USING PATRICK THE WH

QUESTIONS TO IMPROVE YEAR 4

PUPILS
ABILITIES TO GENERATE IDEAS IN
WRITING

NURUL SHUHADA BINTI MAT

NOH 930717 08 6288
8 PISMP TESL / PSV / LGA

INTRODUCTION
For a child, spoken language is naturally acquired as they being
exposed to it but the writing ability has to be consciously
learned.
Planning -> drafting -> editing -> final
Writing process
draft

As teaching writing, teacher should be aware of the pupils need.

According to Kroeker (2015), in a recent survey, writers ranked
lack of ideas or writers block as number four on their list of
Examine
Audienc
Assistan
biggest
hurdlese
rs
t
Role
of teacher
Resourc
Evaluato
e

Editor

REFLECTION OF TEACHING AND LEARNING

EXPERIENCE
Asking me to help them to build
sentences
Took a long time to understand and work on the
exercise given
Struggled to produce their own sentences to continue the
words clues given
More time was spent on teaching pupils how to do the worksheet and
what the suitable words to put in instead of improving their writing
achievement

RESEARCH FOCUS
Problem situation
-Pupils write too short
- Pupils always copy back
the words clues
- Struggled to produce their
own sentences to continue
the words clues given

Root cause
-Pupils do not know
how to generates
ideas and expand the
word clues

Research focus
- To improve year 4
pupils abilities to
generate ideas in
writing by using
Patrick the WH
questions

PRELIMINARY DATA COLLECTION

Intervie Pupils actually are good in other skills in
English except writing.
w
Pupils always write back the words clues
English that were given in questions.
teacher

Diagnost
ic test

11 pupils were able to get over 50

marks with the highest marks was 82
marks.
The rest of them was under 50 marks
6 pupils get under 30 marks with the
lowest marks was 18 marks

ABOUT PATRICK THE WH

QUESTIONS

When students are bored, teaching writing is a like trying to

What
?

Wh
y?

drive a car out of gas you get nowhere

(Celsor 2015)

Wher
e?

WH questions are being use as it will generates idea

on what to talk about such as :

Who
?

Ho
w?

I believe it will help my pupils to generate idea in

writing as WH questions are the basic sign people use
to seek for information

When
?

Who - The person involves

What - The situation
Where - Place where the situation happened
When - The time where the situation happened
How How the situation happened
Why Why it happened

Signific
ant

Practic
ality

Pupils
can
easily
brainstor
m ideas
as they
know
what to
think
about

Can be
conduct
ed inside
or
outside
classroo
m
Costeffective

Workab
ility
Simple
and easy
to
conducted
Simple
preparation

Relevan
ce to
Can be
school
integrated to
other
subjects
such as
Bahasa
Melayu,
Bahasa Cina,
Bahasa Tamil
and Bahasa
Arab as the
focus of this
intervention
is to
generate
ideas in

LITERATURE REVIEW
Process of answering the Wh-question was reflected on
the development of the students writing in terms of
having better supporting sentences and ideas when
compared with the results of the pre-test (Faisal,2011)
There was evidence that the use of WH questions helped
the students to improve their writing, especially in the
qualitative aspect of writing (Samala,2006)
I dont need an alarm clock. My ideas wake me (Ray
Bradbury, 1986)

ACTION RESEARCH MODEL

planning my intervention based
on the pupils achievement in the
diagnostic test
Introduce the Patrick the WH
questions method

Model of action research by

Kemmis and Mctaggart

Implementation of
my intervention

Plan

Act

Reflect

Obser
ve

Looking at the
strength and
weaknesses using
the pupils result.
Analyse the data to
answer RQ

check and observe their

improvement for the three
lessons.
Pre-test and post-test
Document analysis
Interview

RESEARCH OBJECTIVES AND

Researc RESEARCH QUESTIONS
Researc

h
objectiv
es

To study the
effectiveness of
Patrick the WH star
methods to improve
the year 4 pupils
ability to generate
ideas in writing.
To improve the year
4 pupils ability to
generate ideas in
writing by using the
Patrick the WH star
method

h
questio
ns

Does the Patrick

the WH star
method improve the
year 4 pupils ability
to generate ideas in
writing skill?
How Patrick the WH
star method
improve the year 4
pupils ability to
generate ides in
writing skill?

RESEARCH PARTICIPANTS
Pupils come from backgrounds
mostly that not practice English
speaking family

Year 4
(first class
out of 4)

30 pupils
(7 males
and 23
females)all Malay

Most of my participations parents

work as factory workers at the
nearby factories, lorry and bus
driver, working on their own and
doing small business like opening a
small stall near the road

Only using English in classroom

when it comes to English subject

Pre-test

Implementation of action
Intervention 1

Intervention 2

Intervention 3

(worksheet)

(worksheet)

(worksheet)

-Pupils need to write

5 sentences on their

Post-test

-Pupils need to write

-Pupils need to

own as guided by the construct one

--Pupils need to

-Pupils need to

5 sentences on their

construct one

construct one

own as guided by the

pictures and words

sentence by using the sentence by using the sentence by using the pictures and words

clues.

WH questions from

WH questions from

WH questions from

clues.

-Pupils were given 30 the picture and words the picture and words the picture and words -Pupils were given 30
minutes to complete

clues given after

clues given after

clues given after

the test

done the group work. done the group work. done the group work.

minutes to complete
the test

Research questions

a)

Types of data

Data collection method

Data analysis method

1. Does the Patrick the WH

star method improve the year 4 Quantitative

Pre-test

pupils ability to generate ideas

the table and present the data in bar

in writing skill?

Post-test

graph to compare the achievements of

pupils during pre-test and post-test.

Analysis pupils marks based by put them

Document analysis (Worksheets) -

Analysis pupils marks by put them in

table and present it in bar graph to see
the achievement of pupils during each
lesson.

a)

2. How Patrick the WH star

method

Semi-structured interview

improve

the

year

4 Qualitative

pupils ability to generate ides

in writing skill?

Analysis the interview lesson and coding

it into categories.

To gain pupils feedback for the

intervention

DATA COLLECTION METHODSS

PRE-TEST &
POST-TEST
Consists of 5 pictures
and words clues where
they need to construct
one sentence
30 minutes

6 marks for each

complete sentence

DOCUMENT
ANALYSIS
Worksheet 1
Lesson 1
Construct 1 sentence based on
picture and words clues
Production stage
Worksheet 2
Lesson 2
Construct 1 sentence based on
picture and words clues
Production stage
Worksheet 3

Lesson 3
Construct 1 sentence based
on picture and words clues
Production stage

INTERVIEW
- Interview 6 pupils
(different gender and
different level of
achievement)

-consist of 5 questions
To gain feedback and
their opinion about the
effectiveness of Patrick
the WH questions in
improving pupils ability
to generate ideas in
writing

DATA ANALYSIS & FINDINGS

1Does the Patrick the WH questions method improve the
Q
R

year 4 pupils ability to generate ideas in writing skill?

Pre-test and posttest (Increase)

Document analysis
(Increase)

Patrick the WH questions

method improve the year 4
pupils ability to generate ideas
in writing skill

DATA ANALYSIS & FINDINGS

2
Q
R

How Patrick the WH quetions method improve the

year 4 pupils ability to generate ides in writing skill?

Patrick the WH questions

makes pupils understand
better
Semi structured
interview

Patrick the WH questions

makes pupils feel enjoy
during the lesson
Patrick the WH questions
help pupils construct
sentence

Managing Reliability & Validity Issues

Interview

Triangulation
analysis
Document
analysis

Instruments that I used in my research

(interview questions, pre-test and post-test
questions and worksheets) were checked
by my supervisor and cooperative teacher
to maintain its validity.
Questions that I prepare for the test is from
reliable sources (Activities book from well
known author)
Pre-test
and posttest

Ethical consideration
Briefly explain about
the procedures of my
research to the
schools
administrative,
teachers and pupils

Honest in
reporting data,
results,
procedures and
methods

Ask permission
from the schools
administrative ,
teacher and pupils
orally

Not expose the

real name of the
participants and
school

Reflection
My belief
Writing can be an
interesting skill if
the teacher knows
how to attract his
or her pupils
I never teach my
pupils. I only
attempt to provide
the conditions in
which they can
learn
Albert enstein

Strength

Able to
motivate
pupils to
learn
writing

Weaknes
ses

There are
weak
pupils who
still
unsure
about how
to use the
Patrick
the WH
questions
method

Ways to
overcom
e
Group
these
weak
pupils
together,
explain
again and

monitor
their
progress

Able to motivate pupils to learn

writing

SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER

RESEARCH
Lengthen the time period
Conduct more than 1 cycle
Apply the Patrick the WH questions in other subject
eg: Malay language
Vary the activities by using the Patrick the WH questions
method

Descriptive Analysis of Worksheets

Research
participants (RP)

Worksheet 1

Worksheet 2

Worksheet 3

Min score

Max score

Mean

3.77

4.37

5.33

Comparison of mean scores

6
5.33
5
4.37
4
3

Wor
kshe
et 1

3.77
Wor
kshe
et 2

Wor
kshe
et 3

2
1
0

Descriptive Analysis of Pre-test and Post-test

Research
participants (RP)

Pre-test

Post-test

Min score

Max score

14

28

Mean

10.067

20.0

Comparison of mean scores

25
20

20

15

10

10.07

Pre-test
1

Post-test
2

Analysis of semi-structured interview

Interview
text
Pp1:

help

me

the Pp5:help

examination later

Pp6:

Pp3: yes, it helps

write sentence

(because hmmm

Pp4:

it

help

me

think
Pp5: it help me a
lot
Pp6:yes,it
me write

because it give me

Pp2: Enjoy

new knowledge

Pp4:Enjoy

ul

Pp2: Enjoy

Pp5: Enjoy

because I feel proud

Pp3: Yes., ic an

to learn with you

understand now on how what to write

Pp3: happy

to write

me

sentence think

during

Pp1: Enjoy

Helpf

Pp3: helps

Pp2: it can help me Pp4:help

build

Pp1: Enjoy

to Pp2: help

understand

helped

help

to

Theme

Interview text

because it is not

Key
words

Key
words

Theme

Interview text

Pp1: I

Enjoya

ideas

Pp3: Understand

ble

how to write a sentence construct sentence

Pp5: Get ideas on

Pp6: Know how to

Pp4: Because I have the construct sentence

want

construct sentence so it

it

frequently

is easy

Pp4: Enjoy

Pp5:

Pp 5: Happy

construct the complete

Pp 6: Enjoy

sentence because I get

I felt like I want to

Theme

Practical

Pp2: I understand now Pp4: Have ideas to

ideas now on how to

learn

can get more Pp2: Understand

boring and I feel like

to

Key words

I know how to

ideas on what to write

learn again

Pp6:

know

construct

how

to

sentence

ity

REFERENCES
Faisal, M. (2011). The Effect of Wh-Questions on the Quantity and Quality of Low-Level Achieving Students
Paragraph Writing At the University Level. Dirasatedu, 38(1), 367. Retrieved from
https://journals.ju.edu.jo/DirasatEdu/article/viewFile/3111/2696
Celsor, R. (2015). Top 5 Reasons Students Hate to Write. The write foundation.
Retrieved 7 September 2016, from http://thewritefoundation.org/articles/top-five-reasons-students-hate-to-write/
Khwaileh, F. (2011). The Effect of Wh-Questions on the Quantity and Quality of
Low-Level Achieving Students Paragraph Writing At the University Level. Educational Sciences,38(1), 360-363.
Retrieved from http://file:///C:/Users/User/Downloads/3099-6105-1-SM%20(2).pdf
Lay Huah, D. (2012). Puchong, Selangor Darl Ehsan: Penerbitan Multimedia SDN. BHD.
Rohmahtul, H., & Nurvica, P. (2015). The Effectiveness of Wh Questions Towards Generating Ideas in Writing
Recount Text at The Eight Grade Students of SMP Hasan Munahir Karangan in Academic Year 2014/2015 (1st ed., p.
24). Retrieved from http://repo.iain-tulungagung.ac.id/1989/
Richard, J.C., & Renandya, W. A. (2002). Methodology in Language Teaching: An Anthology of Current Practice, New
York: Cambridge University Press
Dokumen Standard Prestasi KSSR Bahasa Inggeris Tahun 4. Kuala Lumpur: Bahagian Perkembangan
Kurikulum.