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 ELT FORUM 4 (1) (2015) 

 

Journal of English Language Teaching 
 

http://journal.unnes.ac.id/sju/index.php/elt 

 

 

IMPROVING STUDENTS’ SKILL IN WRITING RECOUNT TEXT BY USING 

PEER REVIEW TECHNIQUE 

(A Classroom Action Research of the Eighth Grade Students of SMP N 4 Batang 

Year 2014/2015) 

 

Candra Arifiana 

 

English Department. Faculty of Languages and Arts. State University of Semarang 

 

Aticle Info 

________________ 
Article History: 

Received in Juni 2015 

Approved in Juli 2015 

Published in Agustus 

2015 

________________ 
Keywords: 

Peer review technique, 

writing skill, action research. 

____________________ 

Abstract 
___________________________________________________________________ 
This study was conducted based on the fact that writing is the most difficult skill for students to master. Students 

face difficulties in learning writing. They are not sure of how to arrange sentences into good paragraphs, how to 

develop their ideas, they have lack of vocabulary and tend to use only certain words they have known in writing. 

They also apply incorrect grammar in their writing. Teacher considers that teaching writing is a difficult task. 

This final project is about teaching writing recount text by using peer review technique to the eighth graders 

students of Junior High School 4 Batang in the academic year of 2014/2015. The aim of this study is to find out 

how peer review technique can be implemented to improve students’ skill in writing recount text. In order to 

achieve the objectives, an action research was designed and carried out in this study. 

The participants of this study were 38 students of class VIII D of SMP N 4 Batang in the academic year of 

2014/2015. Questionnaire, observation sheet, and writing tests were used as the instruments for collecting data. 

The results of the study showed significant improvement of the students’ achievement in writing recount text. It 

is proven by the average results in every test; pre test (63.00), formative test (74.29), and post test (79.50). The 

students’ writing skill (organization, content, grammar, punctuation, and style and quality of expression) in each 

test improved, too. Moreover, the result of the observation sheet showed that peer review technique changed the 

students’ learning behavior being better than before. Their enthusiasm during the learning process increased in 

each cycle. The analysis result of questionnaire showed that peer review technique was useful to most of students 

to improve their learning interest in writing recount text. Their perception changed positively after having the 

treatment. It meant that the use of peer review technique could ease their problem in writing English especially 

recount text 

Based on the results of those research instruments, it can be concluded that using peer review technique as a 

learning technique gives the improvement to students’ skill in writing recount text. 

 

 

© 2015 Universitas Negeri Semarang 

 
 Correspondent Address:  

   B3 Building  FBS Unnes  

   Sekaran, Gunungpati, Semarang, 50229 

   E-mail: candra1104@gmail.com 

 

ISSN 2252-6706 



 

Candra Arifiana / Journal of English Language Teaching 4 (1) (2015) 

2 

INTRODUCTION 

 

English as International language has 

an important role in the world. Not only used 

in communication, but also in transferring 

information. There are four skills that students 

must be mastered in English they are listening, 

speaking, reading, and writing. These skills 

have to be mastered by the students, especially 

writing skill, because, according to Harmer 

(2004), “Being able to write is a vital skill for 

‘speakers’ of a foreign language as much as for 

everyone using their own first language” (p. 3). 

It means that writing is the basic skill to 

communicate. Also, writing is used for a wide 

variety of purposes. It is produced in many 

different forms (Harmer, 2004, p. 4). For 

examples, letter, book, etc. So, in everyday 

life, the people need to master writing.  

Based on the school-based curriculum 

in junior high school, in English subject the 

students have to understand and create some 

short functional texts such as procedure, 

descriptive, recount, narrative, and report. In 

fact, students have many difficulties to write 

recount text. Based on the researcher 

observation when the researcher had teaching 

practice in SMP 4 Batang class 8D, students 

find it difficult in writing . The students had 

some difficulties in organizing the paragraph 

and grammatical use. There were many 

mistakes in their writing in grammar, diction 

and also lack of vocabulary. The problem is 

they are not aware or do not know the 

mistakes that they have made.  

The students’ problem in writing is also 

caused by the difficulty of expressing ideas in 

writing. It is caused by their insufficient 

knowledge of language components such as 

vocabulary and grammar. Besides the 

difficulties in writing itself, writing problems 

also exist because of the students’ reluctance in 

writing. Harmer (2004:61) states that “the 

students are reluctant to write because they 

rarely write, even in their own language”. The 

lack of writing practice makes students 

perform poorly in writing. Furthermore, they 

are bored and uninterested with the 

conventional strategy of teaching recount text 

which has been applied.  

Because of that, the teacher should give 

some strategies to help students increase or 

even solve their difficulties. These strategies 

should be interesting in order to interest 

students to write. Because basically, the 

students or children enjoy experimenting with 

writing and putting their ideas down on paper 

(Linse, 2006, p. 99). Based on Linse’s 

statement, students actually have had basic 

interest to write. So, the teachers just need to 

give some motivation or direction to develop 

it. 

Seeing those students’ difficulties in 

writing recount text and when their teacher 

corrects their writing, they often just throw it 

away or do not see or check it again. So, peer 

review is adequate technique to help students 

correct their work when there was something 

wrong in their writing; this gives the student 

the opportunity to reflect on their mistakes and 

make improvements to their writing. It also 

shows the teacher what the learners are able to 

do and what still remains difficult or unknown.  

Peer review technique is an essential 

part of the writing process. It is utilized 

between the drafting and revision stages, 

considering the process of writing involves 

four elements: planning, drafting, editing, and 

final version. By peer review technique, 

students can get the four elements in the 

writing process. By applying peer review 

technique, it will help students to know what 

the strengths are and weaknesses or what are 

missing from their writing so they can revise 

and improve it. 

Through this technique, students could 

exchange their writing with their partners to 

check the organization in writing. Bartels 

(2003) states that in peer review students read 

each other papers and provide feedback to the 

researcher, usually answering specific 

questions that teacher has provided. So, 

through this technique, students got good 

feedback to evaluate their writing better and it 

was very useful for students. 



 

Candra Arifiana / Journal of English Language Teaching 4 (1) (2015) 

3 

In this research, the researcher would 

like to find out the students’ improvement in 

writing recount text after being taught by this 

technique. Hopefully, the result of this study 

will give much benefit to the education world 

of Indonesia and be able to offer some 

significant information dealing with the 

application of the games in language learning 

activity. 

 

LITERATURE REVIEW 

 

Farid Helmi in 2012 conducted a 

research entitled “Improving Students’ Skill in 

Writing Recount Text by Using A Personal 

Letter”. He conducted a classroom action 

research to the tenth graders of MASS Proto 

Pekalongan in the academic year of 

2011/2012. 

 

Writing 

 

According to Sokolik in Linse (2006), 

writing is a combination of process and 

product. The process refers to the act of 

gathering ideas and working with them until 

they are presented in a manner that is polished 

and comprehensible to readers (Linse, 2006, p. 

98). 

 

Recount Text 

 

According to Anderson (1997: 48) a 

recount is speaking or writing about past 

events or a piece of text that retells past events, 

usually in the order which they happened. 

 

Peer Review Technique 

 

Peer review is one of techniques in 

teaching writing. It is very important in writing 

process. Bartels (2003) states that peer review 

is also referred to as peer editing, peer 

response, peer evaluation, and peer feedback, 

in which students read each other's writing and 

provide feedback to the researcher. Peer 

review is an activity in process of students’ 

writing to responding to each other’s writing. 

 

METHOD OF INVESTIGATION 

 

A research method which is used in this 

study is action research, while the approach is 

qualitative. Arikunto (2006: 2) also claims that 

action research is a kind of research done by 

someone who conducts the research on what 

he/she is really doing without changing its 

system.  Action research has some procedures.  

The steps above will be explained as 

follows: 

(1) Planning 

Planning is the first step in doing action 

research. 

(2) Acting 

In this step, the researcher or teacher 

executes carefully the plan which is made 

before. This step is the main step of action 

research. 

(3) Observing 

In observation, the researcher or teacher 

observes the collected data during the action 

step. The purpose of this step is to find out 

whether the improvement or the change has 

reached or not throughout the action. 

(4) Reflecting 

In the last step, reflection, the research or 

the teacher evaluates the effect of action in 

order to make sense of what has happened and 

to understand the problem and also describe 

whether there is the positive or negative aspect 

for the study improvement. Based on the 

reflection, the researcher revises the previous 

plan to go for the next cycle. 

The subjects of this research were 

students in the eighth grade of SMP N 4 

Batang in class VIII A in the academic year of 

2013/2014. The researcher chose the eighth 

grade students of junior high school because 

the researcher found that the material was 

appropriate with the curriculum. Moreover, it 

would help them to understand more about the 

material which was writing recount text.  

The instruments of this study were 

writing tests, observation checklists, and 

questionnaire. There were observation 

checklist for the students and observation 

checklist for the teacher. There were two 



 

Candra Arifiana / Journal of English Language Teaching 4 (1) (2015) 

4 

cycles in this research. In the first meeting 

before conducted the treatment, the researcher 

conducted the pre - test. It was aimed to 

measure students’ ability in writing recount 

text before the researcher gave the treatment. 

In this research, the researcher introduced 

sentence race game as the treatment for the 

students to learn recount text. By playing 

sentence race game, the students knew how to 

write and construct a good sentence in 

English. In addition, they learnt grammar 

especially past tense and also vocabulary.  

In the last meeting, the researcher 

conducted the post-test. Post-test was 

conducted to measure the students’ 

achievement after the treatments. The purpose 

of the post-test was to check the students’ 

improvement in writing recount text after they 

had been taught using sentence race game. 

 

RESULT OF THE STUDY 

 

General Description 

 

This action research was conducted in 

class VIII D of SMP Negeri 4 Batang, in the 

academic year of 2014/2015. The research 

was conducted in five meetings started from 

March 23th, 2015 until April 11th, 2014. This 

action research consisted of three main 

activities. They were pre-test, first cycle and 

second cycle. Each cycle consists of planning, 

action, observation and reflection. 

 

Cycle 1 

 

The first cycle consisted of two 

meetings. The first meeting was conducted on 

March 28th 2015 and the second meeting was 

conducted on March 30th 2015. All the 

students were present in the teaching and 

learning process in first cycle.  

In the first meeting, the students were 

introduced with peer review. The purpose of 

this meeting was to give the treatment related 

to recount text using peer review as the 

technique. In this cycle, the researcher started 

to do the first step of action research. First of 

all, the researcher greeted the students and 

checked students’ attendance. Before peer 

review technique was introduced to the 

students, the researcher explained to them 

about recount text about generic structures and 

the language features of recount text. After 

that, the researcher explained about peer 

review technique. The researcher also gave an 

example of how to do peer review, how to 

analyze, correct others’ mistake, and give 

feedback to their friends’ work. The 

researchers asked the students to work in pairs 

and gave them an example of recount text with 

same mistakes and distribute the peer review 

guidelines and peer review sheet. When they 

had finished doing peer review training, the 

researcher asked them to write a recount text 

as the first draft. After they finished writing the 

first draft of recount text, I asked them to do 

peer review.  

The activity in the second meeting in 

this cycle was giving the material of simple 

past tense and held a formative test. The 

students were asked to make a recount text 

which theme was “Study Tour”. The 

researcher gave them time about 45 minutes to 

make their recount text. Meanwhile, I 

recorded the students’ behavior by filling the 

observation checklist for the students. The 

English teacher of the class also filled the 

observation checklist to observe me.  

 

Cycle 2 

 

 Based on the first cycle evaluation, it 

could be seen that there were some mistakes 

were found in their writing product. Most of 

the students were not able to express their idea 

using simple past tense, they used the same 

words to express their writing (repetition), and 

etc. In addition, the mean score of the 

students’ first cycle test result was 

unsatisfactory and under the KKM. That is 

why another treatment was necessary to be 

given to the students so that they were able to 

construct recount text using simple past tense. 

The second cycle was conducted on 

April 4th and April 11nd 2015. All the students 

joined the teaching and learning process. At 



 

Candra Arifiana / Journal of English Language Teaching 4 (1) (2015) 

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the end of the second cycle, the researcher 

handed out the questionnaire to the students.  

 The first meeting of second cycle was 

conducted on April 4th 2015. The procedure of 

teaching and learning process was almost the 

same with the first cycle. Before applying peer 

review technique, the students were given 

another example of recount text and exercise 

about past tense. They were asked to analyze 

and understand the text with their partner also 

done the exercises. Then, the researcher asked 

them to make a short recount text related to 

their past activity. After they had finished it, 

the researcher asked some students to do peer 

review technique. The steps were the same 

with first cycle.  

In this meeting in cycle 2, the researcher 

allocated the time to review the material and 

gave the last test which was post-test. All of the 

students were present on that day. Students 

were asked to make a recount text for about 45 

minutes. The theme was about “My Holiday”. 

At the end of the lesson, questionnaire was 

handed out to the students and they had to fill 

it.  

 

 

The Students’ Score Improvement 

 

After knowing the result of every student, in order to find out further on the students’ 

achievement in detail, the researcher used the following formula to find out the average of the students’ 

achievement in pre-test. 

 

The average of the students’ score =      The total of the students’ score  

         The total number of the students 

The average of the students’ score =     2394 

                                                                38  

=     63 

The average of the students’ score in pre-test was 63. According to the Harris scoring system, it 

could be said that their score was in the level of fair. On the other hand, their score was still low. It 

was lower than the minimum score (KKM = Kriteria Ketuntasan Minimal) of SMP N 4 Batang, 

especially in English subject which was 75.00. Moreover, almost 75% of the students got less than 

75.00.  

Then, in calculating the average score of the students’ writing skill in formative-test, it was used 

the same formula: 

 

 

The average of the students’ score =      The total of the students’ score  

         The total number of the students 

The average of the students’ score =      2823 

           38 

               =     74.29 

The average of the students’ score in formative-test was 74.29. It increased 11.29 points from 

pre-test. It meant that the treatment of teaching writing recount text using peer review was useful. It 

could improve the students’ writing skill and it could be seen from the improvement of their score in 

formative-test. Although the score increased, their score was still fair. It was also still lower than the 

minimum score (KKM = KriteriaKetuntasan Minimal) of the SMP N 4 Batang. There were still students 

who got the score below 75.00.  

 

 



 

Candra Arifiana / Journal of English Language Teaching 4 (1) (2015) 

6 

Here, in calculating the average of the students’ writing achievement in post-test, it was used 

the same formula below: 

The average of the students’ score =      The total of the students’ score  

         The total number of the students 

The average of the students’ score =      3021 

            38 

               =     79.50 

 The average of the students’ score in post-test was 79.50; it increased from the formative-test, 

what a good progress. Initially their average in pre-test was 63, then it became 74.29 in formative-test, 

and finally their average score obtained 79.50 in post-test.  

It meant that the treatment of teaching writing using peer review as the technique was helpful. 

It was helpful to improve the students’ writing skill, especially writing recount text. It was proven by 

seeing their average score which passed the criterion of passing assessment (KKM = KriteriaKetuntasan 

Minimal) of the SMP N 4 Batang, especially in English subject which was 75.00.  

  

 The result of each test showed improvements of the students’ skill in writing recount text. The 

average score are presented in the table below: 

 

No. Test Average Score 

1. Pre-Test 63 

2. Formative Test (1st cycle) 74.29 

3. Post-Test          (2nd cycle) 79.50 

   

Table 1:  Students’ Score Improvement 

 

In the first cycle, the improvement of 

the result was increased 11.29 points. In the 

pre-test, the average score was 63 and in the 

formative test, the average score was 74.29. 

Although the average score was lower than the 

criterion of passing assessment (KKM = 

KriteriaKetuntasan Minimal) of the SMP N 4 

Batang, at least it shows an improvement from 

the pre-test. 

In the second cycle, the result of the 

post-test score also showed a good 

improvement.  The students’ average score 

had increased better, from 74.29.9 to79.50. It 

was more than the criterion of passing 

assessment or KKM.  

 

 From the diagram above, we can see 

that there is an increase of the students’ 

average score. It meant that the treatment of 

teaching writing using sentence race game was 

helpful. It was really helpful to improve the 

students’ writing skill, especially writing 

recount text. 

 

Analysis of the Result of Observation 

Checklist 

 

The researcher used observation 

checklists for this action research. The 

checklist for the students checked their 

behaviour and responses toward the teaching 

learning process. The observation checklist for 

was done by the English teacher of SMP N 4 

Batang. 

Observation checklist for the students 

was categorized in four categories ways, they 

are:(a) the students’ attention to the teacher’s 

explanation (b) the students’ active 

participation during the lesson (asking and 

answering questions, giving opinion, etc) (c) 

the students’ positive response toward peer 

review technique (d) the students’ seriousness 

in writing recount text.The observation sheet 

then be analyzed to see the students’ 

behavioral changes in the learning process. 



 

Candra Arifiana / Journal of English Language Teaching 4 (1) (2015) 

7 

Overall, the result of observation sheet 

showed that the students’ seriousness in 

writing recount text increased from first cycle 

and second cycle 

 

Analysis of the Result of Questionnaire 

 

The questionnaire was distributed to the 

students on April 11th, 2014 after the post-test 

was conducted. It was aimed to investigate 

students’ perception towards the use of Peer 

Review in teaching recount text. There were 

10 items in the questionnaire which given in 

Bahasa Indonesia in order to help the students 

got the best understanding of each item.From 

the students’ responses of the questionnaire, 

the researcher could draw the interpretation as 

follows: 

Item number 1 stated that students liked 

English subject. The result of the questionnaire 

showed that 24% of students strongly agreed, 

71% of students agreed, and 5% of students 

disagreed that writing in English subject was 

likeable. None of them strongly disagreed with 

that statement. 

Item number 2 stated that students liked 

writing in English subject. The result of the 

questionnaire showed that 21% of students 

strongly agreed, 68% of students agreed, and 

11% of students disagreed that writing in 

English subject was likeable. None of them 

strongly disagreed with that statement. 

 Item number 3 stated that the learning 

activity in the school was interesting. From the 

questionnaire result, there were 24% of 

students or 9 students strongly agreed, 65% of 

students or 25 students agreed, 11 of students 

or 4 students disagreed, and 0% or none of 

them strongly disagreed with the statement.  

Item number 4 stated thatwhether the 

students were excited about the technique use.. 

There were 42% of students strongly agreed, 

58% of students agreed, and none of them 

disageed and strongly disagreed. It meant that 

they were interested in the technique I used.  

Item number 5 stated that the students 

enjoyed learning through peer review. There 

were 42% of students strongly agreed, 58% of 

students agreed, and 0% of students disageed 

or strongly disagreed. It meant that the 

technique was enjoyable. 

 Item number 6 stated that the situation 

of the teaching learning process was enjoyable 

after being taught by peer review. There were 

37% of students strongly agreed, 58% of 

students agreed, and 5% of students disagreed 

and none of them strongly disagreed. 

Item number 7 statedpeer review 

technique could improve the students’ 

understanding of how to compose a good 

writing. It found that 37% of students \ 

strongly agreed, 60% of students agreed and 

3% of students disagreed and none of students 

strongly disagreed. 

Item number 8 stated peer review 

applied by the researcher in writing recount 

text could help the students improve their 

writing composition. There were 45% of 

students strongly agreed, 55% of students 

agreed, 0% or none of the students disagreed 

or strongly agreed. It could be seen on 

students’ improvement in aspects of writing in 

each test. 

Item number 9 stated that peer review 

applied by the researcher in writing recount 

text could help the students improve their 

writing. Item number 10 stated that writing 

practice by using peer review was necessary to 

be used continuously.  

Based on the questionnaire analysis, it 

showed that peer review technique teaching 

helped the students to improve their writing 

skill especially recount text. It could be seen on 

the tests result, the students’ score in writing 

recount text was increasing.   

 

CONCLUSION  

 

From the students’ achievements 

results, the writer draws some conclusions. 

They are: the students’ achievement of writing 

recount text of the eighth grade of students of 

SMP N 4 Batang in the academic year of 

2014/2015 was improving after being taught 

by peer review. It was proved by the data 

shown that there is improvement in this 

research. The average of the students’ writing 

score in the pre-test was 63, and it increased 



 

Candra Arifiana / Journal of English Language Teaching 4 (1) (2015) 

8 

11.29 points become 74.29 in the formative 

test and become 79.50 in the post-test.  

 Students’ learning behavior had been 

changed from first cycle and second cycle. The 

students’ learning behavior got better and 

better including their active and also their 

confidence in giving constructive feedback to 

their partner draft of recount text. The result is 

based on the analysis from the observation 

checklist about students’ behaviour and also 

the analysis of the questionnaire. 

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

 

Anderson, M. and Kathy A. 1997. Text Types in 

English. Australia: Macmillan Education 

Australia PTY LTD. 

 

Bartels, Nat. 2003. Written Peer Response In L2 

Writing. English Teaching Forum. 

Germany. 34-37 

 

Belcher, Diane. 2007. Genre and second language 

writing. United States of America: The 

University of Michigan Press. 

 

Best, J. W. 1981. Research in Education. New Jersey: 

Prentice- Hall Inc. 

 

Burns, Anne.. 2003. Collaborative Action Research for 

English Language Teachers. Cambridge: 

Cambridge University Press. 

 

Brown, H. D. 2004. Language Assessment: Principles 

and Classroom Practices. New York: Pearson 

Education. 

 

Celce-murcia, M. 2001.Teaching English as a 

Second Foreign Language (Third Edition). 

USA: Heinle&Heinle. 

 

Elliot, J. (1991) Action Research for Educational 

Change. Buckingham: Open University 

Press.  

 

Harmer, Jeremy. 2004. How to Teach Writing. 

United Kingdom: Longman. 

 

Helmi, Farid. 2012. Improving students’ skill in 

writing recount text by using a personal 

letter. Thesis. Semarang: IAIN Walisongo. 

 

Liu, J. and Hansen, J. 2005. Guiding Principles for 

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