Development of capitalization and punctuation (Cap) sheet as a supplementary writing material

Abstract

This study is a developmental research that aimed to develop an instructional material to augment the learners' writing skills, specifically on addressing the learning gap on the proper usage of capitalization and punctuations. To determine the level of competence, a researcher-made competence test was conducted to 100 randomly selected Grade 10 learners. The result of the competence test revealed that the learners had a very low level of competence on the proper usage of capitalization and punctuation. The Input- Process-Output (IPO) Model was utilized in the development of the instructional material. The developed material CaP Sheet is a 67-page worksheet composed of three parts: the preliminary pages where the competence test was included; the Unit I which discussed the 10 rules of capitalization; and Unit II which discussed the 10 most common punctuation marks used in writing. The developed instructional material was then subjected to evaluation by five (5) experts in the field of instructional material development, curriculum development, language teaching, and teachers. The evaluation determined the level of acceptability in terms of content quality, presentation and organization, accuracy and up-to-dateness of information, and assessment. The mean and standard deviation were the statistical tools used to analyze the data collected from the five evaluators of the CaP Sheets. The results of the evaluation of the Capitalization and Punctuation (CaP) Sheet on the content quality is highly acceptable with the rating (M = 3.83, SD = 0.38). On the presentation and organization, the CaP Sheet also got a highly acceptable rating (M = 3.76, SD = 0.44). On the accuracy and up-to-dateness of information, it got a highly acceptable rating (M = 3.73, SD = 0.46), and on the assessment, the CaP Sheet also got a highly acceptable rating (M = 3.80, SD = 0.41). In overall criteria, the developed CaP Sheet got a highly acceptable rating with an overall mean of 3.79 and standard deviation of 0.41. The result also revealed that the CaP Sheet, as a supplementary writing material for writing, is interpreted as highly acceptable and met the objectives of the study. With a very good rating on its evaluation, the developed material may be used to augment the writing skills of the Grade 9 learners. The gathered data and results in this study may be used by the schools and administrations as a basis on formulating school program to elevate the quality of education to the learners. At the same time, the results of this study will be useful to both teachers or learning facilitators and learners since they will have additional instructional material to use, targeting specifically the writing skills o the learners.