INVESTIGATING STUDENTS’ WRITING QUALITY WITH DIFFERENT PROFICIENCY LEVELS IN INTERACTION-BASED PAIR WORKS

Pair work, an activity involving learners working together in pairs, has been widely used in language learning, especially in writing classes. Many studies have reported the effectiveness of this technique in improving students’ writing. However, there is scarce research on how the factors like students’ proficiency and the level of interaction may affect the effectiveness of pair work. This study, therefore, aims at investigating whether or not there is a significant difference in students’ writing (1) between the high proficient students working in the dominant-dominant pairs (H-DDP) and those working in the dominant-passive pairs (H-DPP), and (2) between the low proficient students working in the dominant-dominant pairs (L-DDP) and those working in the dominant-passive pairs (L-DPP). The experimental research design was taken on. There were forty-eight students involved in this study. The students were the English Department of private University in Madiun, East Java, Indonesia. Independent t-test by using SPSS 18.0 version was chosen to answer the research questions. The results show that the high proficient students working in the dominant-dominant pairs (H-DDP) perform better writing on argumentative essay than the high proficient students in the dominant-passive pairs (H-DPP). The students can manage their writing on argumentative essay effectively. The students give feedback to help each other by giving assistance in argumentative essay writing. Then, there is no significant difference of the low proficient students working in the dominant-dominant pairs (L-DDP) and those working in the dominant-passive pairs (L-DPP). Moreover, high proficiency influences the students working in pair work to write argumentative essay. This implies that teachers should consider students’ proficiency and level of social interaction before assigning students into pairs in writing classes.