see writing as decision
making. When we write something, whether it is an email message, a letter, or an
essay, we are engaged in making one decision after another. We decide what to begin
the text with, whether to include or leave out an idea that comes to mind, whether to
begin a new paragraph or continue the same one, what information to place in the
beginning of a sentence and so on. Successful writing is the result of making the right
decisions most of the time the act of composing and revising.

“The ability to write effectively is becoming increasingly important in our
global community and instruction in writing is thus assuming an increasing role in
both second and foreign education" (Alderson and Bachman, 2002). Bazerman
(1989) stated that "writing makes things happen in the social world, and much of
that social world is embodied in previous pieces of writing". In addition, Alderson
and Bachman (2002) confirmed that "the ability to speak and write a second
language is becoming widely recognized as an important skill for educational,
business and personal reason."

Nunan (1995) also said "language exists to fulfill a range of communicative
functions and that these functions will be reflected in the shape of the language
itself” (Nunan, 1995). Therefore, "writing will be an essential component in the
learning program.”
1.2. Different approaches to teach writing
There are three most widely known approaches to teach writing: product
approach, genre approach, and process approach. First, the product approach
emphasizes the final product of writing with a special focus on correctness and
conformity to rules. Second, the genre approach focuses on the appropriate writing
structure, the content, and the style to be used for the purpose at hand. Finally, the
process approach is a sequential process where the writer goes through several
specific processes to produce a piece of writing, including planning, drafting,
revising, and editing.
1.3. The genre-based approach
1.3.1. Definition of genre

▪

As this paper focuses on the genre-based approach, it’s necessary to
understand the concept of “genre”. What is genre? For Callaghan and Rothery,
“genre is the way people make meaning with one another in stages to achieve their
purposes.” (1993:35). Genre has the special characteristics as follow:
It is culture specific, and it develops and changes along with the culture.
5


▪
▪
▪

It is goal oriented.
It has distinctive stages: beginning, middle and end.
It contains particular linguistic features.

According to David Butt et al. (1995), genre, which relates to the purpose of
the text, is one of the contexts of a text. The other context is register, which is
made up of three variables: field, tenor, and mode. Field refers to what is talked
about or written about. It can be something that happened, is happening or will
happen. Tenor is the relationship between the writer and the reader or between the
speaker and the listener. Mode is the channel of communication, the kind of text
that is being made to convey a message.
“Genre” refers not only to types of literary texts but also to the predictable and
recurring patterns of everyday, academic, and literary texts occurring within a
particular culture (Hammond and Derewianka, 2001). In the Western countries,
genre, either spoken or written, is often identified/grouped according to its primary
social purposes. According to Swale (1990) the genres which share the same
purposes belong to the same text-types. Derewianka (1990) identified further six
main genres according to their primary social purposes:


Narratives: tell a story, usually to entertain.



Recount: to tell what happened.



Information reports: provide factual information.



Instruction: tell the listeners or readers what to do.



Explanation: explain why or how something happens.



Expository texts: present or argue a viewpoint.



Procedure: give instructions how to do/ make something.
These social purposes of the text-genres in turn decide the linguistic inputs
of the text (i.e. their linguistic conventions, often in form of schematic structure
and linguistic features). Specifically, schematic structure refers to internal structure
or text organization of the text-type in forms of introduction, body, and conclusion,
while language features consist of linguistic aspects such as grammar, vocabulary,
connectors, etc. that the writers must use to translate information/ideas into a
readable text.
1.3.2. Genre-based approach
Genre-based approach is the approach in which students are explicitly
exposed to the language features, text structures and the social purposes of each
text type. Then, students step by step produce the text with appropriate scaffolding
of the teacher.

6

Genre-based approach promises very benefits for learners as they pull
together language, content, and contexts, while offering teachers a means of
presenting students with explicit and systematic explanations of the ways writing
works to communicate.
For teachers, genre-based approach draws teachers into considering how
texts actually work as communication. By categorizing and analyzing the texts they
ask students to write, teachers become more familiar with the ways meanings are
created and more sensitive to the specific communicative needs of their students.
Teachers are therefore in a better position to reflect on their own writing and that
of their students, offering them a means to understand, deconstruct, to make
decisions about the teaching methods and materials to use, and to approach current
instructional examples with a more critical eye.
Derewianka (1990) indicates that in order for learners to learn to write a
specific genre, teachers and learners work through a cyclical process which
consists of four stages, namely Building the Field, Modeling, Joint Construction
and Independent Writing. The first stage is intended to give students time to gather
information about what they will be writing. Then, in Modeling, they are exposed
to an authentic text of a particular genre to familiarize with its generic structure,
language features and communicative purpose. Then with the help of their teacher,
they jointly construct a text. Joint writing allows students to experience the
processes of thinking and social interaction in writing by observing how meanings
and language are chosen to serve a particular communicative purpose and by
participating in the decision making which mould them into more confident
writers. Finally, students write the text of the same genre on their own.
The principles of the genre based approach are realized in the teaching and
learning cycle or model. The teaching model consists of a number of stages that the
teacher and students go through so that students gradually gain independent control
of a particular genre. The stages usually come in circle to indicate that there are
different points of entry depending on the needs of the students.

In addition to providing teachers with a way of organizing their courses,
genre based writing instruction follows modern theories of learning in giving
considerable recognition to the importance of collaboration, or peer interaction,
and scaffolding, or teacher-supported learning.
In short, while study genre-based approach students move backwards and
forwards through alternate processes of induction and deduction, between language
and meta-language, activity and received knowledge, experience and theory. That’s
why the aim of teaching genre to grade 12 students in my school would empower
them to write a variety of purposes and audiences. So writing should be taught as
how it can be used in context meaningfully.

7


CHAPTER 2: AN OVERVIEW OF TEACHING AND LEARNING
WRITING SKILL AT HA HUY TAP HIGH SCHOOL
2.1. Teachers
In terms of teaching English writing, most of the teachers just focus on
providing their student writers with vocabulary relating to the required topic and
some guiding questions in order to help them shape their ideas into the completed
paragraphs. Teaching writing in this way only benefits them to an extent that it can
assist them in producing the error-free texts following the models of correct
language.
In addition, there was a tendency among English teachers to ignore teaching
writing. Teachers provided students with less opportunity to practice writing
English. In other word, the English teachers in general were more concentrate on
teaching skills such as reading and listening, and language components such as
vocabulary and grammar.
2.2. Learners
Writing skill is seemed to be difficult for all students in learning foreign

language at high school. The difficulties include those in generating and organizing
ideas using an appropriate choice of vocabulary and putting such ideas into an
intelligible text.
For my students, besides these difficulties, they also have to face many other
obstacles when learning to write compositions in English. They worry about
expressing their ideas clearly within the boundaries of correct usage, grammar,
spelling, and punctuation. Often in the first years of their language learning, there
is little focus on the creative aspects of writing because exams focus on grammar,
spelling, or punctuation. Because of this, students develop a fear of writing and
think that everything they write is riddled with errors. These fears hinder them and
frequently make their writing process slow and also unsuccessful. As a result, it is
rather difficult to engage all students to the main content of the lessons.
Apparently, applying teaching approaches and using teaching methods
should be taken in order to foster and develop their writing skills efficiently.
2.3. The textbook
The pilot English 12 textbook is a series of books organized and complied by the
Vietnam Education Publishing House according to the pilot English curriculums for
upper secondary schools issued by the Ministry of Education and Training in 2012.
The series is the continuation of the Elementary English program and the Secondary
English program. The book series is compiled in a communicative way to help
students, through the use of corpus (phonetics, vocabulary, grammar),
8


develop their ability to communicate in English in four forms: listening, speaking,
reading and writing. The English 12 pilot book focuses largely on vocabulary.
Therefore, students who have access to this program will have many advantages
compared to the old book series.
The textbook is compiled around topics that are close to students. Each topic
is divided into two or three units corresponding to the topics in the program. All

are prepared according to the 10-year English program (from grade 3 to grade 12)
according to the 2020 project of the Ministry of Education, with standards meeting
the ministry’s capacity output. The book is compiled in sections, including: Getting
Started, Language, Skills: Reading, Speaking, Listening, Writing, Communication
and Culture, Looking back and Project. After 3 Units on vocabulary topics, there
will be a Review, designed according to the same sections as the previous lesson.
The book contains ten units, with each unit presenting eight periods. Writing is
the sixth periods in each lesson. It is the last and the most challenging skill in each
unit which is put after three others kills due to its productive nature and dependence
on input from other skills. Writing guide students through the writing process and
focus on the specific text types. Some tasks in the textbook are difficult while some
th
others are not really challenging. In the 12 grade, students are expected to work on a
variety of writing tasks, each of which goes with a particular topic.

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY
This chapter presents a detailed description of how the research was carried
out including the rationale of the using research, participants, data collection
instruments and data analysis procedures.
3.1. Rationale of using action research
Action research is conducted to investigate a specific teaching situation or
practice when the teacher wants to find a solution to that situation or practice. This
action research was carried out in an attempt to find out solutions to the
improvement of students’ writing skills. It was carried out by the researcher with
her own students in an intact class. For these reasons, the researcher believed an
action research design would fit well her purpose.
In this study, the researcher followed the model proposed by Nunan (1992)
because the steps in his model made it easier and more convenient for the
researcher to carry out the research. Besides, it reflected correctly what steps were
taken during the study.

According to Nunan (1992), the action research process has seven steps
illustrated as: Problem identification, Preliminary investigation, Hypothesis,
Intervention, Evaluation, Dissemination and Follow-up.
9


Although there are seven steps in an action research cycle, because of the
limited time of study, the researcher conducted the research within 5 steps: Problem
Identification, Preliminary Investigation, Hypothesis, Intervention, and Evaluation.

More specifically, after realizing that most 12th grade students were not
interested in learning writing, the researcher began to gather data about the target
population and then interpret the data to see whether they had the same problem.
After the results were obtained, the study was conducted to improve the situation.
Finally, the results were evaluated to propose possible next steps.
3.2. Participants of the study
More than seventy students of two classes 12A4 and 12A5 at Ha Huy Tap
High school were invited to take part in an experimental writing class in which I
used the genre-based approach in teaching writing English in order to teach the
student to write. Most of them were not good at learning English, especially their
writing skills were not acceptable, but eager to master this subject like
communicating fluently, making a good speech.
After that the researcher conducted a cycle, in which the researcher, being
the only teacher at the research site knowing the genre-based approach, used this
method to teach them how to write in English.
3.3. Data collection instruments
In order to collect sufficient data for the study, a number of instruments were
employed: pre-test and post-tests, questionnaires
3.3.1. Pre-test and post-test
To measure the quality of the participants’ written texts before and after the

research, the researcher designed a pre-test and a post-test (see appendix 1) on
English writing. The test types selected for this study are popular kinds of writing
test similar to the tests which students are instructed. Therefore, the students are
supposed to be familiar with the test format.
Actually, the pre-test and the post-test on English writing are similar but not
the same. They are similar in format, instruction, length, level of difficulty, and
allotted time. However, the specific writing topics between the two tests are
different although they are both the same genre, writing a narrative.
To score the pre-test and the post-test, the same marking scale (see appendix
2) will be used. This analytic marking scale with specific evaluation criteria was
adapted from Jacobs et al’s (1981) (cited in Weigle, 2002: 115-116). The main
reason for the choice of this analytic marking scale instead of a holistic scale is that
it provides more useful diagnostic information about students’ writing abilities.
3.3.2. Pre- Questionnaire and post-questionnaire

10


Survey questionnaires were chosen because they allowed collecting a large
amount data in a relatively short time.
The preliminary questionnaire (See Appendix 3) was conducted at the first
week of the research with 71 students. The questionnaire aims to investigate
students’ attitudes towards writing skill (items 1, 2) their self assessment of their
writing performance (item 3) and their problems they faced (item 4). The results
from the questionnaire, in cooperation with pre-test results could help the
researcher identify possible problems for students’ writing skill.
The post-questionnaire (See Appendix 4) was carried out after the
intervention step finished. This was done to investigate the effect of new writing
methods on students. The questionnaire included 3 items, the first item is to find
out the students’ attitude to new genre, the second requires students to self assess

their ability after taking part in the research, the last one facing with the changes
they could have from this approach in writing.
It is hoped that the combination of these instruments would enable the
research questions to be answered.
3.4. Data analysis procedure
The researcher used the questionnaire to collect data in this action research.
Then the responses were analyzed by means of descriptive statistics. This research
method was aimed at providing information on students’ attitudes towards, and
opinions about the genre-based approach.
To gain information about students’ progress in their writing, students’
writing pre and post test papers were collected before and over the treatment period
and analyzed of the marking scheme.

11


PART III: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
In this part, the main stages of this action research will be presented under
the following headings: Problem identification, Preliminary investigation,
Hypothesis, Intervention and Evaluation.
3.1. Problem identification
During teaching writing for the 12th grade students at Ha Huy Tap High
school, I realized that my students did not seem interested in writing lessons and
their writing performance seemed poor. Therefore, the author decided to
investigate the problem that her students faced.
3.2. Preliminary investigation
To illustrate the problem that students had in learning writing skill, the
researcher conducted a survey questionnaire and pre test. The collected data was
analyzed to find out how students were not interested in learning writing and to
assess students’ writing skill before the new approach to be implemented.

3.2.1. Analysis of students’ preliminary questionnaire
From the preliminary questionnaire, the students’ personal information was
gathered. There were 71 students taking part in the study.
3.2.1.1. Students’ attitudes towards writing skill
Students’ answers to question 1 and question 2 help the researcher
understand their attitudes towards writing skill.

Chart 1: Students’ attitudes towards writing skill
From chart 1 above, we can see that a majority of the students realized the
importance of learning writing skill. The results show that most of them answered
that learning writing skill was important or rather important (25.4% and 38%)
whereas only 14.1% of students said learning writing was not important and 22.5%
of them thought it was little important.
12


In response to question 2, it is noticeable that 10/ 71students respondent liked
learning writing very much. The population of the students who liked learning writing
skill a little is nearly the same as who did not like it at all (35.3%, 31% respectively).
19.7% of students said that they were rather interested in writing skill.

3.2.1.2. Students’ self assessment of their writing competence
Chart

2:

Students’ self assessment of their writing competence
The data in Chart 2 shows that the writing performance of students was not
good. Surprisingly, it can be seen clearly that only five students (7%) thought that
their writing was very good. The percentage of the students who self evaluated

their writing performances were very bad was 25.3 % and bad was 39.5 %. What is
more, 18.3% of the asked students assessed that they had no idea of their writing
performance. Meanwhile, the percentage of the students thinking their writing
performance were good was only 9.9%. It is remarkable that the attitude of
students about the importance of writing skill did not seem to be affected toward
their writing performance.
3.2.1.3. The difficulties students had encountered
Difficulties in learning writing skill

Frequency

Percentage

a. Expressing ideas logically

46

64.8%

b. Lacking of vocabulary

47

66.2%

c. Lacking some necessary grammar structures

35

49.3%

d. Using connectors

25

35.2%

e. Organizing the written text

40

56.3%

f. Having nothing to write

6

8.4%

g. Using incorrect verb tenses

43

60.5%

Table 1: Students’ difficulties in learning writing skill
13


The data from the questionnaire, as presented in table 1 above, shows the

fact that most of the students in this class saw the lack of vocabulary and
expressing the ideas logically as the two factors that caused the most difficulties
for them in writing lessons. With the highest percentage (66.2%), lacking
vocabulary seemed to be the most challenging for students to develop their writing
skill despite the fact that their teacher had tried the best to provide them a number
of vocabulary exercises. Besides that, 46 participants (about 64.8%) in the survey
found it very difficult to present their ideas coherently. In other words, the
students’ discourse competence was limited. They always wrote the first thing
coming to their mind without rearranging them even they had nothing to express.
The third biggest problem of the students was that they did not know how to use
correct verb tenses (60.5%). It can be inferred that although the teacher had tried to
explain the pattern of grammar to them, they still encountered the problem of
distinguishing the use of tenses in English. Nearly the similar number of
participants used the structures in writing incorrectly. Therefore their writing text
seemed to be the hard thing to complete. Ranking the number four in causing
matters to students’ writings was the way of organizing the written text with about
40 students in this research. It is the frequent problem for any students learning
foreign language at the pre-intermediate level. There were 25 students in this class
thought that it was the connectors that made it difficult for them to write. There
existed the minority of students (8.4%) reported that they had nothing to write.
3.2.2. The results of the students’ pre-tests
Scores (points)

Level

frequency

Percentage

≥ 90

Very good

2

2. 8%

≥80

Good

11

15.5%

≥ 70

Average

27

38 %

≥60

Bad

16

22.5%

≥ 40

Very bad

15

21. 2%

71

100%

Total

Table 2: The overall results of students’ writing tests
Findings from the table tell us that students’ writing performance was rather
poor. Only two students had excellent mark and 11 students which accounts for
15.5% got good mark. It was not satisfied that there were 31 students making up
43.7% had bad and very bad writings, whereas the frequency for students at
average level was 27.
From the result, it can be seen clearly that the majority of the students
evaluated their writing skill accurately.
14


To sum up, the preliminary investigation helped the researcher recognize the
fact that most of the students had difficulties writing because of without
vocabulary, structures, languages features as well as lack of expressing ideas
logically. It suggests that instruction of writing skill should be changed to improve

students’ writing performance.
3.3.

Hypothesis

The analysis and discussion of the initial data above proved that most of
students lacked interest in writing lessons and difficulties made their writing
performance unacceptable. As a result, the researcher had to think of solution for the
problems. Then, the results led to the following hypothesis: Genre-based teaching
may help solve the students’ problem and applying genre-based approach would
effectively improve students’ writing skill in English writing lessons.

3.4.

Intervention

To solve the problem, the author decided to use genre-based approach to
change the way she taught writing to students.
The application of genre-based to teach writing to students consisted of 4
stages.
Stage 1: At the first session, the concept of “genre” was introduced to
students to familiarize themselves with the new approach to teaching. Then, the
narrative genre was explained with its social purpose and schematic structure. A
narrative is an account of a sequence of events, usually in chronological order. The
focus of the text is on a sequence of actions. Aspects of the narrative genre were
then introduced explicitly to the students. These aspects are follows:
+

The identification of the events, climax, and the conclusion

+

The use of the past tense to retell the events

+

Words that show the order of events
All of these aspects were taught based on the two model texts chosen to the
sample narrative texts (See Appendix 5).
Stage 2: Building the field
This stage was done to give students ideas about what to write. This included
activities related to vocabulary and grammar. (This can be seen in the Appendix 6)

Stage 3: Modeling: Teacher provided a detailed scaffold for the narrative:
-

Explicitly introduce the model text.

Ask students to find out the steps of constructing a narrative and language
features (See Appendix7).
Stage 4: Joint-construction
15


The students began to contribute to the construction of a narrative text in
groups of 4 to prepare to write about unforgetale birthday party. The outline were
about: who was in your story, when did it happen, where did it happen, what
happen, Why did it happen, how did you and the others feel.
3.5.

Evaluation

After the intervention step, to assess the effects of genre-based approach and
to find out the answer for the research question “Does using genre-based approach
help improve the quality of my students’ writing?” the post questionnaire and post
test were conducted to collect the data.
3.5.1. The results of the students’ post-test
From the post test results, the writing scores of 71 students who participated
in the action research were calculated (presented in table 3 below).
Scores (points)

Level

≥ 90

Very good

9

12.6%

≥80

Good

23

32.4%

≥ 70

Average

30

42.3%

≥60

Bad

6

8.5%

≥ 40

Very bad

3

4.2%

71

100%

Total

Frequency

Percentage

Table 3: The overall results of students’ post- tests
Then we could check whether applying the genre based approach had
impacted students’ writing performance by comparing the results of two tests (pre
test and post test). The comparison is shown in chart 3 below.

Chart 3: Comparison of the results from pre-test and post-test
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Chart 3 shows the results of students’ writing scores in pre-test and post -test.
Obviously, at all levels, students’ marks for writing had been improved. There was
a noticeable decrease at very bad level, the number of students who got the very
bad mark in post-test dropped to 3 whereas in pre-test it is 15. The second change
is at good level at which the number of students with rose to 32.3% compared to
15.5% in the pre-test. From the two analyzed results above, it can be seen that the
genre-based approach really helped students to improve their writing skill.
An analysis of the students’ performance in detail based on the five main
characteristics was given below.
3.5.1.1. The performance of students in the content of the writing test
When looking into the content of the writing tests of the students in this
research, we can see that their performance varied from students to students. 39.5%
of the students were at good to average level while the same number of students
(35.2%) had the scores ranged from fair to poor. The researcher found out that
there were 11/ 71 students got the scores at very poor level, which account for
15.5%. This meant that not all students were satisfied with their writing tests.

Chart 4: Students’ performance in the

3.5.1.2. The performance of students in the organization of the writing test
Chart 5 below figures out the way students organized their writing. As can be
seen from the chart, the number of students who got the excelent to very good points
was few; there were 2.8% of the respondents in the treatment. The students whose
scores in organizing the writing were at fair to poor accounted for 28/ 71 making up
39.4% and very poor grade were the half of this figure with 17%. It is noticeable that
the students still had difficulty in putting their ideas in the logical order.
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