STUDENTS' PERCEPTION ON THE IMPLEMENTATION OF MIND MAPPING FOR WRITING SKILLS

Writing skills are needed in learning a language and require a process that is not instant. One of the ways to helps student to improve and develop their writing skills is by using mind mapping as alternative strategy. The aims of this research are to know what the advantages of mind mapping for writing skills and to find out the student's obstacles when they make mind mapping based on students’ perception. The data was obtained by interviewing four students grade eight from junior high school of one Private school at East Belitung. The findings showed that students have positive view on the implementation of mind mapping for writing skills: 1) Mind mapping can help them understand the material easier, 2) Mind mapping stimulates students to be creative, and 3) Mind mapping is fun by adding the colour, draw, and lines. Additionally, there are two commonly obstacles that students faced when making mind map in writing, including: 1) Difficult in finding the keywords of mind mapping, and 2) Difficult in connecting keyword to full idea in mind mapping. Mind mapping helps students in practicing students' writing skills in English because the shape of mind mapping has lots of colors, pictures, and lines. However, it should be noted that students also face some difficulties when learning English writing skills using mind mapping.