1.

0 INTRODUCTION
1.1 REFLECTIONS ON PAST TEACHING AND LEARNING
Teaching profession is something that will always need to have some
innovation as it is a vital process for human beings to develop themselves in
order to be a successful person in the future. Therefore, as a practical teacher
in one of the schools located in Banting area, I would like to test a new
method to help the pupils especially year 5 pupils to understand the sentence
construction. It is because they will definitely have to build their foundation
stronger as they will face rather difficult sentence construction as they go to
higher education.
Many pupils in the lower primary level who are from a non English
speaking environment or from lower socioeconomic status do have limited
vocabulary and poor sentence structure which does not allow them to use the
sentence structure that they had learnt in school in their real life situation.
Vandergrift (2006) suggested that the pupils need to comprehend what was
being spoken and that they need to construct a mental representation of what
they have understood. These pupils are unable to express an understanding
of a text or simple instruction due to a lack of word knowledge and meanings
and an inability to structure sentences correctly.
Related to the problems stated above, the need to help the pupils to be
able to construct their own sentence is my main focus for the third practicum
as I wanted to help them in creating their own sentences in a correct form
especially the SVOC. This had been a problem for my pupils since the first
practicum up until now. They are not able to construct their own sentences as
they do not know about how to generate ideas and arrange it by themselves.
Therefore, it had been my concerned that I need to develop a method that will
be able to help them to understand the SVOC sentence and apply it in their
exam as well as in their daily life.
For the first practicum of mine, I had taught the Year 2 pupils and they are
having the same problems as some of them were not be able to construct
their own sentences even by using the simplest sentence structure. The
pupils are only able to write the sentences with the guidance from the teacher

which will be too jaded and not challenging for them. Not only in the first
practicum, but I also faced this problem during the second practicum as I was
teaching the Year 3 pupils. Some of the pupils also are not being able to write
correct sentences. It has become much worse as for the last practicum, I am
teaching Year 5 pupils and they are having the same problems.
During the writing lesson in year five class, I had given them a task which
is to write the SVOC sentences by referring to the example shown to them in
front of the class which is the phrase cards as well as the substitution table.
Some of them are not able to generate ideas on how to write another
sentence except from the example given by the teacher. They just simply
copy the example pasted on the board. Some of the pupils also try to do on
their own, but the end result is disappointing me as they get the structure in
unorganized pattern. I can see that, some of them are able to do it, but for
those who cannot construct their own sentences, it is most probably cause by
the lacking of ideas.
As a conclusion, constructing a correct sentence using the SVOC
structure was the main problem that a teacher should overcome as not only
the lower primary pupils had problems with the sentence construction but also
the higher primary pupils. Therefore, the problem stated above needs a quick
strategy or technique to overcome it from being worse.

1.1.2 Assumptions, values, and beliefs upon teaching and learning

The assumptions that I have made from the problems stated before are based
on the pupils work that I give to them in the preliminary investigation. I assume that
they are not able to construct their own sentences, especially the SVOC because
they do not know how to generate their own idea of what should they write to
construct the SVOC sentence structure. I have tried many different ways, such as
the substitution table as well as personal coaching one face-to face interaction in
order to help them to understand and generate their own sentences, especially by
using the SVOC, but it does not work well for them. Therefore, I think that I need to
do something related to how to make the pupils to generate their own idea which is
through the brainstorming method. It is a good method as many researchers used
this method to help the lower achievement, pupils to be confident with themselves
and to boost up the knowledge input. Rao Z. (2007) stated that the brainstorming
techniques are designed to expand the cognitive toolkit pupils have at their disposal
when facing a writing task. By thinking about the questions given in different
perspectives, as well as exploring the perspectives of the others may develop the
skills to help them access and develop a broader range of ideas in a writing situation.
Through the use of brainstorming method which was one of the methods that I
wanted to research on the effectiveness of it in solving the SVOC sentence
construction problem, I hope that I will be able to use the method that I have planned
to cure the sentence construction problems among the pupils.

I would like to

develop the method by adding two more aspects. The two aspects are categorizing
and matching the words to form a correct SVOC sentence structure. By doing this
research in the teaching and learning practice in the school, I will be able to know
more about ways in handling those problems as research can act as a means of
professional development and continuous improvement for a teacher practitioners
and it also is relevant and practical form of a classroom research. This also has led
me to learn about how to manage things systematically and professionally document
the use of the method that I want to explore on as a way of getting my pupils to write
a correct SVOC sentence.

1.1.3 Methodology used

The research that I am going to implement in the next internship period
will be used Kemmis and Mc Taggart (1988) Action Research Model. It had
been stated by them that action research occurs through a dynamic and
complementary process, which consists of four essential moment: of
planning, action, observation and reflection. These moments are the
fundamental steps in a spiralling process through which participants in an
action research group undertake to:
-

Develop and plan of critically informed action to improve what is already

happening,
Act to implement the plan
Observe the effects of the critically informed action in the context in which it

occurs, and
Reflect on these effects as the basis for further planning, subsequent critically
informed action and so on, through a succession of stages.
Figure 5.0: Kemmis and Mc Taggarts (1988) Action Research Model.

Table 1.0 Descriptions of the Methodology

NO.

STEPS

IMPLEMENTATION

1
-

I wrote a reflection about the progress of the

writing lesson which involves the SVOC

Reflect
-

structure.
I reflect and point out the weaknesses in my
teaching practice as well as identifying the
problems faced by the Year 5 pupils.

2
Plan
-

I prepare a plan of action on what to do in order

to improve on the weaknesses in my teaching
practice as well as to solve the problems faced

by the pupils in SVOC sentence construction.

I am planning to use B-C-M Method to help
pupils to understand the sentence construction
especially the SVOC structure.

3
Act

I will implement the earlier plan in teaching them

the sentence construction.

I also will implement the B-C-M Method with the
chosen respondents from the class.

4
Observe

I will observe the progress of the respondent

during

the

implementation

and

after

the

implementation stage.
The end result of the observation will be
documented.