CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHODS

This study aimed in inquiring whether there is any difference on students’

English writing achievement between those taught by clustering technique and

traditional technique. This chapter presents the method used to collect data of the

study. in detail, it consists of the research design of study, the research variable, the

place and time of study, the instrument of research, the data collection technique, the

data analysis technique, and the research hypothesis.

A. Research Design of Study

The researcher of the study acts as the participant and analyzes the data

taken from the teacher of MTs Raudlatul Ulum.

This study was held in experimental study in order to test the hypothesis,

exactly to find the effectiveness of clustering used. Therefore, to answer the

research problem as written in the first chapter, true experimental design was used

in this study.

In this study, two classes of the eighth grade in MTs Raudlatul Ullum

were involved as the experimental and control group. Both classes were tested by

pre-test and post-test. In the pre-test, all the eighth grades were given pre-test in

order to find similar ability of students in the sample of this study. C class and D

class were chosen as the sample of the study. Post-test was given after treatment

20
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to experimental group. But, before pretest and posttest were administered, try out

was given to another class who was not included in the sample in order get

appropriate test items that E class. The process of the study can be presented as in

the table below.

Table 3.1

The Process of Experimental Research

Posttest
Group Pretest Treatment

C Y1 X Y2
Y2
D Y1 -

Where

C : the experimental group

D : the control group

Y1 : the pretest administered before treatment

X : the independent variable or the treatment (using clustering).

Y2 : the posttest administered after the treatment

The steps of the experiment were as the following. First, two classes were

taken as sample of this study, one being the control group and another being the

experimental group. Then both classes were given a pretest. After that, the

treatments were conducted to experimental group where the students were taught
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by using clustering technique while the control group was taught as usual without

using clustering technique. In this study, the treatments were done twice by the

teacher. And the last was administering a posttest to both groups in the end of the

treatment.

Besides, the test items were given to both classes was “Someone or

something special in your life” as the theme of English writing descriptive text.

The materials of writing text which presented in this study adopted from the

selected English textbook.

B. Research Variables

Variable is the object of the study which determined by the researchers.1

There are two variables in this study: the independent and the dependent

variables. According to Ary, independent variable is variable that affects to the

other variables.2 For this research, the use of clustering technique is the

independent variable. Meanwhile, dependent variable of this study is students’

writing English descriptive text. As stated by Ary, the dependent variable is the

variable that is affected by independent variable.3

C. The Place and Time of The Study

The research was conducted at MTs. Raudlatul Ulum which is located on

Jl. Sumber Kembar Langkap Besuki - Situbondo. The research was carried out

1
Donald Ary, Introduction to Research Education, (New York: Philadelphia press. A, 1998), 30
2
Ibid, 31.
3
Ibid.
 23

from July 13th up to 30th, 2011 for four meeting, consisting of giving pre-test,

presenting materials and giving post-test in the last meeting.

There are some reasons as to why this school was chosen in conducting

the research. This school pioneered to help rural and primitive students who

obligated to reach their aim. Therefore, the English teacher needs creative

techniques especially teaching English writing.

D. The Instruments of The Research

The use of the instrument of the research should be made as appropriate as

possible in order to get correct data. To gain an effective English teaching writing

by using clustering technique, this research used experiment research that consists

both experimental and control classes as the subjects. For the instrument, this

study used test those pre-test and post-test to both classes to collect the data.4

1. Test

To answer the problem, a test was administered to experimental and

control group while the score relates to teacher’s criteria of writing score that

includes content, organization, vocabulary, and grammar. Both the application

of test and the scoring of students’ achievement in writing English descriptive

text were administered by the teacher of MTs Raudlatul Ulum. The tests are

used to know the students’ achievement after implementing clustering

technique. Besides, there were some steps in the process of the research.

4
Louis Cohen, [Link], Research Methods in Education, (USA: Routledge, 2007), 275.
 24

a. Try-out

In this study, try out was a test for the instrument of the research.

It was held before the instrument applied. Furthermore, the purpose of try

out is to find out the reliable instrument to be experimented in the

research. In line with that try out was given to outside sample of the

research with the same level of grade. Meanwhile, VIII E was chosen as

sample of try out which consists of 30 students.

b. Pretest

In this research, the pretest was used to find the students’ English

writing ability in descriptive text. It was conducted to all eight grades

selecting the same or similar mean of students’ English writing ability in

each class. According to selecting test or pretest, C and D class were

chosen as the sample of the research.

c. Posttest

Afterward, the posttest was conducted to measure the effect of

clustering technique used after the application of treatment in

experimental group. The use of posttest also determines whether the test

was effective or not by comparing the achievement of posttest scores in

both classes those experimental and control.

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2. Validity

According to Creswell, validity means that the individual’s score from

an instrument makes sense, are meaningful, and enable the researcher to draw

a good conclusion from the sample of the population that is studied.5 Because

this study deals with writing activity, the content validity is the only type

which is used. A test has content validity when the sample of items represents

some appropriate universe content.

To gain the content validity of writing test, this research developed the

test based on standard curriculum of Indonesia. According to English standard

competence, the eighth graders are supposed to be able to produce a short and

simple essay by using the written words accurately, fluently and acceptable to

communicate in the form of descriptive and procedure text.6 Thus, the English

writing test of descriptive text used in this study was related to standard

curriculum. In this test, the students of both experimental and control group

were asked to compose a descriptive text about “Someone or something

special in your life”. Thus the topic chosen was appropriate to the test the

eighth grades’ writing ability of descriptive text. Besides, the English teacher

of the eighth grade was also asked to judge the content validity of the test.

Finally, the test can be said as a valid one after the English teacher agreed that

the test represented the curriculum.

5
John W. Creswell, Educational Research (Planning, Conducting, and Evaluating Quantitative and
Qualitative Research, Third Edition, (New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc., 2008),169
6
BNSP, Standar Isi Standar Kompetensi Lulusan Mata Pelajaran Bahasa Inggris Sekolah Menengah
Atas, Madrasah Aliyah, dan Sekolah Menengah Kejuruan, (Jakarta: DEPDIKNAS, 2006), 17
 26

3. Reliability

Reliability referred to the consistency of test score from one

measurement to another. Creswell defines that reliability means that scores

from an instrument are stable and consistent.7 In this study, this research used

the formula below to measure the reliability of the test.8

Where:

N : the number of subjects

Xi : pretest score of try out

Yi : posttest score of try out

The criteria to interpret the result based on Brown.9

Scale Level of Reliability

0.00-0.20 Not reliable

0.20-0.40 Less reliable

0.40-0.60 Reliable enough

0.60-0.80 Reliable

0.80-1.00 Very reliable

7
John W. Creswell, Educational Research (Planning, Conducting, and Evaluating Quantitative and
Qualitative Research, Third Edition, (New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc., 2008),169
8
Prof. Dr. Sugiono, Statistika Untuk Penelitian, (Bandung: Alfabeta, 2007), 357.
9
Onik Zakiyah, The Use Of Numbered Head Together (NTH) Technique to Improve Students Reading
Narative Text Ability, (Unpublished S-1 Thesis. Surabaya: English Departement, IAIN Sunan Ampel,
2009), 37.
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From the calculation of reliability of try-out test (see chapter 4) this

research got 58.959 as the result. According to the table above that shows the

criteria for reliability of test item, it was proved that the test was reliable.

E. Data Collection Technique

The data of the study were the scores of the students’ descriptive writing.

These scores were collected through pretest and posttest in order to know the

differences between both experimental and control classes that taught using

different way of teaching. These were the steps of conducting the study.

1. Preparing the instrument of the study. Here, the instrument was in the form of

writing test of English descriptive text which was administered as pre-test and

post-test. Before the instrument was administered for the pretest, it was tried

out in the same school but different class from the classes that were taken as

the sample of the study. The try out itself was done to class VIII E on July

13th, 2011.

2. Taking population and sample. The population in this study was the eighth

grades of MTs Raudlatul Ulum. From this population, there were two classes

taken as the sample of the study through pretest.

3. For the sample of the study, pretest was given to all eighth grades before

deciding experimental and control group. The VIII C and VIII D class were

taken as the sample of the study. Due to similar mean score of students’

English writing ability and held on July 19th, 2011.

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4. After administering the pretest and finding two classes which have similar

mean scores, treatment was given to experimental class.

First meeting, the teacher explained descriptive text and the generic structure.

It was done on July 21st, 2011.

Second meeting, the teacher gave feedback of descriptive text and introduced

clustering technique used, to get better composition. It was done on July 26th,

2011.

5. Then administering posttest to both classes, experimental and control group. It

was held on July 28th, 2011.

F. Data Analysis Technique

To find out the difference of the students’ writing achievement, a

comparative technique was used. The comparative technique is an analysis

technique to evaluate hypothesis concerning the differences between two

variables that are examined statistically. In the comparative technique, the

variables are compared to know whether or not the differences are significant.

The t-test was used to find out the difference of the students’ English writing

achievement in experimental and control group. Next, the students’ score in

pretest and posttest were calculated by using t-test formula.10

To analyze the data, t-test was used under the following steps.

10
Anas Sudijono, Pengantar Statistik Pendidikan, (Jakarta: PT Raja Grafindo Persada, 2006) p.314
 29

1. The first step was to calculate the mean of pre-test and post-test scores in

each group. The formula below is used.

Where:

M xi : the mean of the values

∑x : the sum of rater

N : the number of students

2. Then, the standard deviation formula was used for the scores of pre-test

and post-test of both groups. The standard was calculated using this

formula.

Where:

SDDi : mean

∑D2 : the sum of the d scores

N : the number of the students

3. To test the result of posttest between experimental and control group, the

following formula was used:

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Where:

M D1 : Mean of difference of Experiment Class

M D2 : Mean of difference of Controlled Class

SEM D1 : Standard Error of Experiment Class

SEM D 2 : Standard Error of Controlled Class

T : t – test

4. After all data were calculated, the number of degree of freedom was

calculated by using following formula.

Where:

df : degree of freedom

N1 : Number of individual in experimental group

N2 : Number of individual in control group

Finally, it was found t value from both of the experimental and control

class. Then, it was checked with critical value of t table at 0.05 level of significance
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of t test. The null hypothesis was accepted and the alternative hypothesis was

rejected when t value is higher than t table. On the other hand, the null hypothesis

was rejected and the alternative hypothesis was accepted when t value was higher

than t table.

G. Research Hypothesis

1. If to > tt, it means that Null Hypothesis (Ho) is rejected and Alternative

Hypothesis (Ha) is accepted. Thus, there is positive significant difference

between the teaching writing using clustering and without using clustering.

2. If to < tt, it means that Null Hypothesis (Ho) is accepted and Alternative

Hypothesis (Ha) is rejected. Thus, there is no positive significant difference

between the teaching writing using clustering and without using clustering.