NEEDS ANALYSIS: THE USE OF WORK SHEETS IN DEVELOPING THE WRITING

SKILLS OF GRADE-7 STUDENTS

LARAYOS. KAILA CRISTILA

OLIVER, LEAH MAE

SINOY, LENIEDYL

TEJADA, TRIXY LOVE

TUMULAK, VERL JOY

This Needs Analysis Report is submitted to the College of Education

Language Education Department of Central Mindanao University

As partial fulfillment of the requirements for Bachelor

of Secondary Education

Major in English

JUNE 20, 2023

 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

Background of the Study

One of the most important and well-known skills in language production is writing. It
is a multifaceted, perceptual and voluntary activity that involves the use and coordination of
many mental processes. Combined with semantic and grammatical accuracy, it requires a
high degree of organization of ideas. Global knowledge. Writing skills are becoming more
important in writing English, which is widely used to convey. People use sentences
extensively to communicate, trade, persuade, and express with others. To do. But writing
and learning to write, especially in a second language, is more than just writing things down.
This is one of the basic skills that is very complex and difficult to master. Writing is not a
natural skill as it is not automatic and easy to learn. To get it, students must engage through
proper writing practice. These exercises are designed to improve students' ability to write
and express their thoughts clearly and concisely. Without good habits, you can't write well
and effectively.

Writing skills are often the least desirable skills for students, and it is generally
accepted that the success of improving writing skills depends on the success of other
language skills. Writing skills, on the other hand, are important in both everyday life and
academics and cannot be ignored. Students who master the art of writing correctly and
logically will be able to use the appropriate language and style in their future research and
work. Especially in the era of modern technological development, information exchange is
mainly done via the keyboard. This is essential for people to be able to communicate
consistently and effectively in writing. However, according to some research studies, and
writing has become a struggle for the majority of students. Students are not adequately
prepared to write academically or professionally due to the complexities of writing.

Writing in English is intended to bridge the gap between the ability to express ideas,
feelings, opinions, and other things verbally in Indonesia and the ability to express the same
things in written form in English. It means that written forms allow people to express their
ideas and feelings more accurately. In writing, we must use appropriate words and phrases
and adhere to proper structure. The use of language aspects or abilities in writing, such as
punctuation, spelling, grammatical, vocabulary, and so on, is the fundamental point that
makes writing difficult. If a student does not develop certain fundamental skills, he will be
unable to write with the speed and fluency needed to excel as the demands increase.
Indeed, when a student is having difficulty with a writing assignment, the writing process
itself interferes with learning. Students who face such adversity struggle to stay motivated.
Writing is frequently misunderstood as the process of putting words down on paper in the
same structure as an outline prepared with appropriate style and vocabulary the major ideas
arranged in some often on the correction of mechanical and grammatical errors.

Students' writing skills can be improved by using the guided writing technique
because it allows them to write more easily, and writing practice is the best way to learn to
write. In addition, guided writing is a teaching strategy that can be used to extend and
develop text created during independent writing. A teacher guides a small group of students
in their attempts to create individual written texts, responds to students' attempts, and
extends students' thinking throughout the process. It enables students to plan their writing by
taking into account the audience, purpose, topic, text type, and so on. It enables writers to
concentrate on conventions like spelling, punctuation, standard usage, and handwriting. It
can also be used to motivate students to revise and edit their work. Each session could
concentrate on one of the "authorial" aspects of writing, such as clarifying and extending
ideas or organizing and planning the structure of a text.

Similarly, students' emotions, such as writing interest, anxiety, lack of self-efficacy,

and confusion, play an important role in the development of individual. Furthermore, the
teacher's instruction can shape students' emotions and attitudes toward writing. As a result,
those aspects are classified as affective problems, which must be a secondary focus in this
study.

Students to write English is adequate however, they still have weaknesses in

grammar, vocabulary, and some other writing skills that should be possessed by the student.
In fact, based on my conversation with one of the lecturers who teaches this semester, the
students continue to struggle with sentence construction. Students' difficulties writing English
can be influenced by a lack of vocabulary and grammar, as well as a lack of written
exercises and ideas. The most common issues they face are how to write, what to write, a
lack of vocabulary words, and structural incompetence.

They are generally unable to develop a required level of competence in writing

English in general, despite having English as a medium of instruction and even after years of
exposure to English in schools. As a result, teaching writing has also become difficult
because of the challenges encountered by the students in developing their writing skills.
Students encountered several challenges in writing, including a lack of vocabulary, poor
grammar, poor spelling, student readiness, and limited exposure to books and reading
materials. This needs analysis is necessary to explore the language learning needs of the
students, specifically in their writing skills, raise awareness among parents, students, and
teachers, and plan the best course of action. Therefore, this needs analysis seeks to
determine the common writing issues encountered by BSE English 3A students at Central
Mindanao University.

This study will determine the learning needs in writing skills of BSE English 3A of
Central Mindanao University. Writing abilities are essential for effective communication. It
transmits a crucial message to others. Writing skills are qualities that enable writers to turn
their thoughts into meaningful words and intellectually interact with the message. Writing is
about more than just transmitting information; it is also about self-representation. Writing, on
the other hand, is the mental process of generating ideas, deciding how to convey them, and
structuring them into coherent statements and paragraphs for a reader.

Statement of the Problem

This study aims to identify the language needs of Grade 7 students. Specifically, the
study aims to answer the following questions:

1. What are the most common writing issues encountered by Grade 7 students of
Central Mindanao University?
2. What are the factors that affects the students writing proficiency?

Objectives of The Study

The main objective of this study is to investigate the writing skills of BSE English 3A
students. The study specifically aims to:

1. Determine the common writing issues encountered by Grade 7 students of Musuan

Integrated School.
2. Examine the factors that affects the students writing proficiency.

Significance of The Study

This study is beneficial to the following:

Students. The findings of this research will assess the students in knowing their
writing issues and will serve them as a guide to address such difficulties for the progression
of their written output.

Teachers. This study will help them to know the writing problems of their students
and an aid that will enable them to make plans and action, or make strategies or approaches
to the improvement of their student's writing performance.
 School. The findings of the study will help the school to formulate standardized
writing activities so that the teacher and the students will be active in related to their writing
skills.

Future researchers. This study will help future researchers to decide and come up
with a similar study related to writing issues encountered by the students. It gives them an
idea of what things to be done in getting the finding similar to this study.

Scope and Delimitations of the Study

The primary goal of this study is to examine the specific factors and common issues
that affects the learners’ writing skills. The participants will be a grade 7 students. This study
will be conducted at the Musuan Integrated school. This study will investigate the difficulties
encountered by learners on their writing skills.

The study will use a survey questionnaire as a research tool. The scope of this study
is limited to investigating the difficulties that influence the students' writing skills.
 CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

This chapter presents the related literature already done by the previous researchers.

Writing as a skill

Writing is an important form of communication in everyday life, but it is especially

important in high school and college. Students may find it difficult to come up with ideas to
incorporate into their writing, and their culture has its style for organizing academic writing.

According to Flower, L., and Hayes, J. R as cited by Armana, A. (2011) explain that
writing as a cognitive process consists of four interactive components: task, environment,
long-term memory of the writer, and the actual writing process. The task environment
consists of writing topics, target groups, task urgency, and previously created text. The
author's long-term memory retains the subject's definition, audience identity, and possible
writing plans. The writing process includes planning, translation, and editing

In addition, Richard, JC., and Renandya, W. (2010) also added that writing is the
most difficult skill for learners to learn. The difficulty is not only in generating and organizing
ideas but also in translating them into easy-to-read text. In short, it seems difficult to
implement a write because of some considerations. Chou, L. (2011) surveys student
perspectives on academic writing, academic writing is important because academic writing is
a starting point for publishing your work and a way to inform others of your interests. I found
that I thought it was. In essence, the awareness and integration of writing into all academic
programs stem from the belief that effective writing skills are important at every stage of life
from early education to the future and the effectiveness and difficulty of creative writing in
language learning.

Issues in Writing Skills

Writing according to Gepila, E. (2017) is the most difficult of the four macro talents to
teach and develop. It's difficult since it's equivalent to teaching children how to swim. A child
who wishes to learn to swim must be exposed to a variety of swimming exercises. As a
result, various ideas, principles, and practices must be considered. Similarly, for a youngster
to learn to write well, he must be exposed to a variety of writing-related activities. It's crucial
to remember that writing teachers must determine the learning context, which encompasses
culture, literature, and identity. According to Balinbin, A. (2020) He stated that Filipino
students fall behind in reading, and writing levels counterparts in other Southeast Asian
Countries.

According to Escala, K. L. (2019), JC. & De Leon, K. (2013), the writing issues are
one of the most significant challenges that students face. Because they are uninterested in
composition, they become poor writers, receive low grades in their courses, have more
errors in their homework, write run-on sentences, and write incoherent paragraphs. The
study also revealed that students are frequently struggling with subject-verb agreement and
topic sentence construction, and they frequently have limited knowledge of sentence
structure, linkers, connectors, and vocabulary.

Novariana, H., Sumardi, S., & Tarjana, S. S. (2018) also reveals some findings
related to the students' lack of writing ability. Internal problems caused by students include:
1) low motivation in learning English, 2) difficulty choosing appropriate words in writing, 2) a
lack of vocabulary, 3) difficulty arranging words in the appropriate order, 4) difficulty spelling
the words, 5) difficulty writing sentences in appropriate grammar, and 6) a tendency to be
passive learners in classroom activities.

According to Valderama, T. (2019) an article showed that Filipinos' English

competence is deteriorating. The Philippines fell from 14th place in 2018 to 20th place in
2019. Based on the outcome of an online Standard English Test, the English Proficiency
Index (EPI) is stated to quantify the average level of English language skills of language
learners (SET). English Proficiency Education First, a Swiss-based global company
specializing in dialect, cultural exchange, academic and educational travel programs, was in
charge of this. The country's English Proficiency Index (EPI) is thought to be a solid reason
for the country's education system to be concerned and act quickly to address this issue.

Proficiency in Writing Skills

Despite being one of the largest English-speaking countries in the world, the
Philippines continues to struggle with writing skills. Undoubtedly, the majority of Filipinos can
express themselves in English fluently when speaking, but their ability to translate that
proficiency into writing is not fully observed and frequently a failure. Proficiency is defined as
"the quality of being proficient; skilled; competent." Any curriculum intended to generate
future professionals who will be globally competitive has always included instruction in
helping students become adept, skilled, and competent in both speaking and writing
Redrico, M. L. A. et.al (2019).
 As Cabigon, M. (2015) reviewed in his article, the Philippines has been known
globally as the largest English-speaking nation where the majority of Filipinos use the said
language. It recognizes as one of the official languages and is spoken by many people in the
Philippines approximately 4 million Filipinos. Contemplate as the medium of instruction in
primary education and to the language of commerce and law. He also stated that language
proficiency is observed as the strength of our country in the growth of the economy.

According to Hikmah, N. ’., Akmal, A., & Buffe, F. (2019), the students are good in
writing contents, style and organization but they are still poor in mechanics and
grammar; 2) The students have more errors in grammar aspects such as the usage of
subject and verb, proper usage of tenses, organization of thoughts, contracted words,
distribution of thoughts per sentence, and on mechanics wherein students have errors on
usage of punctuation, capitalization of proper nouns, proper indention of the paragraph and
sentence breaks, and 3) The supplementary learning material must be developed to
improve the writing skills competence of the students.

However, several surveys have found that the majority of students now struggle with
writing. Due to the complexity of writing, students are not sufficiently equipped to write
academically or professionally. Despite using English as their primary language of instruction
and having spent years studying the language in school, they typically struggle to achieve
the necessary level of proficiency in writing English in general. As a result of the difficulties
students have in improving their writing abilities, teaching writing has also become
challenging. A lack of vocabulary, bad grammar, poor spelling, student preparedness, and
limited exposure to books and reading materials were only a few of the writing issues that
students faced (Moses, et al., 2019).

As a result, this needs analysis is necessary to explore the language learning needs
of the students, specifically in their writing skills, raise awareness among parents, students,
and teachers, and plan the best course of action and effective instructional materials.
Therefore, this needs analysis seeks to determine the common writing issues encountered
by grade 7 students from Musuan Integrated School.

Conceptual Framework
 The audio-lingual technique, which dominated L2 learning in the early 1950s and
early 1960s, is where controlled composition, sometimes known as guided composition, first
emerged. The ideas that language is speech (from structural linguistics) and learning is habit
development (from behaviorist psychology) are pertinent to controlled composition. Given
these fundamental ideas, it is hardly unexpected that writing was viewed from this
perspective as a secondary priority. In Teaching and Learning English as a Second
Language (1945), Charles Fries—the father of the audio-lingual approach—ignored writing,
merely allowing that written exercises «might be part of the work of the second language
student. Writing is consequently, according to the controlled composition model, "the
handmaid of the other skills (listening, speaking, and reading), which must not take
precedence as a major skill to be developed and must be viewed as a service activity rather
than an end. Students in controlled composition are provided a passage to work with; as a
result, they are not required to worry about the content, organization, discovery of ideas, or
constructing sentences. They record the material while making a few designated edits,
typically to the grammar or structure nature. Thus, mastery of grammatical and syntactic
forms, as well as formal accuracy and correctness, are emphasized. Controlled programs of
systematic habit development are created to prevent mistakes brought on by interference
from the first language and to reinforce good second language behavior. As a result, the
writer is reduced to manipulating previously taught linguistic structures, and the reader
serves as the ESL teacher's editor and proofreader instead, paying more attention to formal
linguistic qualities than to the writer's thoughts or expression. The text is a compilation of
vocabulary and phrase constructions components, the writing situation is a classroom setting
for ESL students, and the audience or objective are minimal.
 CHAPTER III

METHODOLOGY

This chapter will present the research design, locale of the study, research
participants, data gathering procedure, data analysis, researchers' role, and validity and
reliability of the study.

Research Design

In order to characterize and interpret correlations between teaching tactics and student
preferences, this study uses a quantitative research approach that involves the collection
and analysis of numerical data. A questi

Locale of the Study

This study will be conducted at the campus of Musuan Integrated School. It is located
in university town, Musuan, Maramag Bukidnon in Northern Mindanao. The survey will be
administered on Grade 7 students using a face-to-face survey questionnaire. The research
will take place throughout the academic year 2022-2023.

Research Participants

The participants of this study will be the Grade 7 students who were enrolled in the
school year 2023-2022 at Musuan Integrated School. The students’ writing skills will be
assessed, in order to determine their least mastered skills.

Data Gathering Procedure

To gather the data of this study, the researchers will go through right procedures to
have valid permissions, allowing the researchers to conduct the study. The researchers will
seek permission from the Institutional Ethics Review Committee (IERC) for the registration of
the research, and from the Musuan Integrated School principal. The participants in Grade 7
will then be asked for their permission so that the researchers can conduct the survey. The
researchers will adhere data collection protocols when administering the survey, to ensure
that the respondents are at ease.

Instrumentation

In this study, the researchers utilized an adopted survey questionnaire (5-point Likert
scale) as their research instrument. The survey questionnaire was adopted from Muhammad
Uzair UI Hassan's study about the "Opinion of Second Language Learners About Writing
Difficulties in the English Language," published in 2019. The research instrument is used to
accumulate the necessary information and responses from the respondents and to assess
the validity and reliability of the study. The 5-point Likert scale was employed in floating the
questionnaire to the respondents to specify their level of agreement to each statement about
the issues they frequently encountered in writing.

The scale is named after its founder, psychologist Rensis Likert. On a Likert scale
adopted by the researchers, there are 21 Likert item statements. Each of the statements is
inside a table comprising column heads with corresponding scales (Strongly Agree, Agree,
Undecided, Disagree, and Strongly Disagree). Upon responding to a Likert item statement,
the respondents will simply place a checkmark. Through the scales, the researchers were
able to see how the respondents of the study perceive different placement factors on each
statement about the issues in writing they frequently encountered.

Interpretation

The following points were employed to interpret the data.

Scale Qualitative Description Statement

5 Strongly Agree I take time to recall what
exact spelling is.
4 Agree I face difficulty while using
passive voice in my writing.
3 Undecided I usually lengthen the
sentences as I don’t find the
exact words
2 Disagree I sometime use simple
words when I can’t find
exact English expressions.
1 Strongly Agree I use some simple words to
 replace the difficult ones

Researchers analyze the process of teaching and learning writing skills through
directed writing by analyzing data from observations and questionnaires. Analyzing
qualitative data usually involves coding the data to obtain quantifiable means for testing
some hypotheses.

Statistical Techniques

This study will be using descriptive statistics to analyze the data gathered.
Descriptive Statistics provides a brief summary for samples and observations made. This
analysis or technique is used to summarize statistics, or visuals such as easy-to-understand
graphics. These summaries form the basis for the first description of the data and may be
sufficient for a particular study, either as part of the Statistical Analysis, or by itself.
Descriptive statistics deals with Science Method Information that is collected, organized and
analyzed and interpreted for explanation and decision-making purposes.

Collecting data in a survey is very important because the data is used to obtain the
survey results. In this research, the techniques that will use to collect data by the
researchers are observations, and questionnaires through data they gathered from the
instrument.

1. Observation. Observations are made by collaborators and researchers themselves

as observers. Thus, observing all activities performed in the process of answering the
survey questionnaire and learning each skill as the student’s identify each
participant’s difficulties in writing.
2. 2. Questionnaire. The students as a researcher gives the student a questionnaire
about it how he implements the technique, the benefits they receive, the problems he
faces, and the instrument used.
 The purpose of this technique is to provide a clear explanation of qualitative to
analyze and interpret the data gathered within the instrument. In research, many
measures can be considered. This can help the researchers to simplify large amounts of
data in a meaningful way. Descriptive statistics reduce a lot of data to a simpler

summary.

Figure 1. Shows the final data gathered by the researchers. This will be further
discussed in the results and discussions.

There are two subdivisions of statistical methods.

(a) Description Statistics. Table or graph format numerical facts or data Presentation
and data analysis methodology.

(b) Inference Statistics. It contains techniques for drawing conclusions about the
population of the base of observations obtained from samples.
 References

Cabigon, M. (2015). “State of English in the Philippines: Should we be concerned.”

Philippines. Retrieved from. https://www.britishcouncil.ph/teach/state-english-
philippines-should-we-be-concerned-2.

Escala, K. L. (2019, January 18). Writing Skills of Grade 7 Students in Selected Public
Secondary Schools of Taysan District: Basis for Enrichment Activities.
https://ojs.aaresearchindex.com/index.php/AAJMRA/article/view/8535

Flower, L., & Hayes, J. R. (2011). A Cognitive Process Theory of Writing. College
Composition and Communication, 32(4), 365–387. https://doi.org/10.2307/356600.

Gepila, E. (2017). The impregnable composition writing competency and teaching writing
methodologies. Retrieved from https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/969318/inquiry-into-
decline-of-english-skill-of-ph-students-sought#ixzz6M1dBIPm9.

Hikmah, N. ’., Akmal, A., & Buffe, F. (2019). Writing Skills of Junior High School Students of
the University of Saint Anthony, Iriga City, Philippines. https://doi.org/10.2991/adics-
elssh-19.2019.8

Redrico, M. L. A., Jagunos, M. E. P., & Laborete, D. (2019). Proficiency in Writing: A Key
towards Holistic Success in the 21st Century
Education. ResearchGate. https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.15434.80326

Richard, Jack C. (2010). Second Language Writing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
https://media.neliti.com/media/publications/217534-none.pdf.

Moses, RN & Mohamad, M. (2019) Challenges faced by students and teachers on writing
skils in ESL contexts: a literature review.
https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation.aspx?paperid=97129

Novariana, H., Sumardi, S., & Tarjana, S. S. (2018). Senior High School Students’ Problems
in Writing: A Preliminary Study of Implementing Writing E-Journal as Self
Assessment to Promote Students’ Writing Skill. E-Journal Universitas
Muhammadiyah Semarang, 2, 216–219.
https://prosiding.unimus.ac.id/index.php/ELLIC/article/view/3540
Valderama, T. (2019). Pinoys’ English proficiency declines sharply. Retrieved from
https://www.manilatimes.net/2019/11/18/opinion/columnists/topanalysis/pinoys-
English-proficiency-declines-sharply/656784/.

‘
 Name: _______________________________________________________________

Year & Section: ______________________________________________________

INSTRUCTIONS: Please rate how Strongly Agree, Agree, Undecided, Disagree, and Strongly Disagree
you are with each of the following statements by placing a check mark in the appropriate box.

(Strongly agree=5, Agree=4, Undecided=3, Disagree=2, Strongly disagree=1)

Statement SA A U D SD

5 4 3 2 1

1. I use some simple words to replace the difficult

ones.

2. I usually lengthen the sentences as I don’t find

the exact words.

3. I face difficulty while using passive voice in my

writing.

4. I take time to recall what exact spelling is.

5. I use different words to express the similar

meanings.

6. Writing is difficult for me because I have lack of

vocabulary.

7. The frequent problem which I face while writing

is the correct use of tenses.

8. I face problem to write spellings of the word that

is new to me.

9. I am often confused in the use of punctuation

marks.

10. I get poor grades because of poor spellings.

11. My sentences are not well organized that’s why

I can’t communicate well.

12. I feel confused while referring to the things

which I have already mentioned in my writing.
13. My written expression is not good in describing
the past events.

14. I feel problems in the use of conditional

sentences.

15. I face problems in connecting one paragraph

with the other.

16. The reason of poor performance in writing is the

incorrect use of punctuation marks.

17. Grammatical mistakes affect my expression in

writing.

18. I usually find difficult to understand sentence

structure in English.

19. My written expression is not good in describing

the sequence of events.

20. While writing I often face the problems of

connecting ideas.

21. My sentences don’t convey complete sense as I

am not good at marking commas in sentences.