The Analysis of EFL Students? Needs for Writing Materials Development

This paper discusses the needs and interests of the students of English Education Department of STAIN Prepare, Indonesia for essay writing materials. The students taken as the sample of the research were the fifth semester students of academic year 2015/2016 who registered in essay course classroom. Data on students needs and interests were found through needs analysis, which used observation and questionnaire as data gathering instruments. Through the needs analysis, it is found that the students have been familiar with writing activities done outside the classroom such as writing SMS, diary, or literary works such as poem, short story, etc. . However, their writing ability was still low, since their mastery in sentence structure was still the basic structure of English sentences. Moreover, they have difficulties in some of writing skills, such as arranging ideas in a paragraph, writing by using correct grammar, and completingthe writing on time, which are rooted from their weaknesses in grammar, structure, and vocabulary. In addition, students were interesting to write topics about their real life, that they function language as the representation of reality such as to make statement, to convey facts and knowledge, and to explain or report (Michael Halliday, 1973 cited in Brown, 1994). Finally, the research also found their learning needs such as their preferred classroom participations and preferred places to do writing activities. Students thought group work was more interesting than pair work and individual work. Moreover, students prefer to do writing activities outside the classroom to in the classroom.