Abstract:
This study examined the effects of teacher scaffolding on grade 11 students’ paragraph writing skills. Specifically, it investigated whether there was statistical significant difference between the experimental and control groups of participants on their paragraph writing performance. In addition, the study assessed the reactions of the experimental group towards the teacher scaffolding intervention program. The study employed a quasi-experimental design with quantitative data collection and analysis method. Test (pre and posttest) and questionnaire were tools used to gather data. The pretest and posttest results of the experimental group (EG) and control group (CG) were analyzed through independent samples t-test and paired samples t- test methods of analyses. One sample t-test was employed to analyze the data collected through the questionnaire. The results of the pre-tests revealed that, the mean scores were 25.095 for EG and 23.837 for CG and the significance value sig 2- tailed was 0.735 i.e. greater than the p- value 0.05. This confirmed that there was no significant difference between EG and CG in their pretest. Thus, the groups were homogeneous in paragraph writing performance before the treatment. In contrast, the results of the post-test indicated that the sig 2-tailed = 0.005 i.e. < 0.05. In addition, the pretest – posttest comparison of the EG revealed that sig 2-tailed = 0.011< 0.05. Both the posttest and pretest – posttest results showed that, there was statistically significant difference between the pretest and posttest results of the group. On the other hand, the pretest - posttest comparison of the CG indicated sig.2-tailed = 0.866 i.e. > 0.05. Thus, the CG did not show significant difference in their paragraph writing performance. Questionnaire results further indicated that EG has got the conceptual knowledge of paragraph writing. They were motivated and initiated by the teacher scaffolding to improve their writing skills. Thus, it can be concluded that teacher scaffolding has a positive effect on the students’ paragraph writing achievement to practice their writing skills independently