Basic Level Students’ Proficiency in Free Writing

Abstract

The present study entitled “Basic level Students’ Proficiency in Free Writing” aimed at determining the students’ proficiency of grade 8 in free writing. Survey was used as a research design. The sample wasone hundred and five students selected from seven community schools of Lahan municipality through simple random sampling procedure. The study used essay writing and paragraphs writing as tools for data collection. The collected data were analyzed and interpreted with the help of the tables and statistical tools such as mean and percentage. The findings show low proficiency of students in free writing seen from the measures of ability in subject matter, cohesion and coherence, vocabulary, grammar and mechanics. The students who had below basic level category of proficiency were 44.81%, basic level category were 29.29%, proficient 1 category were 19.16%, proficient 2 were 3.53%, proficient 3 were 3.15% whereas students haven’t achieved advance level of proficiency. The overall performance was below 40% indicating students’ low proficiency in writing. This thesis consists of five chapters. The first chapter incorporates the background of the study, statements of the problem, rational of the study, objectives of the study, research questions, delimitations of the study, and the operational definition of the key terms. The second chapter contains review of both theoretical and empirical literature along with their implications, and conceptual framework. The third chapter deals with methods and procedures of the study which comprise design and method of the study, population, sample and sampling strategy, research tools, sources of data, data collection procedures and ethical considerations. The fourth chapter deals with the analysis of data, and interpretation of the results. The fifth chapter determines findings, conclusions and recommendations.