Students’ Acquisition of Negative Constructions in the ...

Students’ Acquisition of Negative Constructions in the

Present Tense

THESIS

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment

Of the Requirement for Degree of

Sarjana Pendidikan

Garnis Dwi Sulistyowati 112009068

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE

SATYA WACANA CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY

SALATIGA

2013

Students’ Acquisition of Negative Constructions in the

Present Tense

THESIS

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment

of the Requirements for the Degree of

Sarjana Pendidikan

Garnis Dwi Sulistyowati

112009068

Approved by:

Prof. Dr. Gusti Astika, M.A Martha Nandari, M.A

Supervisor Examiner

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Students’ Acquisition of Negative Constructions in the Present Tense

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Students’ Acquisition of Negative Constructions in the Present Tense


Abstract

This study aimed to describe the students’ writing problems of negative constructions in the

Present Tense. This study was conducted in a rural school, SMP Negeri 2 Tuntang. The

research participants were thirty four students in that school. The data were collected using a

test. The students changed ten positive statements into negative statements in the Present

Tense. This study found three common writing problems of negative constructions in the

Present Tense. They were morphological error, syntactic error, and mechanical error.

Keywords: Negative Constructions, Students’ Perception, Morphological Errors,

Syntactic Errors, Mechanical Errors

Introduction

Background of the Study

Writing skill becomes an important skill in which students should be proficient at.

Becoming a proficient writer is one of the students’ major objectives. They should be able to

write fluently and correctly, besides being able to speak and read in English. For EFL

(English as Foreign Language) students, writing helps students to learn English. There are

three advantages of learning writing. First, writing reinforces the grammatical structures and

vocabularies. Second, students will also have a chance to be adventurous with the language,

which means they can go beyond what they have just learned to say because sometimes

students cannot speak what they want to express. So, writing is an answer to express their

ideas. Third, when they write, they become involved with the new language.

According to Sokolik (2003), in writing, physical and mental activities are working

together to create and develop sentences to make them clear to readers. Raimes (1983:6) also

explained that the close relationship between writing and thinking makes writing a valuable

part of any language course. She identified the different components for producing a clear,

fluent and effective piece of writing: content, the writer’s process, audience, purpose, word

choice, organization, mechanics, grammar and syntax. It can conclude that writing is not easy

and more difficult than speaking (Norrish 1983:63). Writing is complex because it tests a

person’s ability to use a language and the ability to express ideas. As a result, a person needs

to write not only coherently but correctly as well. Based on the description above, this study

is aimed to answer students’ writing problems in writing negative construction in the Present

Tense.

Literature Review

Theories of Grammar

Grammar is used as a mean to analyze language system, and the study of grammar is

not just considered as an essential feature of language learning, but is thought to be sufficient

for learners to actually acquire another language (Rutherford, 1988). Harmer (2003) cited in

Nunan (2005) affirmed that grammar is the way in which the words change themselves and

group together to make sentences.

Grammar can be a frightening thing for EFL students if they don’t master it. In my

view, the native speaker of English has learnt how words behave in a sentence as well as

what they mean, but it is different for people who learn English as a Foreign Language. EFL

students have to learn grammar before they express their ideas in the written or spoken form.

They should think about what a certain tense they should use in forming a sentence and

which one is the appropriate word choice they should use to make an understandable

sentence.

Some language educators have argued that foreign languages are best learned

deductively where the students are asked to memorize and recite definition, rules, examples,

and exceptions. In the deductive approach, the teacher presents the grammar rules and then

gives students exercises in which they apply the rules. As Thornbury (2000) pointed out that

the advantages of deductive approach in teaching grammar is straight to the point and can be

time-saving. Many rules can be more quickly explained than elicited, thereby allowing more

time for practice and application.

Students’ perception about writing

Students’ perception when they write is complicated. They feel confused when they

write their ideas. They have a lot of ideas, but they cannot express it in English. It occurs

because they do not know which tenses they should use and how to arrange some words. The

word “tense” of course has strong correlation with grammar. Rea-Dickins (1991) stated that

the goal of grammar worksheet is to provide an opportunity for the test-taker to create his or

her own message and to produce grammatical responses as appropriate to a given context.

Bachman and Conde (1998) also supported that providing grammar exercises in a test is to

measure grammatical development in classroom.

This study was based on Ferris’ theory. Ferris (2002) said that there are four common

EFL students’ writing errors: morphological errors, syntactic errors, lexical errors, and

mechanical errors. Based on the framework from Ferris (2002), this study aimed to answer

the following question, what are the students’ writing problems of negative construction in

the Present Tense? The purpose of this study was to identify students’ writing problems in

writing negative construction of the Present Tense. I had great curiosity to know about what

the students’ writing problems in writing negative construction of the Present Tense were. It

could be grammatical, syntactic, or mechanical errors.

There were two aspects of significance of this study. The first one is for teachers.

Teachers could apply the result of the study to increase students’ achievement in teaching and

learning of Present Tense. If they knew common errors done by students, they could know

which part the students are usually confused at. They could repeat and repeat the explanation

until the students were able to write negative constructions in the Present Tense correctly

without errors.

The second one is for the students. This research could increase their awareness

toward English structure. They could realize in which part they need to improve their writing.

The result of this study might suggest other questions for further research about students’

writing problems in the Present Tense.

The Study

In this study, the participants should write negative sentences in the Present Tense.

They were given the positive sentences first, and then they changed them into negative

sentences. Students often made grammatical errors. For example, given a positive

construction such as Jasmine sweeps the floor every morning, their negative construction

might be Jasmine do not sweeps the floor every morning. From that example, it could be seen

that they were still confused on how to arrange the words with the correct structure or

grammar, especially on how to use do or does based on the subject. They thought that writing

activity was the most difficult exercise in learning English. That’s why they were reluctant to

write in English. If they never tried to write, they would never be a good writer.

Method of the Study

This study was a descriptive research because it described the students’ writing

problem of negative constructions in the Present Tense. The setting of the study was junior

high schools located in Tuntang, Kab. Semarang, Central Java. I used a test which consisted

of ten questions in order to change the positive construction into negative construction in the

Present Tense.

Participants of the Study

The participants in this study were a class of thirty four students which are mixed

between male and female. They were students in the seventh grade of Junior High School in a

rural area, SMP N 2 Tuntang. I used purposive sampling in selecting participants. Before I

conducted this study, I had taught there during my teaching practicum program. So, I knew

about the characteristics of the participants. All of the students at that school learned English

as beginner. They learned English when they entered in the first year of Junior High School.

Thus, in introducing Present Tense for them was a challenging experience because it was a

new thing for them. I had to teach them first all of Present Tense’s types before I gave them a

test because they were not have been taught it before.

Research Instruments

The instrument used in this study was a test. The purpose of the test was to identify

students’ difficulties in making negative constructions in the Present Tense. The test had ten

positive sentences and the students were required to change the positive sentences into

negative sentences in the Present Tense. I gave the test only once while conducting the

research.

Data Collection Procedure

The data for the study were from the participants’ test results in making negative

sentences in the Present Tense. I made the schedule to meet with the participants for

collecting data. It was not easy to arrange time with the students because they had to follow

their lesson materials from the school’s handbook. Then, I asked the teacher to give me two

hours of her teaching time. The students spent around 30 minutes to do the test that consisted

of ten questions. Before I distributed the test, I reviewed the description of present tense. I

explained the description about the present tense; what it was and when it should be used.

Then, I taught them positive sentences first and made some examples. After that, I continued

with the negative sentence. At this stage, I emphasized the use of don’t, doesn’t, and to be

followed by not. Next, I taught them the interrogative form.

As has been discussed above, the aimed of this study was to identify the students’

writing problems in writing negative constructions of the Present Tense. I gave them a test on

negative constructions of the Present Tense. There were ten statements of positive sentences

that should be changed into negative sentences. After I collected their work, I analyzed the

errors in their work, i.e the negative sentences in the Present Tense.

Finding and Discussion

This section discusses the students’ acquisition of negative constructions in the

Present Tense. The analysis was based on the framework proposed by Ferris (2002) who

categorizes errors in writing into four groups:

Grammatical errors which involve tense, form, subject-verb agreement,

article/determiners, and noun ending (plural)

Syntactic errors which consist of sentence structure, run-on, and fragments

Lexical errors which include word choice, word form, idiom error, pronoun error,

and informal usage

Mechanical errors which involve punctuation and spelling.

In the analysis, I only discussed three types of writing errors found in the data:

grammatical errors, syntactic errors, and mechanical errors. The three categories of errors are

presented in Figure 1 below

Figure 1. Overall errors made by students in writing in the Present Tense

Figure 1 shows that the overall errors made by students in writing of negative

constructions in the Present Tense. This type of error contained several sub-types of errors.

The error in form was the highest, eighty three cases. Then, errors in placement of the

negative construction after determiners; seventeen cases, fifteen cases for subject-verb

agreement errors, eleven mistakes for noun endings in plural form, and then there were eight

errors for articles.

The second type of error was syntactic. There were five errors in sentence structures.

And the last was mechanical errors which was the lowest in occurance. It had only two errors

83

17 15 11 8 5 20

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

Form Determiner Subject-verb agreement

Noun ending (plural)

Article Sentence structure

Spelling

Grammatical error Syntactic error

Mechanical error

Total

in spelling. Based on the figure above, the highest number of errors made by the students was

morphological. It showed that the students’ acquisition in well-form writing was still low.

Morphological Error

Morphological errors are portrayed from those resulted from the misapplication of the

morphological rules in the formation of words. According to Akande (2005), morphological

errors are due to the learners’ misunderstanding about the meaning and morphological rules.

This type of error may include such errors as omission of plurals on nouns, lack of subject-

verb agreement, the subject-verb agreement, verb tense or form, article or other determiner

incorrect, omitted, or unnecessary.

Form error

The first type of morphological error found in this study was form error. It could be

tenses and the form or word placed in a sentence. In the section below are ten tables in

describing the errors in forms. Tables 1 to 10 show the form errors that the students made in

their test.

Table 1. Errors in statement 1: I live in the small town of Central Java

Type of Error Sub-type of

error

Example Percentage

Morphological

error

Form I live don’t in the small town of

Central Java

9,375 %

I live in the don’t small town of

Central Java

21,875 %

I live in the doesn’t small town of

Central Java

3,125 %

I live don’t live in the small town of

Central Java

3,125 %

I don’t in the small town of Central

Java

3,125 %

The first statement in the test was I live in the small town of Central Java. The

participants should change that statement into negative construction of the Present Tense. The

correct answer was I don’t live in the small town of Central Java. In the test, they made

mistakes as displayed in the table above.

As can be seen in the Table 1, the highest percentage (21,875%) of form error was I

live in the don’t small town of Central Java. The word don’t should be placed after the

subject “I”. The correct form of that sentence should be I don’t live in the small town of

Central Java.

Then, the second highest (9,375%) was I live don’t in the small town of Central

Java.The students made errors in placing the negative word. As stated above that negative

word should be placed after subject. And the rest of students’ errors based on Table 1 were

the misplacement of doesn’t as written in the third row. In the fourth row the students put two

same verbs in a sentence. The statement was I live don’t live in the small town of Central

Java. And the last was the students did not write a verb in a sentence. So, that sentence did

not have meaning.

Table 2. Errors in statement 2: Jasmine sweeps the floor every morning

Type of error Sub-type of

error

Example Percentage

Morphological error Form Jasmine doesn’t sweeps the

floor every morning

21,875 %

Jasmine sweeps doesn’t the

floor every morning

3,125 %

Take a look at the first row, there had been written Jasmine doesn’t sweeps the floor

every morning. The students often made errors dealing with placement of verb. It reached

21,875% of students who did this error. They should write sweep only because there was

doesn’t there. And as displayed in the second row 3,125% the students made same mistakes,

but the different was they put it oppositely. The correct sentence was Jasmine doesn’t sweep

the floor every morning.

Table 3. Errors in statement 3: My brother plays basketball every Sunday and Friday

Type of error Sub-type of error Example Percentage

Morphological error Form My brother doesn’t plays

basketball every Sunday

and Friday

40,625 %

This statement had one case of form error with the percentage of 40,625%. It was like

the previous table that shows students’ writing error dealing with the verb position doesn’t.

When I asked them whether they have understood they said that they understood. However,

when they did the test, this problem still occured. If a negative sentence has the auxiliary

doesn’t, the verb does not need to be added with + -es/-s. The correct answer of that

statement was My brother doesn’t play basketball every Sunday and Friday.

Table 4. Errors in statement 4: My father works in the police office


Morphological error Form My father doesn’t works

in the police office

25 %

My father doesn’t in the

police office

3,125 %

The table above had two cases. First, the problems with placement of negative word

and verb reached 25%. Second, missing verb in the sentence as displayed in the second row

with the percentage 3,125%. After the word doesn’t, the students did not put any verb. A

sentence is not a sentence if it doesn’t have at least subject and verb.

Table 5. Errors in statement 5: They go to the Safari Park on Saturday


Morphological error Form They go to don’t the

Safari Park on Saturday

9,375 %

They go to the doesn’t


3,125 %

They go to the Safari

don’t park on Saturday

3,125 %

They go to the don’t


6,25 %

They go to the doesn’t


3,125 %

In table 5, it could be seen that there were five examples of form errors in statement

five. The highest percentage was 9,375% was in the first row. This error was made because

the students were not aware how to put the word don’t or doesn’t after the subject. Actually,

those errors above had similar form error, either the students didn’t put don’t or doesn’t or

they were not aware who the subject was. If the subject was single, they should write doesn’t

after the subject. Generally, the students’ error here were dealing with how to put negative

word in a sentence.

Table 6. Errors in statement 6: She is a beautiful girl in my school


Morphological error Form She is a doesn’t beautiful

girl in my school

3,125 %

This type of error had a small percentage; 3,125%. The example error above was the

students put the word is and doesn’t together in the same sentence. It was incorrect, so they

should only write isn’t after the subject. From this case it could be seen that the students’

understanding was still low. This kind of statement was simple because the students just need

to write not after to be.

Table 7. Errors in statement 7: We are students in the SMP Tunas Harapan


Morphological error Form We are don’t students in

the SMP Tunas Harapan

3,125 %

We are students in the

not SMP Tunas Harapan

3,125 %

Table 7 above had two examples of form error. The first was similar with the previous

explanation in Table 6. The second was about misplacement of verb ini the sentence with the

percentage of 3,125%. The students should put not after the to be are.

Table 8. Errors in statement 8: He is the smartest boy in my class


Morphological error Form He is the doesn’t smartest

boy in my class

3,125 %

He is don’t the smartest

boy in my class

3,125 %

He is the not smartest boy

in my class

6,25 %

He is the smartest boy

not in my class

3,125 %

The first and second form errors were similar with the previous errors in Table 6 and

7. From Table 8 above, it could be seen that the highest percentage of the error 6,25% in the

third row. The students did not pay attention to the rules of the negative structure with

superlative adjective. The forth row was similar with the third row. The difference was in the

forth example where the students wrote the word not after the superlative degree, not after the

determiner.

Table 9. Errors in statement 9: My rooms are big and clean


Morphological error Form My rooms are not are big

and clean

3,125 %

My not room are big and

clean

12,5 %

My rooms not are big and

clean

21,875 %

My rooms doesn’t are big

and clean

3,125 %

My don’t rooms are big

and clean

3,125 %

My not rooms are big and

clean

6,25 %

Table 9 shows that there were several form errors made by the students in to-be form

of negative construction in the Present Tense. Based on the highest percentage (21,875%) the

students’ writing problems was on how to place the word are not after the subject. They

wrote not are, it should be are not. Another example was My not room are big and clean.

The appropriate answer should My rooms are not big and clean. In this case, the participants

should put the word not after to be, not after the subject.

Table 10. Errors in statement 10: Ir. Soekarno is the first president in Indonesia


Morphological error Form Ir. Soekarno is the

doesn’t first president in

Indonesia

3,125 %

Ir. Soekarno is the first

don’t president in

Indonesia

3,125 %

Ir. Soekarno is the not

first president in Indonesia

9,375 %

Ir. Soekarno not is the

first president in Indonesia

3,125 %

Ir. Soekarno is the first

not president in Indonesia

3,125 %

Ir. Soekarno not the first

president in Indonesia

3,125 %

Table 10 above also portrayed some form errors in the students’ test. The highest

percentage was 9,375% showed in the third row. The students made mistakes about

placement of negative sign. The correct statement was Ir. Soekarno is not the first president

in indonesia. The first row and the rest showed error as much as 3,125%. The students still

made mistakes in putting words is and doesn’t or don’t together in one sentence. The other

errors made by the students based on Table 10 was about understanding sign of negative

word not.

Determiner

A determiner is a grammatical element that appears with a noun phrase as a

complement. According to Martha and Robert (1998) pointed out that determiners signal

nouns in a variety of ways that may identify the noun as specific or general quantify it

specifically or refer to quantity in general. This kind of error was about the usage of term the

before a noun phrase. Determiner had three functions, there were:

To show a certain word is finite or infinite in explaining an object

To indicate that there is only one thing or object

To explain a certain word that had been explained before

For example, the word The Safari Park has a clear perception that the writer’s mean was only

Safari Park, not another.

Table 11. Students’ errors of the placement of negative signs after determiners

Statement Negative construction (errors) Percentage

I live in the small town of Central

Java

I live in the don’t small town of Central

Java

21,875 %

I live in the doesn’t small town of

Central Java

3,125 %

They go to the Safari Park on

Saturday

They go to the doesn’t Safari Park on

Saturday

3,125 %

They go to the don’t Safari Park on

Saturday

6,25 %

We are students in the SMP

Tunas Harapan

We are students in the not SMP Tunas

Harapan

3,125 %

He is the smartest boy in my class He is the doesn’t smartest boy in my

class

3,125 %

Ir. Soekarno is the first president

in Indonesia

Ir. Soekarno is the doesn’t first


3,125 %

Ir. Soekarno is the not first president in

Indonesia

9,375 %

Table 11 above showed that students still made mistakes in their test. The number of

determiner error was higher than subject-verb agreement. The highest percentage based on

Table 11 was 21,875% in the first row. Students wrote I live in the don’t small town of

Central Java. They should put the before the noun and not negative sign don’t.

The rest of the data from Table 11 were also about students’ errors in putting the

before negative sign not, doesn’t, and don’t. It can be concluded that students’ errors was

about the placement of negative signs after determiners.

Subject-verb agreement

This sub-type of error was about the subject that fits with the verb. From their test it

was found that students’ errors were dealing with subject and verb agreement. They didn’t

know how to differentiate when they should use verb+ -s/-es if they have put the word do and

does.

Table 12. Subject-Verb Agreement Errors


I live in the small town of Central

Java

I doesn’t live in the small town of

Central Java

3,125 %

Jasmine sweeps the floor every

morning

Jasmine don’t sweeps the floor every

morning

15,625 %

My brother plays basketball every

Sunday and Friday

My brother don’t plays basketball

every Sunday and Friday

9,375 %

My brother don’t play basketball every 3,125 %

Sunday and Friday

My father works in the police

office

My father don’t works in the police

office

15,625 %

My father don’t work in the police

office

6,25 %


Saturday

They doesn’t go to the Safari Park on

Saturday

3,125 %

Table 12 illustrated that the number of students’ error in subject-verb agreement was

also on big three of students’ writing problems. Take an example from the second row

(15,625%) stated that Jasmine don’t sweeps the floor every morning. The students as test-

takers wrote don’t whereas they should wrote doesn’t. And they also put the word sweeps.

Those were double mistakes for that statement. Their perception was if they use the word

doesn’t, they don’t need to add –s/-es in the verb. It was true, but they also thought

oppositely. If they used don’t, they should add –s/-es. They have to be aware of combining

don’t and doesn’t with verb + -s/-es.

And also they did not notice what the subject was. They needed to differentiate

whether the subject was singular or plural. From Table 12, it could be seen that most of the

students made mistakes in choosing the word don’t and doesn’t.

Article

The articles a and the are usually regarded as reflecting a contrastive

indefinite/definite article system (Garton, 1983). The function of an article is to modify,

especially non-specific nouns. Articles a and an indicate a singular count noun.

Table 13. Article Errors


She is a beautiful girl in my school She is a not beautiful girl in my school 25 %

Table 13 displayed the students’ error in placing article in a sentence. It could be seen

that 25% of the students needed to learn more about the usage of an article. This case would

be similar with the determiner before in Table 11. As an example above, She is a not

beautiful girl in my school. This case happened because the students did not understand the

function of a in that sentence. The article a should be put after negative sign not.

Noun endings (plural)

This type of error indicated how students added noun ending (-s) in the plural form.

From the data collection, there were some examples of such errors.

Table 14. Plural Form Errors


We are students in the SMP Tunas

Harapan

We are not student in the SMP Tunas

Harapan

21,875 %

My rooms are big and clean My not room are big and clean 12,5 %

Table 14 showed two examples of students’ errors of a writing negative sentence in

the Present tense. From the first row it could be seen that 21,875% of students made errors in

writing a noun in the plural form. The example was We are not student in the SMP Tunas

Harapan. The correct sentence was We are not students in the SMP Tunas Harapan. They

should add (-s) in the word students because the subject was we.

The second case reached 12,5%. The statement was My not room are big and clean.

In this case, the word room should be substituted with rooms. This was because there was to

be are after the noun. The table above proved that students still have problem in dealing with

plural noun form.

Syntactic error

Structure

Syntax is system of rules that cover the formation of words (Thornburry, 2005).

Syntactic error was the rules breaking of the phrase structure rules and violate the formation

of grammatically correct sentences. This error could be exemplified as word order,

ungrammatical sentence constructions resulting from faulty use of verbs, prepositions,

relative clauses in sentences. This kind of error was about sentence structured form. It is

based on how to place the subject, verb, object, complement, or adjunct.

Table 15. Sentence Structure Errors


I live in the small town of

Central Java

I don’t in the small town of

Central Java

3,125 %

My father works in the police

office

My father doesn’t in the police

office

3,125 %


Saturday

They go to the Safari don’t

park on Saturday

3,125 %

He is the smartest boy in my

class

He is the smartest boy not in

my class

3,125 %

Ir. Soekarno is the first president

in Indonesia

Ir. Soekarno not the first


3,125 %

Table 15 provided data collection of students’ errors in sentence structure. The number of

errors in Table 15 were same, 3,125%. Take a look at first, second, and fifth row from the

table. Three of them had the same errors in the missing verb. Such an example above was I

don’t in the small town of Central Java. There was a verb missing also in that sentence. The

appropriate answer was I don’t live in the small town of Central Java. The students should

add the verb live to explain what the action of the subject. Another example was My father

doesn’t in the police office. The correct answer was My father doesn’t work in the police

office. There was a missing verb in that sentence. That’s why it was a structure error.

Mechanical error

According to Shoebottom (2010) a mechanical error was a kind of orthography (spelling

and capitalization) and punctuation. Everyone who wrote in English made such mistakes,

whether native speaker or ESL student. In many cases mechanical errors were the

consequence of quick writing where the focus was on the content rather than the form.

Spelling

Read (1975) analyzed the spelling attempts of young children and concluded that their

spelling inventions reflected their current knowledge of the orthography and the rules that

had been abstracted about the spelling system. Spelling was the writing one or more words by

using letters. In this error dealt with how the words are form. For example, Jasmine does’t

sweeps the floor every morning. The correct spelling from the word with bold and italic was

doesn’t. In writing skills, we needed not only good in creating and combining sentences, but

also we needed to be aware of the spelling. This was because if the word was miss-spelling,

the meaning will be different. The example of students’ writing problems in spelling shows in

the table below:

Table 16. Spelling Errors


Jasmine sweeps the floor every

morning

Jasmine does’t sweeps the floor every

morning

3,125 %

My brother plays basketball


My brother does’t plays basketball


3,125 %

Table 16 informed that 3,125% of students made mistakes in spelling. They did not

notice whether the word which they write was complete or not. The two cases above showed

similar errors. The students only wrote does’t in their sentence whereas the correct word was

doesn’t. Although, they forgot to write one letter, it couldn’t be tolerated because there was

no meaning of that word. Another reason which influenced was they might write quickly or

wanted to finish their test earlier.

Conclusion and Recommendation

The purpose of this study was to show students’ problems in writing negative

constructions in the present tense. This study used Ferris’ theory (2002) and found three

common problems of negative constructions in the present tense. I found three common

students’ writing problems. They were grammatical errors, syntactic errors, and mechanical

errors. The highest number of errors made by the students was grammatical errors. Then, in

the second place was syntactic errors. The last position was mechanical errors. This study

found that the students still had problems to write negative statements. In addition, they were

confused whether they had to add –s/-es in the end of verbs. That’s why they often made

ungrammatical sentences of negative constructions in the present tense.

Based on the conclusion, this study recommends that the teacher delivers the

materials through a deductive approach. According to Purpura (2004), foreign languages are

best learned deductively, where students can memorize rules, recite definition, and remember

examples and exceptions. It starts with the presentation of a rule and is followed by examples

in which the rule is applied. In this study, the teachers used a lot of Bahasa Indonesia during

teaching. It may become a source of the problem because there’s little opportunity for the

students to practice the target language.

This approach could be applied using PPP (Presentation, Practice, Production) model.

It allows the teacher to control the content and pace of the lesson. In the Presentation phase,

teachers could demonstrate and explain the material first. They may use power point slides to

attract students’ attention. Then, in the Practice phase the teachers could provide some or

many examples to sustain the students’ understanding aimed at achieving accuracy. And the

last is the Production phase in which teachers could give the students exercises based on the

materials that have been explained in Presentation and Practice phases to improve fluency.

This study was limited to identify the students’ writing problems only in Junior high

school in a rural area. Further research may include participants to reveal more issues in

teaching the present tense or research that looks at other factors that may influence the

students’ writing problems in the present tense.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This thesis would not have been finished without the support of many people.

I would like to praise ALLAH SWT who has given me the life and always gives me bless. I

wish to express my gratitude to my supervisor, Bapak Prof. Dr. Gusti Astika M.A.,

who were abundantly helpful and patience in guiding me to finish this thesis in a limited

time. Deepest gratitude is also Ibu Martha Nandari M. A., as my thesis examiner. Without

whose knowledge and assistance this study would not have been completed. I would like to

thank all of the teachers and students of SMP N 2 Tuntang who were willing to share all their

thought and experiences to support this thesis. I also wish to express my love and gratitude to

my beloved family: Bapak, Ibu, Mas Dwi who always supported me and provided what I

needed during doing this study. Special thanks to Ochki’s members, Agam, and Niners who

also supported me with their prayers and spirits to finish my thesis.

Appendix

Change these positive sentences into correct negative sentences of the Present Tense!

I live in the small town of Central Java.

..........................................................................................................................................

Jasmine sweeps the floor every morning.

..........................................................................................................................................

My brother plays basketball every Sunday and Friday.

..........................................................................................................................................

My father works in the police office.

..........................................................................................................................................

They go to the Safari Park on Saturday.

..........................................................................................................................................

She is a beautiful girl in my school.

..........................................................................................................................................

We are students in the SMP Tunas Harapan.

..........................................................................................................................................

He is the smartest boy in my class.

..........................................................................................................................................

My rooms are big and clean.

..........................................................................................................................................

Ir. Soekarno is the first president in Indonesia.

..........................................................................................................................................

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