Republic of the Philippines

PANGASINAN STATE UNIVERSITY

Sta. Maria Campus
Sta. Maria Pangasinan

Research Title:
The Impact of Student Vocabulary on Writing Narrative Text for Third Year College
Students of Pangasinan State University Sta. Maria Campus

Researchers:
Leader: Rodel C. Andres
Members: Glydel Mae P. Riola
Dhaniella Grace Serios
Jeza D. Cabalitasan
Mary Rose Felicitas

Subject: EL110 – Language Education Research

Instructor: Prof. Marlon L. Perado, MALT
 CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION

Learning English is crucial since it has become an international language that is spoken by almost
every community on the planet. English is spoken as a second language in many nations. Despite the
challenges of learning English, it is worthwhile to do so because it is used in practically every aspect of
life: communication, trade, economy, politics, education, science, and technology. English is not
considered a second language in Indonesia, but it is a foreign language. English is also called the target
language that has to be taught teach in schools in today's Indonesian curriculum. Therefore, the student is
hoped to increase their ability in English. In recent years, English as a foreign language has been learned
by Indonesian learners since they were in Elementary School. At the elementary school, English is taught
as a local content subject.

We regularly connect through written communication, which reinforces grammatical structures,

idioms, and vocabulary. Writing instruction is a unique method of reinforcing learning. Writing is a type
of education in and of itself, and the writing processes and rhetorical environment in which it occurs are
critical. So, it is evident that writing is an essential language reinforcing skill and a crucial ability because
it becomes a means of learning, discovering, developing, and refining language ability. Through writing,
the students become involved with the new language, trying to express their ideas and use eyes, hands,
brain constantly as a unique way to reinforce learning.

Studying language means learning vocabulary. This means that vocabulary is an essential element
in a language. A language can have meaning because of its vocabulary. An extensive vocabulary will help
express ideas more clearly without using much repetition of words. According to Akhadiah (2012: 95),
mastery of vocabulary can be distinguished based on two angles, namely quantitative and qualitative
angles. The use of quantitative vocabulary means the scope of vocabulary mastered by someone from a
language, while mastering vocabulary qualitatively means understanding the meaning of vocabulary
mastered by someone.

Kridalasakna (2003: 75) defines vocabulary as a component of language that demands all
information about the meaning and usage of words and the richness of words that a speaker or writer of a
language has. Meanwhile, Fries (2009: 31) says that vocabulary is an essential aspect of learning a
language. Therefore, students who master much vocabulary will be more comfortable to master a
language than other students who do not have much vocabulary.

Besides, with a lot of vocabulary, a person can speak English better. Therefore, students must
have much vocabulary to make it easier for them to learn a foreign language. The same opinion was
expressed by Tarigan (2005: 2), that the quality of one's language ability depends on the quantity and
quality of their vocabulary. The richer the vocabulary a person has, the greater the likelihood of being
skilled in the language.

From some of the previous definitions, it can be deduced that vocabulary is the smallest linguistic
unit with a free nature, that it may be spoken, that it has an understanding, and that it is a wealth of words
that someone needs to comprehend the reading. Vocabulary is critical in communicating. The vocabulary
chosen or utilized shows a person's ability. The higher the level of ability, the larger or varied the
vocabulary. Various vocabulary tests can be used to determine someone's vocabulary. A vocabulary test
measures a student's ability to use vocabulary in both receptive and productive languages. The vocabulary
test must evaluate the pupils' ability to use their words. The selection of materials or vocabulary to be
tested, as well as the forms and methods of testing, must then be considered.
According to Nurgiyantoro (2001: 213), factors that need to be considered in choosing the
material to be tested are 1) vocabulary test materials; who pay attention to (a) the level and type of school;
(b) the level of difficulty of vocabulary, (c) passive and active vocabulary, and (d) general, unique
vocabulary, and expressions; 2) The vocabulary test levels used by using Bloom's taxonomy in the
vocabulary test include vocabulary tests: (a) the memory level, (b) the level of understanding, (c) the level
of application, and (d) the level of analysis.

The explanation implies that mastery of vocabulary is the ability to actively understand and use
vocabulary by enriching students' vocabulary to be the teacher's goal in language learning. Tarigan
explained that to improve the quantity and quality of students' vocabulary, this meant: 1) improving the
lives of students; 2) improve the level of mental abilities of students; 3) improve the level of the
conceptual development of students; 4) sharpen the students' critical thinking processes; and 5)
broadening the horizons of students' lives, so teachers must utilize various word development techniques
in the process of teaching and learning vocabulary. (Tarigan, 2005: 23).

According to Hiebert and Kamil (2005) vocabulary is the knowledge of meanings of words.
Mastering vocabulary is very important for students who learn English as a foreign language. That is
why everybody who learns English as a certain language has to know the words. The mastery of
vocabulary can support them in speaking when they communicate with people. They can also write to
people effectively and do translation when they have good knowledge of vocabulary. If they do not know
the meaning of words, they will not be able to speak, write, and translate anything in English. The
students can be said to gain progress in learning English if they know about vocabulary. Referring to the
previous paragraph, it seems that vocabulary has very significant role in mastering a language.
Widdowson (1978) stated that native speakers can better understand ungrammatical utterances with
accurate vocabulary than utterances with accurate grammar but inaccurate vocabulary. Thus, vocabulary
is one of the important things in learning English especially in speaking and writing skills. Therefore, the
English teachers should be able to apply certain way or strategy to enrich their students’ vocabularies. In
this study, researcher intends to investigate the language learning Strategies used by teachers of English
as a foreign language, aiming to find out the effectiveness of using narrative texts in learning vocabulary
of English at the seven grade students of MTs.Az-Zuhriyah Tanjung Teros, in Academic Year
2016/2017.
 According to Olshtain in Celce (2001:207), writing as a communicative activity needs to be
encouraged and nurtured during the language learner’s course of study. This opinion is strengthened by
Raimes who gave the reasons for teaching writing: “We frequently have to communicate with each other
in writing” and “Writing reinforces grammatical structures, idioms, and vocabulary.” Based on the
primary of observations, the researcher got information’s about the students in class XI B at MA
MualliminMuhammadiyah Makassar still have problems in writing a good text in English. The students’
score in writing are still low. Only some students get good score. The problem may be caused by some
aspects: The first is rare opportunity to use English because the status of English as a foreign language,
not as main daily communication. The second is the students do not have enough practice in writing text.
So, the students may make mistake like, determining the main idea, using the suitable word, and
arranging the sentences. Therefore, the students need to master the structure of the English language,
should have enough vocabulary, and also know the spelling of the words in order to be able to write
correct sentences and arrange them into a good communicative activity needs to be encouraged and
nurtured during the language learner’s course of study. This opinion is strengthened by Raimes who gave
the reasons for teaching writing: “We frequently have to communicate with each other in writing” and
“Writing reinforces grammatical structures, idioms, and vocabulary.” Based on the primary of
observations, the researcher got information’s about the students in class XI B at MA
MualliminMuhammadiyah Makassar still have problems in writing a good text in English. The students’
score in writing are still low. Only some students get good score. The problem may be caused by some
aspects: The first is rare opportunity to use English because the status of English as a foreign language,
not as main daily communication. The second is the students do not have enough practice in writing text.
So, the students may make mistake like, determining the main idea, using the suitable word, and
arranging the sentences. Therefore, the students need to master the structure of the English language,
should have enough vocabulary, and also know the spelling of the words in order to be able to write
correct sentences and arrange them into a good paragraph.

According to Oxford English Dictionary (1991:461), vocabulary is defined as “total number of

words in a language, words known to a person, list of words, their meaning especially at the back of a
book used for teaching a foreign Language.” Vocabulary is a total number or list of words, and then it
can be arranged into broader forms, such as phrase, clause, or sentence. Those arrangements form ideas
that can be understood by others. Furthermore, Richards (2002:255) stated that: “Vocabulary is a core
component of language proficiency and provides much of the basis of how well learners speak, listen,
read and write. Without an extensive vocabulary and strategies for acquiring new vocabulary, learners
often achieve less than their potential and may discourage from making use of language opportunities
around them.” vocabulary, as people may know, is just a word but actually vocabulary not just build
from a word but also from another word that convey one meaning.

Jo Ann Aeborsold and Mary Lee Field (1997) also classified vocabulary into topic-specific or
content-specific vocabulary. Topic-specific or content-specific vocabulary is the words that appear
frequently in a particular text because they are related to the topic of the text. For example, in a text of
the topic of ice cream, the words flavor, texture, cone, toppings and carton might appear frequently. So,
we can call those words as topic-specific or content-specific vocabulary. Moreover, Burton (1992:100)
says there are two kinds of vocabulary used by people for their communication, namely; general
vocabulary and special vocabulary. The general vocabulary is the words used in general; there is no limit
of fields or users, general in meaning and use. The special vocabulary is used in certain field, job,
profession, or special science. For example: politicians, journalist, and lawyer. All these have specialized
vocabulary arising from particular circumstances of their lives and works.

Writing is also important in academic settings. Progress in school depends on developing an

adequate degree of writing proficiency and fluency (Scardamalia & Bereiter, 1983). Writing is the
primary medium by which teachers evaluate students’ performance. It also provides a flexible tool for
assessing students’ knowledge and academic competence in class and on high-stakes educational
assessments (Christenson, Thurlow, Ysseldyke, & McVicar, 1989; Graham & Harris, 1988). For some
children, writing even represents an alternative medium for expressing thoughts and ideas that they might
be unable or unwilling to express in a different way (Polloway & Smith, 1982). Persistent writing
problems, therefore, make it difficult for students to reach their educational, occupational, and personal
potential (Graham, 2006). Finally, writing is considered a fundamental means for passing the social
aspects of a culture from one generation to the next (Rohr, 1994). Lindemann (1995) indicated that
human beings are social animals who use language (and its form of written language) to make sense of
the world, and to remember and organize their lives. He also claimed that many financial, legal, or other
transactions require writing, and thus in our society, putting it in writing has a greater force than
speaking. The importance of writing is also illustrated by Gelb (1952) who suggested that written
language is necessary for a civilization to exist.

Writing is a method of representing language in readable form. Olson (2020) stated that
writing is a form of human communication by means of a set of visible marks that are related, by
convention, to some particular structural level of language. In addition, Nordquist (2019) also stated that
writing is a system of graphic symbols that can be used to convey meaning and the act of composing a
text. People can inform, educate, and entertain themselves by writing. By reading the written word, you
can explain or describe your thoughts and ideas. Writing can help students improve their learning
process. By reading a written subject can provide students with useful information. Assist them in
improving their language skills.

Unfortunately, writing is generally difficult task for students. This phenomenon might occur
because students consider writing is difficult, do not know how and what to write, feel less of
vocabulary, afraid of giving criticism, and sometimes lose their mind of topic in composing the paper,
many careless errors, poorly planned papers and reports, difficult to develop and organize ideas, frequent
capitalization, punctuation, and grammar errors, and mental fatigue or tiredness while writing.

There are many types of text that can be used in writing forms such as narrative, procedure,
recount, description, news item, report, explanation, analytical exposition, spoof, hortatory exposition,
discussion, and review. The researcher uses narrative text to see the impact of students’ vocabulary in
writing because narrative text is a story of human experience, describe an action in the past, or telling a
story based from real world or imaginary. So that, the students will easily to compose sentences which
shows the use of the vocabulary of the students in writing what they imagined or experienced. According
to Erasmus+, a narrative text entertains, instructs or informs readers by telling a story. Narrative texts
deal with imaginary or real world and can be fictional (fairy tales, novels, science fiction, horror or
adventure stories, fables, myths, legends, etc.) and non-fictional (articles, newspaper reports, historical
writings).

For most students, writing is the most difficult skill in English. It differs from
learning other skills in that writing is a thought process. As a result, it can aid in people’s
comprehension. “Writing is an important aspect of language learning because it provides a very
good way of foxing the vocabulary, spelling, and sentence pattern,” Pattel and Jain (2001)
stated. There are also significant differences, according to Nunan (2001). Writing, unlike
speech, is temporally displaced because it allows for message delivery from one location to
another.

Linse (2005), on the other hand, mentioned that writing is a process and a product.
Narrative is one of several writing genres. The telling of a true or fictitious event or connected
sequence of events is referred to as narrative. Because the narration is writing about the
progression of events in the past, the simple past tense is used in narrative writing. According to
Sattayatham and Ratanapinyowong (2008), majority students have understood the content in the
text and what they were assigned to answer, but they struggled with the paragraph writing
format. They produced an opinionated article that missed an opening, a main topic, and
transitional words. Likewise, the text was unorganized and incomprehensible.

Moreover, they concentrated more on expressing their ideas and neglected the
finish. According to Andrew (2014), the writing process is the most effective way to reduce the
number of errors made by students. The advantage of this method is that it provides students to
organize their own writing by allowing them to think as they write; that is, educators transfer
their texts to the readers in printed form via the complex writing stage of pre, drafting, revising,
editing, and publishing. They keep on going to revise their writing throughout the process,
focusing instinctively on mistakes in word order, grammatical structures, terminology,
definition, grammatical errors, and word usage. Second, while producing different aspects of
academic prose-writing, they are acquired grammar during the revising stage or in the context of
peer assessment and collaborative learning, such as narrating a story to a group of students.
According to Herlinawati (2011), teachers should clearly explain irregular verbs to students
when writing narrative text. The teachers should then be creative in their teaching of narrative
text because there are some rules to follow when writing narrative text.

According to Knapp and Watkins (2005), narrative is primarily concerned with

entertaining a reading audience. It also serves an important social function aside from being a
medium for entertainment. According to Mcintyre (2006), narrative is essentially a story about
happenings or events, real or imagined, that the narrator finds interesting or significant.
 On the other hand, a narrative text is a type of text whose main purpose is to
entertain, tell a story, or provide an aesthetic literary experience. According to Rebecca
(2003:3), a narrative text is a text that relates a series of logically and chronologically related
events that are caused or experienced by factors. Because it describes past events, this statement
teaches us how to use simple past tense in narrative writing. Examples of narrative text include a
biography, folk tale, fiction, short story, and so on. Narration is a text that tells a story with
complications or problems and attempts to solve them. A narrative text’s aim is usually to
impress the viewers or audiences.

So according to Pardiyono (2007), narrative text is not the narrative itself but
instead the trying to tell of the story, which is why it is mostly used in turns of phrase such as
printed storyline, verbal storyline, and so on. Narrative text is a text that precisely informs the
tasks or happenings, and demonstrates a few controversial encounter and response implies to
entertain often times meant to give moral lesson to the reader. Text writing is a difficult process
because it necessitates mastery of grammar, vocabulary, and general text structure. Students
must, however, study writing text because it is written in the curriculum.

One of the text types that students should be familiar with is narrative. According to
Hastuti, narrative text is a story that is used to inform, entertain, motivate, or teach readers. It
means that narrative is a text that tells about a story or a past event from beginning to end and
serves some purpose for the readers. It means that a narrative is a story that is intended to
entertain and inform the audience, particularly the readers or listeners. According to Pardiyono,
a narrative text is a story text that contains a climax followed by a resolution at the end of the
story. The story may be fictional, such as a legend or fable, or non-fictional, such as a true story.
It means that a narrative is a text story with a plot, climax, and resolution at the end. The plot is
made up of both fictional and nonfictional elements. According to the characterizations,
narrative text is a narrative meant to amuse and entertain the audience the viewers, and the
content of the story includes a climax and resolution at the end. The narrative text then tells the
story of fictional and nonfictional characters.

Narratives, according to Montgomery (2007: 251), are stories about a series of

connected events. A narrative’s events are linked together in a variety of ways. The most
obvious is when one event triggers another. Such causal connections connect one event to
another and serve to unite the narrative while also allowing it to reach moral conclusions about
the consequences of actions. He goes on to say that a narrative’s content is a collection of
represented events, as well as the participants in those events and the circumstances surrounding
those events.

“A narrative text is an imaginative story to entertain people,” writes Wardiman

(2008:93). Susilohadi (2008: 9) goes on to discuss that narrative texts start with a layout, which
depicts the scenario and incorporates the people involved. The complication then informs the
readers of the ensuing crisis. Finally, the resolution informs readers that, for better or worse, the
crisis has been resolved. According to Hartono (2003: 6), “the purpose of Narrative text is to
entertain the reader with the story.” The narrative text has language features such as using the
simple past tense, past perfect, past continuous, past perfect continuous, and past future
continuous, according to Hartono (2003: 7).