This thesis is describe the students ability in writing a descriptive text. The objective of the research is to find out the ability of the students in writing a descriptive text of eight grade of SMPN 9 Banjarmasin. Writing is one of the productive skills that must be learnt by the students. Among the four skills taught in schools, descriptive text is one of the writing skills in junior high school students. In a good writing, the students should understand about components in writing, they are : content, organization, vocabulary, grammar and mechanic.

This research is conducted using quantitative approach with descriptive design. The researcher uses a test as the instrument. The total number of the population in this research are 270 students and the sample is determined by cluster random sampling method with the sample of 30 students of VIII B. The result of the research shows that there is only 1 (3,44%) student who are in excellent category, 2 (6,66%) students in very good category, 12 (40%) students who are in good category, 4 (13.33 %) students in average category, 8 (26.66 %) students in low category, and 3 (10 %) students who are in very low category   .

Based on the result above, the researcher would like to suggest that the students should improve their writing skills, especially in making Descriptive text. For the English teacher in SMPN 9 Banjarmasin should give more explanation how to write a good description text, and then give them periodic exercise to write description text to improve their ability.