STUDENTS’ DIFFICULTIES IN RETELLING PAST EXPERIENCE:(A Case Study at One Private Junior High School in Bandung)

摘要

The present study aims to discover the students’ difficulties in retelling past experience based on generic structure and linguistic features analyses. Nine stories were analyzed by transitivity of functional grammar developed by Halliday (1994) to identify linguistic features and the theory of generic structure of recount proposed by Emilia (2011) to analyze the generic structure of the students’ stories. To make it clearer, the grammatical errors discovered in the stories were classified by Dulay et al. (1982) on surface strategy taxonomy. The findings showed that all students have developed their stories based on the obligatory elements of recount. However, the optional part (re-orientation) only appeared in one student’s story. In other words, the students did not give their personal comments on the events they have experienced. In terms of linguistic features, low achievers and two high achievers did not apply one linguistic feature of recount, namely past tense. Misformation is the most frequent type of grammatical errors in students’ stories at 54%, followed by omission at 35%, addition at 8% and misordering at 2%. The dominance of misformation and omission reveal that the students still find it difficult to apply correct form of verb (process) in retelling past experience. The study also revealed that lack of understanding in applying correct verb (process) form, lack of knowledge in terms of vocabularies, and nervousness due to lack of exercise become the possible causes of the students’ difficulties. Teachers are recommended to give more exposures to the students about the stories or texts with appropriate structures and features, and to promote activities which allow students to train their capability of speaking. ududKeywords:students’ difficulties,speaking, error analysis, transitivityududPenelitian ini bertujuan untuk mencari tahu kesulitan siswa dalam menceritakan pengalaman masa lalu berdasarkan analisis struktur umum serta fitur-fitur linguistik. Sembilan cerita dianalisis dengan menggunakan transitivity of functional grammaryang dikembangkan olehHalliday (1994) untuk mengidentifikasi fitur-fitur linguistik serta teori mengenai struktur umumrecountyang diajukan oleh Emilia (2011) untuk menganalisis struktur umum cerita siswa. Lebih jelas lagi, kesalahan gramatikal yang ditemukan di dalam cerita tersebut diklasifikasikan dengan menggunakan teori yang dikembangkan olehDulay et al.(1982) yaitusurface strategy taxonomy.Hasil temuan menunjukkan bahwa seluruh siswa telah mengembangkan cerita berdasarkan elemen wajib dalamrecount. Namun, bagian opsional (re-orientation) hanya muncul dalam satu cerita siswa. Dengan kata lain, para siswa tidak memberikan komentar personal terhadap kejadian yang telah mereka alami. Dalam hal ditur linguistik, siswa low achieversdan duahigh achieverstidak menggunakan salah satu fitur linguistik dalam recount, yaitupast tense. Misformationmerupakan kesalahan gramatikal yang paling umum dalam cerita siswa dengan 54%, diikuti olehomissionpada 35%, additionpada 8% danmisorderingpada 2%.Dominasi darimisformationdanomissionmenunjukkan bahwa para siswa masih kesulitan dalam menggunakan bentuk verba (process)yang tepat dalam menceritakan pengalaman masa lalu. Penelitian ini juga menemukan bahwa kurangnya pemahaman dalam menggunakan bentuk verba(process)yang tepat, kurangnya pemahaman dalam hal kosakata,serta kegugupan akibat kurangnya latihan menjadi penyebab dari kesulitan para siswa. Para guru disarankan untuk memberikan paparan lebih pada siswa perihal cerita atau teks dengan struktur dan fitur yang berterima, serta melakukan aktivitas yang memungkinkan siswa untuk melatih kemampuan berbicaranya. ududKata kunci: kesulitan siswa,berbicara, analisis kesalahan, transitivity