Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menentukan kesulitan siswa dalam menulis teks naratif di kelas Sembilan SMP Muhammadiyah 2 Tarakan dan untuk mendeskripsikan cara siswa mengatasi kesulitan yang dialami dalam menulis teks naratif di kelas Sembilan SMP Muhammadiyah 2 Tarakan. Metodologi penelitian yang dipergunakan ialah metode kualitatif untuk mendapatkan data. Peneliti menggunakan penelitian deskriptif untuk menyampaikan hasil penelitian. Pada teknik pengumpulan data, penelitian ini mempergunakan hasil test menulis siswa, nilai siswa dan wawancara. Subjek penelitian ini yaitu siswa kelas sembilan SMP Muhammadiyah 2 Tarakan sebanyak 32 siswa. Hasil penelitian mengungkapkan bahwa kesulitan siswa terdapat dalam dua kategori yaitu kategori dalam aspek linguistik dan aspek kognitif. Setelah dianalisis, kesulitan siswa dalam aspek linguistik terdapat delapan kategori kesulitan yang paling dominan pada saat menulis cerita naratif yaitu grammar, kosa kata, ejaan, kata penghubung, kata ganti, tanda baca dan kata sifat. Sedangkan kesulitan siswa dalam aspek kognitif terdapat setengah dari subjek penelitian yaitu sekitar 16 orang mengalami kesulitan dalam penulisan organisasi dan mekanik sebuah teks naratif. Hal ini disebabkan oleh kurangnya pengetahuan siswa dalam penulisan teks naratif yang baik dan benar.

Kata Kunci: Kesulitan Siswa, Menulis, Teks Naratif

The purpose of the study was to determine students' difficulties in writing narrative text at the ninth-grade students of SMP Muhammadiyah 2 Tarakan and to describe how the students overcome the difficulties in writing narrative text at the ninth-grade students of SMP Muhammadiyah 2 Tarakan. The research used was descriptive qualitative method. In the data collection, the researcher employed students’ writing test result, students’ grades and interviews. The subjects of the study were 32 ninth grade students of SMP Muhammadiyah 2 Tarakan. The results revealed that the students faced difficulties in two categories: linguistic aspects and cognitive aspects. Among the linguistic aspects, eight categories of difficulties were found to be most dominant when writing narrative stories, namely grammar, vocabulary, spelling, conjunctions, pronouns, punctuation and adjectives. Half of the research subjects, around 16 people, experienced difficulties in organizing and writing a narrative text due to their lack knowledge. Half of the research subjects, around 16 people, experienced difficulties in organizing and writing a narrative text due to their lack knowledge. It is important to note that the cognitive aspect was not the only challenge faced by the students.Half of the research subjects, around 16 people, experienced difficulties in organizing and writing a narrative text due to their lack knowledge. Keywords: Student Difficulty, Writing, Narrative text.