AN ANALYSIS OF TEACHING WRITING THROUGH GENRE BASED APPROACH AT SMAN. 10 PEKANBARU
Drs. ASWIR ASTAMAN, M. Pd
ABSTRAK
Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengkaji bagaimana guru bahasa Inggris di SMA Negeri 10 Pekanbaru menerapkan pembelajaran berdasarkan pendekatan genre untuk keterampilan menulis dalam bahasa Inggris.
Penelitian ini adalah penelitian kualitatif deskriptif. Informan dalam penelitian ini adalah 4 orang guru bahasa Inggris di SMA Negeri 10 Pekanbaru. Data dikumpulkan melalui interview, study dokumentasi, dan observasi pembelajaran.
Hasil dari penelitian ini menunjukkan bahwa banyak guru yang belum memahami sepenuhnya penerapan dan tujuan pendekatan berdasarkan genre meskipun sudah berlaku selama sekitar 4 tahun. Masih adanya ketidaksesuaian antara konsep Genre-based Approach dengan penerapan didalam kelas. Di samping itu, kesulitan guru dalam mengajar menulis adalah kurangnya penguasaan kosakata siswa dan lemahnya kemampuan siswa dalam menyusun kalimat.
Dari hasil penelitian ini, disarankan pada Depertemen Pendidikan Nasional untuk mengadakan pelatihan yang lebih memadai untuk penerapan Genre-Based Aapproach bagi guru-guru, dan pelatihan tersebut haruslah merata bagi guru-guru bahasa Inggris dan tidak terfokus hanya pada teori saja tapi lebih ditekankan pada penerapanya di dalam kelas.
Meskipun penelitian ini berhubungan dengan pengenalan Genre-Based Approach bagi guru-guru bahasa Inggris, namun implikasinya juga penting untuk penerapan Genre-Based Approach untuk keterampilan lain selain writing, seperti pengajaran bahasa Inggris secara terpadu.
Key words: Genre Based Approach, Teaching Writing
Background of the Problem
Education policy for English language teaching in Indonesia has undergone several changes. The changes aim at improving the outcomes of English language teaching itself. In 2004, the Ministry of National Education has decided to bring in a new curriculum in all subject areas, including English. The curriculum is known as Competence Based Curriculum or 2004 Curriculum which recommends a new approach, that is the Genre-Based Approach.
Genre-Based Approach can be defined as an approach in teaching English which views language as an open dynamic system, where knowledge about language is taught in an explicit manner; and genres (Types of the text) are used as the starting for modelling and developing four language skills; listening, speaking, reading and writing are developed in balance ( Martin in Firkin, 2007: 1).
In Indonesian model, the Genre-Based Approach is conducted in two cycles; they are spoken cycle and written cycle. Parallel to Competence Based Curriculum, the result of the process of teaching and learning should be measurable and observable. For these reasons, at the end of both cycles every student must be able to produce their own texts either spoken or written texts. In other words, at the end of spoken cycle students are expected to be able to produce monologue in the same of genre that they are learning. Similarly, at the end of written cycle every student must be able to produce written texts of genre they are learning. For instance, if the genre is narrative, at the end of written cycle every student must be able to write a narrative text or to tell a narrative story. Thus, if there are 40 students in a class, it means that the English teacher would have collected 40 narrative texts. If in one year a class is taught 5 genres by the teacher, she or he will have 200 texts which are kept in the students’ portfolio as the indicators of the successful in teaching writing. In addition, each student at least has produced 5 texts of various genres. It means, a Senior High School student will produce at least 15 texts of 12 type of the texts in three year periods of learning. The 12 type of the texts are: recount, report, discussion, explanation, exposition analytical, exposition hortatory, news item, anecdote, narrative, procedure and descriptive as well as review. If a student has produced about 15 text in 12 types of the text, logically he or she has adequate exercise in writing. It means that, the students will have adequate competence in writing English.
However, it was hard to find students’ collection of texts. From several Senior High Schools which researcher visited, the teachers did not have the texts which were written by their students. The Senior High Schools which researcher visited were : SMA Negeri Minas, SMA Negeri 1 and 3 Tualang, SMA Negeri 1 Siak Sri Indrapura, SMA Negeri Sungai Apit, SMANegeri Lubuk Dalam, SMA Negeri 1 Selat Panjang and SMA Negeri 1 Pekanbaru. From those 8 Senior high schools, only the English teachers of SMA Negeri 1 Pekanbaru showed the collection of their students’ text.
The absence of students’ collection of texts led to the problem of how those teachers assessed, measured and observed their students’ learning progress. As mentioned before, the texts that students produced play important role in measuring and observing students’ learning progress. Those texts can be used as the tools of the measurement and observation.
In addition, there was a tendency among English teachers in Indonesia’s schools to ignore teaching writing. Teachers provided students with less opportunity to practice writing English. In other words, The English teachers in general were more concentrate on teaching the skills such as reading and listening, and language components such as vocabulary and grammar. The main reason for this preference is predicted because writing skill is not evaluated in National examination .
The facts mentioned above had aroused the researcher’s interest to do the research on the implementation of teaching writing using the Genre-Based Approach. In particular, it focused on teachers’ adoption of the new approaches and the problems they encounter during the process.
Statement of the Problem
Based on the background of the problem, the statements of the problem in this study were as follow:
1. How well do English teachers at SMA 10 Pekanbaru understand about the Genre-Based Approach for teaching writing English.?
2. How do English teachers at SMA 10 Pekanbaru teach writing through Genre-Based Approach?
3. What difficulties do English teachers at SMA 10 Pekanbaru face in using Genre-Based Approach for teaching writing?
4. How do English teachers at SMA 10 Pekanbaru overcome the difficulties in teaching writing?
Review of the Related Theories
The elaboration of the related theories of this study begins with the theories of teaching writing to the theories of the Genre-Based Approach for teaching writing. Then, it continues with the comparison of some opinions in the Genre-Based Approach.
1. Teaching Writing
This research is related to teaching writing. Richard (2003: 303) states that from those four language skills to be taught at schools, writing is the most difficult for the teachers and students. The difficulties are in generating and organizing idea as well as in translating these ideas into readable text. This opinion is supported by Raimes (2003: 306) who says that learning and teaching language promote anxiety and there is more anxiety when writing is involved. Furthermore she says that many teachers themselves do not feel comfortable with writing in English even if it is in native language. Because of this Raimes(2003: 303-314) proposes some steps to help teachers to plan teaching writing. The steps are as follow:
a. Planning.
b. Drawing up a Syllabus
c. Selecting Material
d. Preparing activities.
e. Evaluating the teaching.
Furthermore Beare (2007: 2) states that to minimize the difficulties in teaching writing, the exercise of writing is not directly writing paragraph or composing the text. It can be started by writing sentences. Students should be able to construct the sentences, overcome problem with sentence and write connected sentences. After the students have the ability to construct the sentences, the writing exercise is increased by giving experience to the students to write paragraph, the text or the whole text. This activity will have students to become independent writers. The stages of this activity is as follows :
1. Guided writing.
2. Writing different types type.
3. Learning text type.
Beside the exercises and activities mentioned above, Stanley (2007: 1) says that the successful of teaching writing also influenced by the interest of teachers. Teachers should be interested in teaching writing, because their suggestion instead that paying attention to what students say will show an improvement in writing. As an addition he offers three stages in teaching writing, they are :
1. Pre- writing
2. Focusing idea
3. Evaluating, structuring and editing
2. Nature of Genre
The word genre itself comes from The French (originally Latin) word for kind or class. The term genre was first introduced in the area of English as specific purpose (ESP) in 1981, in an ESP journal article by Elaine Tarone and her colleagues on the language of scientific reports (Paltridge, 2001: 2). In addition, Mahwah (2002: 2) explains that genre as means for analyzing text has become a means for better pragmatic and linguistic understanding of texts It also supplies possible pedagogical applications. It devoted to genre pedagogy adds to pedagogical thinking because it stretches notions of what can be done in the reading and writing classroom. Further explanation from Chaldler ( 2005: 2) that term genre is widely used in rhetoric, literary theory, media theory, and more recently linguistics, to refer a distinctive type of the texts.
From the description above a conclusion that can be drawn is that genre has the strong relation with the text. What is text? Texts are made of words. Words are around us. When words are used to make meaning the text is created (Rajan, 2003: v). So the text that we use in this research refers to Encyclopedia Britanica (2008) which says that text is a unit of connected speech or writing , especially composed of more than one sentence, that form a cohesive form.
There are thousands of texts around us. The text can be classified into genre through three characteristics, they are purpose of communication, organization structure and language features. The purpose of communication or social function is the reasons why we speak or write or create the text. Organization structure of the text or generic structure is the text organization or text arrangement. Language features or lexical grammar that is such things as the grammar, vocabulary and connectors that we use.
Further information from Lin (2006: 6) says that genre refers to more specific classes of texts, such as newspaper reports or recipes. Furthermore Partridge (2001: 11) genre describe types of activities such as personal letter, advertisement students essay and the term of text type represent group of text which are similar in linguistic form such as Procedure, anecdote, description. However, the term of genre in this article means type of the text. This term has been widely used in the recent English curriculum in Indonesia. There are twelve genre or types of the texts that should be taught at Senior High School, they are recount, report, discussion, explanation, Exposition analytical, exposition hortatory, news item, anecdote, narrative procedure description and review (Depdiknas, 2004: 37)
3. Genre-Based Approach
To conduct the classroom activity in the process of teaching and learning based on genre, Genre-Based Approach is used. Yan (2005: 2) says that this approach has become popular since the 1980s along with the notion that student writers could benefit from studying different types of written texts. According to Lin (2006: 2) in Genre-Based Approach, teaching and learning focuses on the understanding and production of selected genres of texts. Teaching and learning around text genres has become increasingly influential in main stream ELT in a number of situations, including ”primary, secondary, tertiary, professional and community teaching contexts “ involving native speakers of English as well as ESL and EFL learners”. Furthermore explanation from Gao (2007: 5) says that genre approach shows a powerful response to the deficit of process models.
The rational why Genre-Based Approach developed in Australia was Australian theorist, Halliday. Martin, concern about the exclusivity perpetuated by traditional approaches (Gee, 2005: 1). Furthermore Gee adds that for the Australian theorists above, genre represented a stage or goal-oriented social process: “genres are referred to as social process because members of culture interact with each other to achieve them; as goal oriented, because they have evolved to get things done; as staged because it is usually takes more than one step for participants to achieved their goals”. The other rational for adopting Genre-Based Approach is that, Genre-Based Approach facilitates clear links to the student’ purposes for writing beyond the writing classroom (Lin, 2006: 4).
To teach genres, the proponents of Genre-Based Approach propose the framework of teaching, what they call as Curriculum cycle.
4. Curriculum cycle
In the classroom, the activities of genre approach look like a cycle or wheel, so that it is known as the curriculum cycle, (Gee, 2005; 2). The cycle consists of a number of stages. Each stages has special objectives and activities, such as the cycle described by Martin et. Al. in Chappell (2004: 4-9) is as follows:
1. The field- building activities: that is the aimed at immersing the learners in the context of culture and social purpose of spoken text, their temporal and spatial context, the roles and relationships of the related components, and the role of the language within the activity, as well as medium chosen.
2. The text modelling and a deconstruction of the text. This involves analysis of the rhetorical staging on the spoken text, the lexical and grammatical resources used.
3. The joint production of similar spoken text is carried out by the teachers and learners
4. The independent construction of the text by the learners themselves.
One widely accepted classroom application of teaching English using the Genre-Based Approach is the “teaching and learning cycle” or also referred to as “the curriculum cycle”. This cycle consists of four main stages; they are building knowledge of field, modelling of text, join construction of text and independent construction of text. It aims to provide support for learners as they go through each stage of the cycle. The following elaboration of the teaching and learning cycle is adapted from Paltridge (2001: 31).
- Building knowledge of field
This stage focuses on building up a shared experience and cultural context about the topic of text.
- Modelling of text
This stage focuses on introducing particular genre though a model of text that deals with the field that the students have already explored in the stage of building knowledge of field.
- Joint construction of text
In this stage, teacher and students work together to construct texts that are similar to the text that have already being learnt in the previous stage.
4. Independent construction of text
In this final stage, students are ready to work independently to produce their own text within the choosen genre.
Derewianka, cited in Lin (2006: 7) describes that each lesson unit or cycle has its central focus a chosen text type or genre, and consists of a fixed sequence of stages. The descriptions of the cycle vary in minor ways, but four phases essential for developing control of a genre may be identified, namely:
1. Context Exploration
Cycle begins with context exploration, referring to the possible contexts of situation in which the chosen text- type or genre may be used.
2. Text Exploration based on Model Texts
The aims of this stages are to familiarize the learners with the target text-type or genre, and to draw attention to organizational and linguistic features commonly found in texts belong to it.
3. Joint Construction of a Text
In this stage the model text is exposed, and making use of the knowledge and awareness gained from the exploration of the text.
4. Individual Application
The last stage in the Cycle, individual application, as the name suggests, requires learners to work individually and independently, for example, in the case of writing, to produce individual essays. Ideally, this is carried out only after the students have successfully produced a jointly constructed text or understanding of the text.
Both Martin (cited in Chappel, 2004: 4-9) and Partridge (2001: 31) agree that the teaching and learning activities at the first stage of the curriculum cycle, Building Knowledge of the Field, aimed at immersing students in the context of culture, social purpose of the target text, controlling relevant vocabularies and grammatical pattern. However each of them put different emphasis on their view of the Building Knowledge of the Text stage. According to Derewianka (cited in Lin, 2006: 7), the activities involved at this first stage are functioned as the pre activities such as pre-listening, reading, speaking and writing. He urges that the first step which he calls Context exploration, functioned as actual development, or as the starting point. For Partridge the core idea of all activities at this is the interaction between teacher and class or students and students.
For the second stage, modeling of the text, both Partridge and Derewianka share similar opinion that this stage focuses on introducing the target text through a model of text by exploring the text’s social function, text organization and linguistic features. Martin points out that the activities involve analysis of rhetorical staging on the text, the lexical and grammatical resources used. Derewianka proposes the use communicative activities such as re-assembling of jigsaw text or information gap.
At the third stage, Martin, Partridge and Derewianka agree that teacher and students work together to construct the text of the focused genre. Partridge stresses that in constructing the text, attention should be paid to the schematic structure, linguistic features and knowledge of the field of the text. Derewianka adds that In the case of writing, the texts may go through a few rounds of drafting, editing, and re-drafting. If the objective of teaching to develop speaking, there should be much oral interaction, its nature and intention is different from that of most forms of communicative language teaching. Where the interactive activities in the latter are often designed to simulate real life interaction, directed at providing opportunities for talking in the language, the talk here is about using language, and is focused on a collaborative effort to learn to accomplish a purpose in the language.
At the last stage, referred as Independent Construction (Martin and Partridge) or Individual Application (Derewianka), students work independently and individually to produce the chosen genre. In the other word, at this stage, each student produces the text, as addition, Derewianka stresses, it can be done ideally if the students have successfully produced a jointly constructed text or understanding of the text.
The stages of curriculum cycles explained by Martin, Partridge and Derewinka above present the material of teaching integratedly, therefore there is no explanation in which stages skills reading and listening developed. Because of this reason it is necessary to explain the stages which are suitable to be applied at Senior High School in Indonesia. The stages are implemented in two cycle, spoken cycle and written cycle. Spoken cycle especially to develop listening and speaking, and written cycle to develop reading and writing. The stages of each cycle is as follow:
1. Building Knowledge of the field
2. Modelling of text
3. Joint construction of the text
4. Independent Construction
5. Genre in Developing Writing Skill
The role of Genre in content writing instruction, according to Reppen (2001: 326), should emerge naturally from the material features. Instructions need to provide a scaffolding so that the students can progress toward more academically valued ways of writing , learn content material, and have better chance to experience success in school.
In applying the process of using genre approach in writing, according to Yan (2005: 3), the teacher should be aware of the following three general guidelines. First, because writing is so difficult, the teacher should adopt the role of assistant, guide and work closely with students to encourage them. Teacher should offer helpful feedback and suggestions. Second, teachers should directly train students about the writing strategies. Third, teachers should include the listening, speaking, and reading skills in the writing class. Typically, the teaching procedure for the process genre is divided into the following six steps : (1) preparation, (2) modeling and reinforcing, (3) planning, (4) joint constructing, (5) independent constructing, and (6) revising.
Gao (2007: 7) describes that the practice of writing based on genre includes three stages (1) pre- writing, (2) drafting, (3) revising
The process of developing writing skill in this research followed the guidance of Indonesian National Education Department (2004: 3-23) which adapted the theories mentioned above. It is stated that the process of teaching and learning writing is conducted in written cycle as the follow up of reading.
The steps started with Building Knowledge of the Field, modeling of the text, joint construction of the text and independent construction of the text.
Method of the Research
This research was related to the analysis of teaching writing through Genre-Based Approach. It observed how the teachers performed the process of teaching and learning and what activities the students did in the classroom. It also described the subject naturally as what it was. So that the research was designed as qualitative research, as Gay (2000: 16) describes that qualitative research seeks to probe deeply into the research setting in order to obtain understanding about the way things are, why they are that way and how the participants in the context perceive them.
The finding of the research was presented descriptively. Because of this reason this research was descriptive research. It was parallel to Miles and Hiberman (1985:15) who explain that qualitative data are rich of description and explanation of processes. This statement is supported by Gay explanation that qualitative research rely heavily on verbal description(Gay, 2000:201)
The research was carried out at SMAN. 10 Pekanbaru, with the informants were 4 from 8 English teachers who teach there
The techniques of collecting data in this research considered to the focus and the purposes of the research. In the qualitative research, sample and the source of data should be Emic prospective (Sugiono, 2005: 206-207). It means the point of view of informants are very important. In this case, the points of view of the teachers as the doers or main actors in teaching English through genre.
To gain the data needed for this research the researcher used (1) observation, (2) Interview and (3) Documentation.
Data analysis researcher used was the techniques suggested by Miles and Hiberman, with the steps were as follows :
1. Data collection.
In this steps, the researcher interviewed the informants about their understanding about the concept and their knowledge of Genre-Based Approach and how they applied in the process of teaching and learning. After that the researcher checked the documents of the teacher such as syllabus and lesson plans. In these documents the preparation of teaching and learning, the steps of teaching, were observed especially the process of teaching writing.
The last steps of collecting data was teaching observation. From this activity, the data about the real steps of teaching of the teachers, the materials taught and the process as well as the product of teaching were gained.
2. Data reduction.
Data reduction related to the process of selecting, focusing, simplifying and abstracting as well as transforming the raw data which are gained in the research.
Researcher grouped the data based on the way they were gained. They were classified into three group, they were data from interview, documentation and teaching observation.
3. Display the data.
The second activity of analysis is data display. The data gained are performed and organized that permit conclusion drawing and action taking.
4. Conclusion drawing/Verification
This is the last step of data analysis activities. Sugiono (2005: 99) says that the conclusion in the qualitative research can be in form of description about the object of the research.
Discussion
The discussion of the study are presented based on the techniques of collecting data namely, interview, documentation and teaching observation. The data collection shows about teachers’ understanding of genre based approach, their opinions and the application in the classroom.
1. Teachers’ Understanding of the Genre-Based Approach
The data about Teachers’ understanding of Genre-Based Approach was gained only through interview because it explored the understanding of informants about Genre-Based Approach. It discussed three aspect of Genre-Based Approach such as how they conceptualize the theory and their opinion about the Genre-Based Approach for teaching writing.
a. Conceptualization of Genre Based Theory
The data gained indicates that the participant conceptualize the theory of the genre based in relation to the secondary school English language curriculum requirement. The curriculum requires teachers to teach 12 type of text to senior high school students, identifies text type, their generic structures, the purpose of text, and the social function. This conceptualization can be seen as a concept of the Genre-Based Approach in Indonesian context, particularly the secondary school English language teaching context.
The data also indicate the important of students’ ability in understanding different types of texts as the outcomes of teaching and learning language through the Genre-Based Approach. It also suggests that the major aim of teaching English in senior high school using the 12 type of texts is to understand the texts by understanding the purpose of the text, generic structure and the language features. This concept was parallel to Lin (2006: 2) who said that in Genre-Based Approach, teaching and learning focuses on the understanding and production of selected genres of texts.
b. Opinion about Genre-Based Approach
The findings indicate that these teachers have positive attitudes towards the Genre-Based Approach for teaching English. In their teachings practice, the Genre-Based Approach has provided positive outputs for students in understanding and producing a particular text type. In addition, these positive attitudes are beneficial for the teachers themselves in terms of motivating them to keep using the approach in their teaching practice.
2. Application of the Curriculum Cycle
The data about the Application of curriculum cycle were gained through three resources namely interview, documentation and teaching observation. The application discussed four stages of curriculum cycles, they are building knowledge of the field, modelling of the text, joint construction, and independent construction.
a. Building knowledge of the Field
What was reported by the participants through interview suggests that majority teachers agreed that the first phase of the curriculum cycle, the building knowledge of the field, is a preparation phase. A stage for preparing student to the next phase by introducing the topic and related material of the targeted text by using students experience and prior knowledge. In this matter, the participants share similar views with those who work in genre pedagogy such as Martin cited in Chappel (2004: 4-9), Derewianka cited in Lin (2006: 7) and Paltridge (2001: 31).
From the data of interview and documentation which consist of syllabus and lesson plan, the conclusion can be drawn that the data from interview and lesson plans the participants have followed the theory of Genre-Based Approach as Martin in Chappel (2004: 4), Derewianka in Lin ( 2006: 7) and Paltridge (2001: 31).
b. Modeling of the Text
Data related to the aim of modelling phase support the notion that this phase is aiming at familiarizing the learners with the target text-type or genre, and to draw attention to organizational and linguistic features commonly found in text belong to it (Derewianka, Cited in Lin, 2006: 8).
In conclusion, the participants had not reached all aims of modeling stage in their practice teaching in the class based on the data gained from interview on the other hand the data from documentation showed the difference one.
c. Joint Construction of the Text
The data show that there are different opinions about the aim of the Joint construction phase. The different opinions among these teachers suggest a lack of understanding about the theoretical concept of joint construction of text which influences the application of this phase in the classroom. Two participants view joint construction of text purely only as a phase of reconstructing a model text. This opinion differs from the theory proposed by Hammond (cited in Kim, 2007: 7), theoretically this phase refers to the stage when students carry out exercise to write the text with the assist of the teachers. There is the interaction between teachers and students. It also involves reading, research and disseminating information.
Data from syllabus and lesson plan almost the same with the data from interview above. Participant focused the activities of joint construction only to construct the model text of focused genre.
Teaching observation has shown the different data about the activities on joint construction of the text. Three of the four informants showed that joint construction of text was the follow up of reading comprehension. Form the teaching observation data, it can be concluded that most of informants have understood the function of joint construction and use appropriate teaching activities for supporting the function.
d. Independent Construction of the Text
What was reported by the participants through interview indicates that in independent construction of text, students are regarded capable to work on their own. It is assumed that the students have understood and had all the necessary knowledge about the texts that they are going to write. In addition, this also suggests that each student is assumed capable of working on a particular genre completely on his/her own, free from teacher and peer students’ help and intervention (Paltridge, 2001: 31). By doing this, it provides teachers with students’ products for the sake of assessment. In other word, teachers can assess individual student’s learning progress and achievement from the text that they wrote.
This practice of individually writing text by students in the independent construction of the text is in accordance to concept of independent construction of the text proposed by Martin Cited in Chappel (2004: 9), Paltridge (2001:31) and Derewianka cited in Lin (2006: 9) that at this phase, students work independently and individually to produce the chosen genre.
Then, the data related to the activities done in this phase shows that majority of the teachers asked the students to present their individual writing in the class in the next meeting. This practice is quite difficult to be done in most Indonesia’s classrooms regarding the big number of the class and the time available for asking each student to present his or her work.
Finally, the teachers’ preference to have their students to write at home and present the result of the writing orally in front of the class can be said as a product oriented. The teachers put more concern on how good is the products that students can produce rather than on the process how the students can produce a good product. According to Badger and White (2000: 154), this is called a product-based approach to writing. It is an approach that sees writing as mainly concerned with knowledge about the structure of language, and writing development as mainly the result of the imitation of input, in the form of texts provided by the teacher.
Data from all the participants’ teaching observation support this indication. There were less attention paid to the development of the writing itself, for example the process of collecting related information, drafting, editing and revising the writing. Another interesting issue arises from the comparison of data from interview, syllabus, lesson plan and teaching observation. It shows that data from syllabus and lesson plan are often conflicted with the data from interview and teaching observation. From the teaching observation, it is found that all of the teachers taught without following their lesson planning. Teachers’ difficulties in Teaching Writing through Genre Based-Approach
What was reported by the participants suggests that most difficulties that they encounter when teaching writing through the Genre-Based Approach lay heavily on students’ English language mastery such as vocabulary and grammar. In other words, the only factor that contributes to the obstacle of the application of the Genre-Based Approach in the classroom come from students.
4. Teachers’ strategies to Overcome the Difficulties
What was reported by the participants concerning their strategies to overcome the difficulties related to students’ limited vocabulary mastery suggest that vocabularies development is still become the priority for the classroom activities. It also suggests that more time allocation have been spent for vocabularies activities in the classroom.
Conclusions and Suggestions
Based on the findings, the following conclusions and suggestions made:
1. Conclusions
a. There is a limited understanding about the concept of the genre based approach among these teachers. They only see this approach as teaching English using twelve different types of texts. However, the participants considered this approach quite effective for developing students’ vocabulary, grammar and ability to write a particular text. There are positive attitudes towards this approach among the teachers’ who participated in this study.
b. In the practice the genre based approach for teaching writing, particularly in the application of the curriculum cycle, these teachers tend to use several modelling activities in joint construction phase for ease of students’ initial writing process. The research has also found that there is a significant shift in the focus of teaching writing using the Genre-Based Approach and the other writing methods or approach previously used. The findings show that these teachers have began to move from focusing on teaching grammar and vocabulary to understanding text as a whole beyond the sentence level. However, it is also found that the practice teaching of writing is still a product based approach which is concerned on the final output of the learning process.
c. Regarding difficulties in the application of this approach, it found that the problems lay heavily on students’ English language mastery. Students’ limited vocabulary mastery is the major obstacle in the application of this approach to EFL learners. It also found teachers’ difficulties in translating the theoretical concept of each phase of the cycle into effective classroom activities.
d. Concerning the way to overcome students’ limited vocabulary mastery, the findings show that paying more time and attention for vocabulary building as the common solution that these teacher used. However, since the teachers do not realize their own limited understanding and practice using the genre based approach for teaching writing, therefore, there were no suggested solutions for them regarding this problem.
2. Suggestions
This research has revealed some perspectives and experiences of a small group of Senior high school English teachers concerning their teaching practice using the genre- based approach for teaching English writing skill. Due to the scope of the issue and the limitations of the study, the results are not able to represent the generalized condition for all teachers in Riau province. This study only looks at the experience of four teachers. In my experience as a teacher trainer, these experiences are quite common. However, further studies would need to be conducted with different groups of participants so that generalizations can be made.
Finally, this study has indicated that the curriculum changes in the Indonesian educational system for the teaching of English place a lot of stress and need for learning on teachers. Therefore, planning for this learning is critical for the success of the new program and the intended improvement in students’ learning. The planning should involve sequence of stages from training need assessments to designing appropriate training program based on the result of the training need assessment.
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