A CORRELATIONAL STUDY BETWEEN WRITING INTEREST, VOCABULARY MASTERY, AND WRITING SKILL OF THE TENTH GRADE STUDENTS OF SMA NEGERI 1 KARANGANYAR IN THE ACADEMIC YEAR OF 2012/2013

The objectives of this research are to find out the correlation between (1) Writing Interest and Writing Skill; (2) Vocabulary Mastery and Writing Skill; (3) Writing Interest, Vocabulary Mastery, and Writing Skill. The study was carried out in May 2013 at SMA Negeri 1 Karanganyar. The method used in this research was a correlational study. The population in this study was all the tenth grade students of SMA Negeri 1 Karanganyar which consist of nine classes. The total number of the students was 378 students. The sample was 34 students taken by cluster random sampling technique. The instruments in collecting the data were questionnaire and tests. The questionnaire was used to collect the data of writing interest; while the objective test was used to collect the data of vocabulary mastery; and the essay test was used to collect the data of writing skill. The techniques which were used to analyze the data were Pearson Product Moment and Multiple Correlations. The result of this study shows that (1) there is a positive correlation between writing interest and writing skill (rx1y = 0.680 >rt = 0.339); (2) there is a positive correlation between vocabulary mastery and writing skill (rx2y = 0.846 >rt = 0.339); (3) there is a positive correlation between writing interest, vocabulary mastery simultaneously and writing skill (Ry12 is 0.889 and Fo = 58.692 > Ft = 3.32). Based on the result of the study, it is known that the first hypothesis saying that there is a positive correlation between writing interest and writing skill is accepted. The second hypothesis saying that there is a positive correlation between vocabulary mastery and writing skill is also accepted. Meanwhile, the third hypothesis saying that there is a positive correlation between writing interest, vocabulary mastery simultaneously and writing skill of the tenth grade students of SMA Negeri 1 Karanganyar in the academic year of 2012/2013 is also accepted. The result of the research shows that writing interest and vocabulary mastery are important variables for writing skill. Both writing interest and vocabulary mastery have positive contribution in writing skill. Therefore, writing interest and vocabulary mastery should be considered in increasing writing skill, although the factors are not only come from those variables. Keywords: Correlation, Writing Interest, Vocabulary Mastery, Writing Skil