TEACHING PERSUASIVE TEXTS THROUGH THINK-TALK-WRITE (TTW) STRATEGY: AN INSTRUCTIONAL ANALYSIS

This research was conducted after noticing the writing problems occurred in grade VIII of one public junior high school in Bandung in academic year 2017/2018. The students showed their inability of writing persuasive texts in accordance with the generic structures and language uses. The treatment used to overcome the problem was think-talk-write (TTW) together with the application of video as the instructional media. The research foci were: 1) how the learning session with TTW strategy was planned and was conducted; 2) how the improvement of students’ learning outcome by using TTW with video media was; 3) how the students’ responses towards the use of TTW with video media were. The research aimed at equipping the students with the ability to write persuasive texts appropriately. The method employed was classroom action research conducted in three cycles. The data collection techniques used were tests, observations, and questionnaires. The data were analyzed through several steps: categorizing, interpreting and validating data. The result indicated that learning to write persuasive texts by using TTW with video media improved the students’ writing ability. This was pointed by the test result from all cycles; in cycle I, the mean of students’ scores was 63; in cycle II, it increased to be 72; and in cycle III, it showed improvement to be 81. To conclude, it was proved that TTW strategy could improve the students’ writing ability on persuasive texts.


INTRODUCTION
Writing is a language skill frequently used by society in daily life to communicate for a number of purposes. In writing, everyone conveys ideas, thoughts, and arguments about something. To Bolinger (in Tarigan, 2008: 16), writing delivers words into readers' mind in its own way, which sometimes much easier to understand than spoken language. The language applied in writing is totally different from the one used in speaking, due to its intention to be read by many people (Rusyana, 1984: 130). To that end, a writer should utilize BAHTERA: Jurnal Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra, Volume 19 Nomor 1 Januari 2020 http://journal.unj.ac.id/unj/index.php/bahtera/ P-ISSN : 0853-2710 E-ISSN : 2540-8968 144 BAHTERA : Jurnal Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra, Volume Januari 2020 clear language, as nothing can explain more than his/her writing.
One of the material suggested to teach in the syllabus of Indonesia language subject is persuasive texts. The intention is to enable students to be aware and think critically about actual problems arisen in their surroundings, such as environmental problems, social and cultural. Persuasive texts, also well-known as argumentative texts, are used to invite people to do something as suggested by the writers (Hornikx, 2005). Gerot and Wignell (1994) call the texts by exposition texts, texts whose aim is to persuade people to do something. Finoza (2002) further states that arguments presented in persuasive texts contain fact, general truth, or someone's opinions communicated to others. While Keraf (2007) acknowledges persuasive texts by declaring that persuasive texts are a kind of verbal art pointing at convincing people to do something at one particular time.
Persuasive texts consist of these generic structure (adapted from Derewianka, 2011;Droga & Humphrey, 2003;Gerot & Wignell, 1994;Knapp & Watkins, 2005;Toulmin, 2003) (see also Cahyani, 2016). In spite of its importance as stated by the 2013 curriculum, some people, especially students, still find it difficult to write. A number of problems are identified BAHTERA: Jurnal Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra, Volume 19 Nomor 1 Januari 2020 http://journal.unj.ac.id/unj/index.php/bahtera/ P-ISSN : 0853-2710 E-ISSN : 2540-8968 145 BAHTERA : Jurnal Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra, Volume Januari 2020 during learning at schools, including in SMPN 40 Bandung. One of the problems found is they were lack of ability to write a text, especially persuasive texts, in accordance with the right structure and the language uses. Based on the initial interview with the Indonesian language teacher there, it was revealed that the students showed no interest towards the persuasive texts. The students were still lack of understanding while the learning repetition had been applied. Based on the assignment scoring, 42,86% students did not pass the minimum criteria or passing grade on identifying the elements of persuasive texts, and 83,33% did not pass the passing grade on determining the generic structures of persuasive texts. This above mentioned fact basically indicates agreement with Newell and colleagues' statement (2011) and Mills and Dooley (2014) as well, that teaching persuasive texts is a demanding work. For that reason, explicit teaching such as giving a model before students write their own texts is crucially needed (Emilia, 2011).
The students' low ability in writing persuasive texts should be overcome by implementing an appropriate strategy.
Think-Talk-Write (TTW) strategy, firstly introduced by Huinker and Laughlin (1996), is believed to enable students to be able to read well, learn in groups, use media, accept information, and deliver information. This is one of the cooperative learning strategies suggested by Killen (1998) as cited by Setiawan, Sujana and Apgrianto (2017 Ambarsari, Syarif and Reynaldi (2018). Setiawan, Sujana, and Apgrianto (2017), Azis (2016), Suminar and Putri (2015) have also highlighted the positive influence of TTW strategy towards the students' writing ability as well. Even, TTW had also been proved to give good impact on elementary school students specifically on their writing creativity (Wirda, Setiawan, Hidayat, 2017) .TTW has also been corroborated as an alternative strategy to intensify students' engagement in learning effectively, especially to improve writing ability and critical thinking (Zulkarnaini, 2011 (Aqib, 2016).
Initially, Skerritt (1984: 247) has specified video as media to capture and bring reality into the classroom, an excellent substitute for classroom activity and a well make product of high quality and coherence.
Recently, video still remains as trusted instructional media to enhance learning including writing (Hayati, 2017;Lestiyaningsih, 2017)

Cycle III
Planning in cycle II was generated as the follow up action from cycle II learning.
Cycle II learning was considered not working very well after analyzing the students' writing.
To overcome the problems, a revision of planning was made. Before presenting the video related to the topic, as performed in cycle II, the researchers would like to provide the students with a modelling text how to create good title for persuasive texts. In addition to that, the researchers also explained common mistakes the students made in persuasive texts they composed in cycle II. This step was expected to give enlightenment for students for not doing the same mistakes.

Persuasive Texts
Cycle I

The Analysis of Persuasive Texts in
Cycle I

Formal Aspects
It was identified that 7% of persuasive texts written by the students were categorized into good based on the criteria of the formal aspects. 7% of the texts were categorized into fair, and 85% were categorized into poor.

Generic Structures
Thesis statement; in cycle I, 4% of persuasive texts composed by the students were grouped into excellent in the thesis statement part. Meanwhile, in the same part, 37% of persuasive texts were categorized into good. The rest were 59%, clustered into fair criterion.
Reiterations; there were 19% of the texts perceived as good. 44% of them were noticed fair, and the rest 37% were categorized into poor.
From the formal aspects, it seemed there was something inappropriate with the title, the persuasiveness was not clearly seen, for the absence of persuasive words.
The author's full name was not also fulfilled. However, the theme written was in accordance with the video content.
Seeing from the structures, all generic structures were completely written down.
The thesis statement focused on a general problem about smoking, which was in accordance with the theme. The arguments posed supported the text, but only a few fact of smoking bad effect was presented.
Preposition "di" in the phrase "di dalam rokok" should not be utilized to open a sentence.

Scoring Range 2,67-3,00 (B)
52% of the text written by the students were grouped to the scoring range of 2,67-3,00 (B Some of the language uses were found incorrect. Some clauses in the sentences were also separated inaccurately.

Fair
Scoring range 2, 01-2,33 (C+) There were 26% of the texts composed by the students, scored between 2,01-2,33 (C+). The text below was one of the students' writing. of the texts were good, while the rest (10 texts or 37%) were distinguished as fair.
The scores were summarized in the following graph. To overcome the problems identified in cycle I, a revision of treatment to implement in cycle II was made. Text modelling was added as one of the activity series.

Text Analysis
Formal Aspects 7% of the texts showed the excellence based on the formal aspects. 4% were classified as good, 26% of the texts were included into fair, and 63% dominated the criterion of poor.

Generic structures
Thesis statement; in cycle I, 19% of the texts written by the students showed very good understanding in the thesis statement.
33% were categorized into good. And the rest (48%) were in fair category.
Arguments; in cycle II, 30% of the arguments composed were regarded as excellent. 56% was good and the rest 11% was included into fair category.
Recommendations; 30% of the recommendations proposed by the students were categorized into excellent. 56% were good and 15% were grouped into fair. Reiterations; 7% of the students could produce excellent reiteration. 48% were good in reiterating and the last 11% were fair in conveying the reiteration. There was still 33% of the text stating poor reiteration.

Scoring range 3,34-3,66 (A-)
In cycle II, there found 4% of the texts categorized into 3,34-3,66 (A-). The following was the example of the criterion. Seeing its formal aspects, the tittle written was considered precise, asking readers to prevent measles and rubella.
However, the intention of the text to ask readers having measles and rubella vaccination was not explicitly stated. The theme was in line with the video content.
The writer's name was also revealed.
The text had all generic structures of persuasive texts. The thesis statement was talking about the problem of measles and rubella. The series of argument contained some facts as well, but they were lack of proofs supporting the damage of those two.
However, the punctuation was irrelevantly applied. A comma supposes to be used to divide clauses in a sentence, but the writer did not use it. For instance, "Campak dan rubella menular tetapi ia bisa dicegah dengan imunisasi", it supposed to be "Campak dan rubella menular, tetapi itu bisa dicegah dengan imunisasi".  Scoring Range 2, 15% of the texts were assorted to 2,34-2,66 (B-). The following text was the example.
Being analyzed from its formal aspects, the text indicated some mistakes.
The title was less suitable as the absence of persuasive words. The writer's identity was not written completely. However, the theme was in agreement with the video content.
Based on its language uses, the title was not well organized as the capital letters were not utilized exactly.
Being analyzed from the formal aspect, the title of the text was not considered persuading people. However, the content was considered well-founded as it was in line with the video content. Some mistakes were identified in the generic structures. The outline seemed to be improper. The thesis statement was not clearly declared. The arguments were not corroborated by facts any proofs. Luckily, the reiteration was mentioned.
Some things from the language uses should also be amended. Some clauses were separated inaccurately, for instance, "Cegah campak dan rubella karena campak dan rubella dapat menyebabkan cacat dan kematian". The sentence supposed to be, "Cegah campak dan rubella, karena campak dan rubella dapat menyebabkan cacat dan kematian". The title was improperly written due to the absence of capital letters.

Text Scoring in Cycle II based the 2013 Curriculum Scoring Scale
Generally, the result of students' writing in cycle II indicated the score increases. The average score increased from 63 (in cycle I) to 72. So did the score conversion, from 2,52 to 2,88. 1 (4%) of the texts written by the students were distributed into excellent BAHTERA: Jurnal Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra, Volume 19 Nomor 1 Januari 2020 http://journal.unj.ac.id/unj/index.php/bahtera/ P- The analysis showed that they did not write the text in agreement with the generic structures and language uses. The titles written were not using persuading words. The language uses also showed inaccurate application, for instance less persuasive dictions, clause separations, capital letter uses, and punctuation.
In overcoming those problems, the researchers revised the plans to implement in cycle III. In this last cycle, the foci would be on explaining common mistakes made by the students and title modelling by using appropriate and accurate persuading words.

Text Analysis Formal Aspects
The persuasive texts written by the students in this cycle showed a pleasing result. 89% of the texts were considered excellent based on the formal aspects. 11% were classified into good category.

Generic Structures
Thesis statement: 15% of the texts' thesis statements was regarded as excellent, 26% were good, and 59% were included into fair.
Arguments: 44% of the texts' arguments were grouped to excellent, 48% were good and 7% were fair.

Recommendations: 30% of the texts'
recommendations were categorized into excellent, 33% were regarded as good and the rest (37%) were considered fair.
Reiterations: 11% of the texts' reiteration were viewed as excellent, 37% were good, and 52% were included into fair.

Good
There was 41% of the texts were classified into B+ (3,01-3,33), and 37% of the texts were categorized into B (2,67-3,00).    Setiawan, & Hidayat, 2017;Zulkarnaini, 2011). This also signifies the basic theory of TTW suggested by Huinker and Laughlin (1996), that TTW provides an opportunity for students to be able to deliver information including conveying their ideas in writing.

Text Scoring in
Further talk, the facts that most students in their initial time have not written the texts appropriately and successfully are not surprising as highlighted by Newell et.al (2011), Mills andDooley (2014). They claimed that young writers need assistance to be able to write such complex texts for persuasive texts are not simply stating arguments, but it should be supported by facts to persuade people (Finoza, 2002;Gerot & Wignell, 1994;Hornikx, 2005;Keraf, 2007 (Derewianka, 2011;Droga & Humphrey, 2003;Gerot & Wignell, 1994;Knapp & Watkins, 2005;Toulmin, 2003) (see also Cahyani, 2016).
Another interesting fact contributing to students' success in writing persuasive texts is the use of video as the instructional media. The video presented during the classroom sessions assist the students with information and reality about the danger of smoking, measles and rubella and environment. This denotes video benefits as suggested by Skerritt (1984) and AECT (in Aqib, 2016) as well as demonstrates the findings of the previous research; Hayati, 2017;Lestiyaningsih, 2017).

Implementation of TTW
Having finished the treatment, a questionnaire was distributed to the students containing some questions related to the learning process by using TTW strategy.
The first question was asking whether or not the students found difficulties during the time of writing the persuasive BAHTERA: Jurnal Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra, Volume 19 Nomor 1 Januari 2020 http://journal.unj.ac.id/unj/index.php/bahtera/ P-ISSN : 0853-2710 E-ISSN : 2540-8968 164 BAHTERA : Jurnal Pendidikan Bahasa dan Sastra, Volume Januari 2020 texts. 20 students (74%) answered they did not, while 7 students (26%) said they did. This is a delighted finding as a con to common problems face by students in writing persuasive texts, namely the difficulties to build argument, specifically the ability to construct logical, convincing and insightful persuasive texts (Mills & Dooley, 2014) The second question focused on asking the students if the discussion assisted them with the understanding of writing persuasive texts. 25 students (93%) agreed that discussion helped them to get the gist of persuasive texts and how to write the texts well. Meanwhile, 2 students (7%) revealed that the discussion did not work for them. This findings substantially serve as an indication of how TTW especially talk step assist students with the ideas exploration and organization stimulus to write their own texts (Ambarsari, Syarif, & Reynaldi, 2018;Huda, 2016).