1 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES NGỤY VÂN THÙY AN INVESTIGATION INTO COMMON WRITTEN ERRORS COMMITTED BY FIRST YEAR STUDENTS AT NGHE AN ECONOMICS AND TECHNOLOGY COLLEGE Khảo sát lỗi viết sinh viên năm thứ trường cao đẳng Kinh tế – Kỹ thuật Nghệ An thường mắc phải M.A Minor Programme Thesis Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60.14.10 HANOI – 2010 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES NGỤY VÂN THÙY AN INVESTIGATION INTO COMMON WRITTEN ERRORS COMMITTED BY FIRST YEAR STUDENTS AT NGHE AN ECONOMICS AND TECHNOLOGY COLLEGE Khảo sát lỗi viết sinh viên năm thứ trường cao đẳng Kinh tế – Kỹ thuật Nghệ An thường mắc phải M.A Minor Programme Thesis Field: English Teaching Methodology Code: 60.14.10 Supervisor: Phạm Thị Hạnh, M.A HANOI - 2010 TABLE OF CONTENTS Declaration i Acknowledgements ii Abstract iii Table of contents iv List of Abbreviations vii List of tables viii Part A: Introduction 1 Rationale of the study Aim of the study Scope of the study Research questions Structure of the study Part B: Development Chapter I: Liturature review 1.1 Writing 1.2 Paragraph 1.3 Errors and Mistakes 1.4 Classification of errors 1.4.1 Interlingual Errors 1.4.2 Intralingual Errors 1.5 Sources of errors 1.5.1 Interlingual interference 1.5.2 Intralingual Interference 10 1.5.2.1 Overgeneralization 10 1.5.2.2 Ignorance of rule restriction 10 1.5.2.3 Incomplete application of rules 11 1.5.2.4 False concepts hypothesized 11 1.6 Error analysis 11 1.7 Significance of error analysis 12 1.8 Error Frequency 13 Chapter II: Research Method 16 2.1 Research questions 16 2.2 Research methodology 16 2.3 Participants and context of the study 16 2.3.1 Context of teaching and learning at NgheAn Economics and Technology college 17 2.3.2 Participants and their background 17 2.4 Research Instrument 18 2.5 Procedure of data collection 19 2.5.1 Collection of samples 19 2.5.2 Identification of errors 19 2.5.3 Classification of errors 19 2.5.4 Explanation of errors 20 2.5.5 Evaluation of errors 20 Chapter III: Findings And Discussion 21 3.1 Findings 21 3.2 Discussion 24 3.2.1 The most common errors 24 3.2.1.1 Preposition errors 24 3.2.1.2 Errors in Verb Tense 26 3.2.1.3 Errors in using Articles 27 3.2.1.4 Subject-Verb agreement errors 28 3.2.1.5 Errors in Verb form 29 3.2.1.6 Errors in pluralization 29 3.2.2 The cause of those errors 29 3.2.2.1 Mother tongue interference 30 3.2.2.2 Overgeneralization 31 3.2.2.3 Ignorance of rule restrictions: 32 3.2.2.4 Incomplete application of rules: 33 3.2.2.5 False concepts hypothesized 34 Chapter IV: Pedagogical Implications and recommendations 4.1 Pedagogical Implications 4.1.1 Implications for teachers 35 35 35 4.1.2 4.2 Implications for syllabus designers 35 Recommendations 36 4.2.1 Peer-correction 37 4.2.2 Teacher correction 37 Part C: Conclusions 38 Conclusions 38 Limitations of the study 38 Suggestions for further study 39 References 40 List of Abbreviations EA: Error Analysis L1: The first language L2: The second language 10 List of tables Table 1: Collected data about errors made by students in their free writings 21 Table 2: Collected data about errors made by students in their final writing tests 22 Table 3: Comparative data about errors made by students 22 Table 4: Frequency of each types of errors 23 11 Part A: Introduction Rationale of the study English has recently been used in many fields of life in Vietnam It has entered into politics, economics, tourism, electronics, telecommunication, culture and science and technology It is not only a means but also a key to accessing the latest achievements of science and technology Further more, it‟s English that brings Vietnam closer to many other countries in the World Therefore, it is necessary for many Vietnamese to have a good command of English to satisfy the growing needs in a developing country like Vietnam Learning a language is a lifelong process And whenever a language is learnt or acquired, one is faced with the problem of errors As a famous saying goes “to err is human” In the process of language development, this is also the case When the utterances produced by learners are examined and compared with the target language norm, they are often found to be full of errors Errors are an inevitable feature of learning process As it is known in 1950s, behaviourist learning theory described language learning as habit formation and explained why learners made errors According to based language teaching, old habits hinder or facilitate forming new habits That is why errors are unwanted Since the errors were result of non-learning rather than wrong learning, there was a danger of errors becoming habits if they were tolerated, so like sin, error should be avoided However, in recent years, many experts on Communicative language teaching have emphasized the significance of EFL/ESL learners‟ errors which have been considered as “a way of learning” (Olsson,1974), as “strategy the learner uses in order to learn” (Corder,1981), as “a natural and unavoidable part” of their language learning process (Doff, 1988), and as the learners‟ “learning steps” (Edge,1989) Nunan (2001) believed that “linguists and educators began studying the specific language learners used as they attempted to communicate in the target language” and that “errors were seen not as evidence of pathology on the part of learners, but as normal and healthy part of learning process ”.They are not problems to be overcome or evils to be eradicated They, in fact, are part of learning and reveal the strategies that learners use to learn a language They provide valuable insight into the language learning process 12 Being a teacher of English at Nghe An Economics and Technology college for five years, I have marked many students‟ final written tests I found that, students made a lot of mistakes and errors in their writings The errors they have made were grammatical errors, vocabulary errors, semantics errors, or errors of coherence and cohesion ect… As teachers, how should we treat those errors? how to make their writing better? Having realized the significance of focusing on learners‟ errors in learning and teaching a language, I this research to investigate into the most common errors committed in the process of foreign language acquisition by first year students at Nghe An Economics and Technology college to find and draw out the best possible solutions to solve the problems mentioned above This research attempts to overview the background theories of learners‟ errors analysis, investigate and find out the causes of those errors More importantly, this study tries to give some suggestions on how to treat students‟ errors in the process of foreign language acquisition Aims of the study This study tries to: - investigate the errors made by first year students of Nghe An Economics and Technology college in their written work - identify and classify the errors into various categorizations - draw out the most common errors that committed by first year students of Nghe An Economics and Technology college in their written work; and - recommend methods of treating errors for teachers and students of English at Nghe An Economics and Technology college Scope of the study Learning a foreign language is a step by step process, during which errors or mistakes are to be expected These errors and mistakes are now considered a part of language learning process Therefore, instead of seeing errors negatively as a sign of failure, we can see them positively as an indication of what still needs teaching However, due to the limitation of time, and more importantly, the requirements of academic thesis, this study could not cover all types of errors of all four language skills I just focus on the analysis of written errors, especially the grammatical errors which are committed by first year students at Nghe An Economics and Technology college under the study of their writings, thereby 13 making some pedagogical suggestions for error treatment that I believe may be appropriate to the context of Nghe An Economics and Technology college Research questions For the achievement of the above objectives, this study was designed to seek the answers to the following questions: What are the most common written errors committed by first year students at Nghe An college of Economics and Technology? What are the main sources of those errors? Structure of the study The study was structured into main parts Part A is the introduction in which the rationale, the aims, the research questions, the scope and the structure of the study are presented Part B is the development of the study in which three chapters are presented Chapter I consists of the literature review in which various perspectives on error and error analysis which have been documented in the literature are reviewed to provide a theoretical background of the study Chapter II is about the research methods in which the research questions, research approach, research instrument, data collection, participants and context of the study and procedure of investigation are given Chapter III is about findings and discussion Some pedagogical implications and recommendation are included in chapter IV of this part Part C is the conclusions which deal with the main summary of the study Limitations and suggestions for further study are presented in this part as well ... ERRORS COMMITTED BY FIRST YEAR STUDENTS AT NGHE AN ECONOMICS AND TECHNOLOGY COLLEGE Khảo sát lỗi viết sinh vi? ?n n? ?m thứ trường cao đẳng Kinh tế – Kỹ thuật Nghệ An thường mắc phải M.A Minor Programme... of Nghe An Economics and Technology college in their written work; and - recommend methods of treating errors for teachers and students of English at Nghe An Economics and Technology college Scope... VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES NGỤY V? ?N THÙY AN INVESTIGATION INTO COMMON WRITTEN ERRORS COMMITTED