THE USE OF DICTOGLOSS TECHNIQUE IN IMPROVING STUDENTS WRITING ABILITY

ARRANGED BY: GROUP 4

SYAHRUL RAMADANA (A1D2 08065) FANDI ARDIANSYAH (A1D2 08007) ANUGRAH PUSPITA AYU (A1D2 08013) NUZUL HIJRAH SAFITRI (A1D2 08017)

ENGLISH STUDY PROGRAM TEACHER TRAINING AND EDUCATIONAL FACULTY HALUOLEO UNIVERSITY KENDARI 2011

A. INTRODUCTION Writing is one of English skills that should be mastered by senior high school students. By mastering writing skill, students not only able communicate directly (oral form) but also indirectly (written form). They can share information easily with people from the other country. In writing, the students should deliver ideas or messages to the reader clearly in order to avoid misinterpretation. Jacob (1981:60) states that a writer is required to use his/her knowledge to deal with content, organization, vocabulary, language use, and mechanic. In other word, the elements that should be paid attention to produce good writing as a product such as vocabulary, grammar, organization, spelling, and punctuation. Grabe and Kaplan (1996:304) state that intermediate levels students are generally expected to master the basic skills for composing simple messages and the mechanic of writing. Because of that, the teachers in teaching writing skill not only teach how to develop ideas but also how to produce English written grammatically and systematically. Unfortunately, most teachers cannot be able to teach writing effectively. They still implement conventional way where the students are instructed to write a passage and submit it, without giving any guidelines how to write well during the process of writing. Due to these facts, the students cannot produce effective writing. Related to the students difficulties in mastering writing skill, Mukminatien (1991:12) states that students merely get difficulties in writing not only caused by the students themselves but also inappropriate teaching language technique. Consequently, students have less motivation to learn. In fact, writing is a complex skill to be learned and taught so that it is usually neglected in language learning. Dealing with the above explanation, these problems will be solved by applying Dictogloss technique in order to improve students writing ability. Besides, it can give benefits for English teaching and learning process in school. Grabe and Kaplan (1996:306) suggest that one of ways to prepare students for writing and to give opportunities for generating many relevant ideas is cooperative learning or group work.

B. CONTENT Some points that will be discussed in this part as follows: a. Dictogloss (DG) Technique Originally, Dictogloss which is called grammar dictation or dictocomp, are not well-known but it seems to have been developed in Australia. Wajnryb (1990) argues that Dictogloss is a task - based procedure that encourages students to reflect on their own output. Basically, Dictogloss is a task that motivates students to interact cooperatively in small groups in order to construct linguistically acceptable text similar in content and style to one they have listened and taken notes. The text which is constructed in working together not exact replicas of the original text but another reconstructed version. Moreover, Dictogloss is a task that helping students in using their grammatical competence to reconstruct a text and become aware of their shortcomings and needs. Therefore, Dictogloss is a new an excellent way of practicing grammar and vocabulary as learners work on a combination of meaning and form, which makes grammar learning more purpose and meaningful. Dictogloss is one of techniques in cooperative learning method which introduced by Ruth Wajnryb. This technique has some procedures which can solve the problems in learning writing. Moreover, cooperative learning is a method in which students work together in sharing ideas and responsible for helping each other to achieve learning goals and to enhance self confidence. Furthermore, if the students try to share their knowledge and try to use the experience of their teammates, they will gain more. When the students are writing individually, they do not have motivation to use their competence. Vasiljevic (2010:47) states that Dictogloss technique is a teaching procedure that involves topical warm-up, explicit vocabulary instruction and possibly grammar correction with a new type of meaning-based listening activity and cooperative learning. In detail, the teacher introduces unfamiliar words to students firstly to avoid misunderstanding. Next, students are dictated a short text by the teacher and they take notes during the reading of text. Then, the students work in small group proceed to piece together the text as a cooperative endeavor by pooling of the groups notes and they reconstruct the text specifically about word choice, sentence formation, and cross-

sentence connections. Finally, after each group has produced its own version of the text, it will be analyzed and corrected. Brown (2001: 11) points out that Dictogloss have been the subject of a number of studies and commentaries which have supported and developed the use of this technique for the most part. Some rationale reasons to advocate Dictogloss namely the students are encouraged to focus their attention on form and all four languages skills are integrated listening (to the teachers dictation or played recording), speaking (discussing with team mate during reconstruction), reading (notes taking during dictation, the groups reconstruction and original text) and writing (reconstruct another version). Dealing with writing activities in Dictogloss technique, which students are required to take notes or keywords during dictation, arrange their ideas grammatically in the reconstruction, avoid or clarify grammatical and lexical pitfalls, improve writing style, do revising and editing, are believed to encourage the students in improving their writing skill. According to Kowal and Swains study (1994) shows that Dictogloss encourages students to move from the semantic processing dominant in comprehension to the grammatical processing needed for production Therefore, Dictogloss technique seems is an interesting way to be applied in increasing students writing ability. b. Advantages and Disadvantages of Dictogloss (DG) Technique a) Advantages
1.

Dictogloss technique is an effective way that combines individual and group activities. Students listen and take notes individually and then work together to reconstruct the texts. Students are actively involved in the learning process and there are multiple opportunities for peer learning and peer teaching.

2.

Dictogloss procedure also promotes learners autonomy. Students are expected to help each other in recreating the text. The analysis and correction stage enables the students to see where they have done well and they need to be improved. Students gain insights into their linguistic shortcomings and also develop strategies for solving the problems they have encountered.

3.

The reconstruction stage in Dictogloss helps students try out their hypotheses and subsequently to identify their strengths and weaknesses. A reconstruction task encourages students to consider the input more closely.

4.

Dictogloss directs students to focus on form and meaning in terms of writing activity. Brown (2001) states that Dictogloss combines focus on meaning and focus on form. Moreover, Swain (1999) states that students must be engaged in the act of meaning-making when they focus on form. In this case, during the reconstruction stage, students are required not only using their grammatical competence but also developing ideas to produce another version.

5. Dictogloss enables students to develop their thinking skills. The discussion in

reconstructing the text provides the learners a chance to use their thinking skills as they challenge, defend, learn from and elaborate on the ideas presented during collaboration on the reconstructed task. b) Disadvantages
1. Dictogloss is taking over, it means that in conducting Dictogloss technique that

played in group, some students will have an opportunity for taking over or dominate the group. 2. Group arguing is also one of negative effects of Dictogloss due to the groups sometimes spending their time for arguing, not studying. 3. It cannot be argued that teachers will get difficulties to assess individual learning when the students learn in group.
4. Uncontrolled class will happen because group can be noisy and difficult to be

controlled especially for the class that has a large number of students.
c. Teaching Writing Under Dictogloss (DG) Technique

Teaching procedures of Dictogloss Technique as follows: There are some procedures that will be conducted when we apply Dictogloss technique in teaching writing skill (Vasiljevic, 2010: 3) as follows:
1. Teachers do some preparation before dictation section that divided into two

ways are as follows:

a.

Introducing about the topic of writing text in dictation that the

students are going to hear that namely Topical Warm Up in order to give students background knowledge about the spoof text or funny story that is going to be listened by giving them some questions related to the topic.

b.

Giving explanation about some vocabularies that occur in the

upcoming spoof text that is going to be dictated as the key words to know the general idea of the text named Vocabulary Preparation
2.

Teacher plays the recording to the students the first time and forbid them

to take a note or write anything. The students just listen it carefully in order to get the general idea of the story.
3.

Teacher plays the recording to the students for the second time and allows Teacher plays the recording to the students for the third time to give Teacher divides all of students in group of four or three depending on the Teacher asks students to discuss what they have heard and attempt to

them to take some notes about the text that is going to be listened. 4.
5.

chance for the students to check their notes. total number of students in the class.
6.

produce a coherent text which is close in content and organization to the original version.
7.

Teacher monitors the students activity during reconstruction in order to

observe the nature of group interaction to ensure that all students participate and the more advanced students do not dominate the group. They should encourage silent students and adjust the timing if it is necessary.
8.

Teacher display the original text by using an overhead projector or to Teacher asks students to do the analysis and correction step as the last step

distribute a copy of original text for each group after doing reconstruction.
9.

in Dictogloss technique. In this step, teacher can ask each group to submit their reconstructions.
10. Teacher gives feedback about the students writing.

C. CONCLUSION Based on the above explanation, we can conclude that Dictogloss (DG) technique is an effective way to teach writing. It is because Dictogloss (DG) technique is a new excellent way of practicing grammar and vocabulary as learners work on a combination of meaning and form, which makes grammar learning more purpose and meaningful. Besides, if the students mastery of vocabulary and grammar, they will compose writing texts better.