ROUNDTABLE TECHNIQUE AND STUDENTS’ WRITING ABILITY

: In spite of its importance, writing seems always be a challenging skill for students to master in learning English. Persuading the teachers to persistently try different teaching techniques to reach the goal of teaching better writing is a must. Using roundtable technique become one of the choices. As this experimental study has proven that using roundtable technique give significant effect on the students’ writing ability. Toward the 42 students taken as the sample of the research, it is proved that there was significant difference on the students’ writing ability before (M=54.48, SD=13.155) and after being taught by using roundtable technique (M=73.9, SD=7.569), t(20)=13.55, P<0.0005. The results of independent sample t-test also shows that there is significant difference in writing ability between the students taught by using roundtable technique (M=73.9, SD=7.569) and those who were not (M=64.86, SD= 15.32), t(29)=2.426, P<0.05


INTRODUCTION
Writing is an essential skill to master in learning a language. Sadiku (2015) emphasizes that in language classroom writing is a skill that needs to put into attention. According to Sadiku someone who is always successful at expressing his self must have a good writing skills since writing is the evidence of the intellectual level.
Thus, the students should master writing as one of the important skills as it is a communicative act of sharing information, thoughts or ideas to the readers (Hellen & Hafizh, 2014;Ernidawati & Sutopo, 2017).
However, some studies still report that there are still problems in the students' writing ability especially in Indonesia. The result of PISA 2016 showed that out of 72 countries included in the study, Indonesia ranked 65 in terms of literacy achievement. It can be assumed that Indonesian people has low literacy culture.
In accordance with the fact, the preliminary research conducted in one of private Islamic Junior High Schools in Jambi, MTs An-Nizam, It is found that the students writing proficiency is considered low. According to the teachers, there were only 60% of the students reached a standard score for English. If they could not be categorized good in overall achievement in English let alone their achievement in writing. It is also found that the teaching technique applied during the teaching and learning process did not consider the students' need. Some students could not sit quietly and talked to their friends about their writing assignments. As a matter of fact, it is recommended for the teacher to select more interesting technique to be applied in the class room to make the students become confident in learning writing and improve their ability.
Some research studies have proved that using roundtable technique brings positive effect on the students' achievement. Su'aidah (2014) through her study showed that the implementation of roundtable technique help the students to become confident in the learning process. The students who were in different level of achievement can work together and help each other during the learning process. Setiyaningsih (2015) also showed through her research study that applied roundtable technique for teaching descriptive text that during the learning process the students could share the ideas before their start writing. This help them a lot that they can improve their achievement. In addition, Sinaga (2017) mentioned that the students who were taught by using roundtable technique could be more active in the writing class than those who were not taught by using roundtable technique.
The results could also be seen through their writing score.

Operational Definitions
There are some terms that are needed to be defined operationally

Roundtable Technique:
In this study, roundtable technique refers to one kind of cooperative learning in teaching writing.
During the implementation of the technique, the students were required to work in group of four to brainstorm the ideas for their writing. They form the roundtable or sit in circle. Then the teacher asked several questions related to the topic of writing. The students then would pass around a sheet of paper to answer the questions.
Each of the member of the group add his/ her contribution. This is how the students work together as a team and the teacher made sure that all of the students became active participants.

Writing ability:
The terms writing ability refers to the students' results of writing narrative text. The students' writing results were collected by using writing rubric. Since this study is limited only to enhance the students' narrative writing achievement, the rubric adopted from McGraw-Hill (2007), which focused on assessing students' narrative text, was used. The aspects such as focus/organization, elaboration/support/style, and grammar, usage and mechanics were scored in the rubric.

Population and Sample
The population of the study were the eighth grade students of MTs An-Nizham Jambi.
The samples were selected on the basis of convenience sampling. There were 42 students whom were assigned to either experimental (21 students) and or control group (21 students).

Research Procedures
The

Technique to Collect the Data
In order to collect the data of the students' writing ability, the researchers used writing test as the instrument. The researchers made sure that the writing test was valid by checking the curriculum used in the school. In this study, the researchers also applied inter-rater reliability to check the reliability of the data gained from the instrument used. There were two raters judged the data. Before the raters score the actual research data, the researchers conducted try out to non-sample students and asked the rater to score the results of the try-out to find out their consistency in their scoring. The results of statistical analysis of interrater reliability by using Person Product Moment showed that the reliability is high (r=0.824, n=25). It means there was high consistency in the way both of the raters score the students' writing.

FINDINGS
In this study, the researchers used writing score criteria adopted from Hyland (2003) to categorized the results of the students' writing.

The Students' Score Distribution in Experimental Class
The researchers found that the results of students' writing improved after being taught by using roundtable technique. Based on the data obtained, the highest score in the pre-test was 83 which categorized very well and it was gained only by one student. There were two students (9.5%) reached the scores in the range 71-80 and were categorized good. There were also two students (9.5%) who were categorized average (61-70). The category fair (51-60) was gained by 6 students (28.7%). Eight students (38%) were also categorized poor (41-50). There were also the students who reached the score 31, less than 40 (9.5%) which can be categorized inadequate.   The statistical results of paired sample ttest also showed the same positive results.

Control Class
The results found in control group showed that there were differences on the students' writing score before and after the intervention. and two students (9.5%) who could be categorized poor (41-50).
Although it seems like the results show progress in the students' achievement, the progress is rather small. The percentage of the sample who gained >80 increased by 10%, but the total number of the students who gained the score less than 40 in the posttest were still the same as the total number of the students in pretest. There were three students (14.3%) were categorized inadequate with the lowest score 32.

Groups
To make sure the significant effect of the used of roundtable technique in teaching writing, it is important to compare the results of the posttest between the two groups, experimental and control group.  (29)    The results of Independent sample ttest proved that there is significant also shows that there is significant difference in writing ability between the students taught by using roundtable technique (M=73.9, SD=7.569) and those who were not (M=64.86, SD= 15.32), t(29)=2.426, P<0.05.

Interpretation
The research findings have already confirmed the answer to the problems formulation.
First, it is confirmed that there is significant improvement on the students' writing ability after being taught by using roundtable technique.
Secondly it also verified that there is significant difference in writing ability between the students taught by using roundtable technique and those who were not. In fact, the results are due to some reasons.
For one thing, since roundtable technique belongs to cooperative learning method, it helps the students to learn from each other. It helps the students to brainstorm the idea before they start writing their draft. Getting ideas to write is one of the obstacles that most students afraid of when they start writing. Therefore by using the technique, the students are stimulated to share their ideas. Lou (2005) argued that roundtable technique is useful for brainstorming, writing and reviewing concepts and vocabulary learned. Thus, the students can start writing the text easily because they can ask their friends to brainstorm the ideas. The idea is also in accordance with what Barkley, at al. (2005). As Bakery stated that the benefit using roundtable technique is students were able to build upon each other's contributions.
It can encourages the students to adjust their writing (in areas such as content, conventions, style, and vocabulary) as they respond and react to the comment of the writers that proceed them.
Furthermore, during the implementation of the roundtable technique, the researchers found the students' seriousness during the teaching and learning process, their enthusiasm in doing the tasks and their active participation. In another words, it was found that there was positive attitude toward learning. The writing activities became more interesting because in writing narrative text the students wrote the text in group. As Barkley, Cross and Major (2005) stated that roundtable technique is a technique where the students take turn responding to a prompt by writing one or two words or phrases before passing the paper along to other. It in fact can lead the students to be more active and responsible in their group, so each member of the group has responsibility for the instruction given.
Another thing to consider is the significant difference of the mean score between the students taught by using roundtable technique and those who were not. Compared to control class that did not receive any special intervention during the writing class, those in experimental class experienced learning activities which provided them the opportunity to share, ideas, express opinion and create written text quickly and efficiently (Alberta, 2008

CONCLUSIONS
Based on the results of the study, it can be concluded that Roundtable technique is effective to be used to improve students' writing especially in writing narrative text since there is significant improvement on the students writing ability after being taught by using roundtable technique. Its effectiveness is also proven by the results of independent sample t-test that showed significant difference on writing ability between the students taught by using Roundtable Technique and those who were not. Indeed, the results confirmed that the students' better performance is due to the facts that the students were provided with the opportunity to engage in the teaching and learning process willingly. As a matter of fact, they felt less pressure, but high responsibility toward certain activities to be accomplished in teaching and learning process.
In addition, the researchers would like to offer several suggestion for the reader of this study as well as the future research study.
Firstly, with the benefits of roundtable technique in improving the students' performance, it is recommended for the teachers to use roundtable technique in the teaching and learning English classroom especially in teaching writing. During the process of teaching and learning writing by using roundtable technique, the teacher needs to consider the students' difficulty in writing so it will help the process of learning runs smoothly.
Besides for the future researcher, the same experiment with larger population and higher level of Students in English mastery would be necessary to conform the findings of this current study. The future researcher is also recommended to investigate the implementation of Roundtable technique in relation to other language skills and components such as reading, grammar, or vocabulary. Other aspects or types of writing would also be necessary to include as the variable of the study.