Error analysis in complex sentences written by Indonesian students from the English education department

Adaninggar Septi Subekti

doi:10.24815/siele.v5i2.10686

Adaninggar Septi Subekti

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.24815/siele.v5i2.10686

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Abstract

This study was aimed to analyse errors made by learners in writing four types of complex sentences; complex sentences with adjective clauses, noun clauses, adverb clauses, and multiple-clause structures in an Essay Writing class. This study was done based on the realisation that learners’ grammatical knowledge is not always translated into accurate language production in real writing contexts and as a continuation of a previous study with the same participants which found that learners’ mastery of complex sentence structure affected their L2 writing achievements. Through document analysis of 40 essays, by these learners, using Thematic Analysis, the present study found five major themes of errors. They were lack of tense consistency, errors of omission, which included omission of verbs, omission of subjects and verbs, and omission of subjects, errors of addition, incorrect verb formations (double finite verbs), and the combination of several errors. Using Error Analysis as a framework, some possible contributing factors were further examined. Based on the findings, pedagogical implications and limitations, along with suggested directions for future research were also presented.

Highlights

English Education Departments (EED) of Indonesia’s universities at an undergraduate level typically have courses assessing learners’ basic skills, reading, listening, writing, and speaking, and three basic elements, vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar, in the first few semesters of their generally four-year study
As the most frequent errors have been identified, teachers should focus on these types of errors when teaching, teach these aspects better, and remind learners to be aware of them when writing and editing and/or when checking their own or other’s writing
The frequent errors learners made in writing might be due to the “weak” connection between grammar classes and writing classes

Summary

Introduction

English Education Departments (EED) of Indonesia’s universities at an undergraduate level typically have courses assessing learners’ basic skills, reading, listening, writing, and speaking, and three basic elements, vocabulary, pronunciation, and grammar, in the first few semesters of their generally four-year study These learners will typically be required to take at least two levels of classes such as Reading, A.S. Subekti, Error Analysis in Complex Sentences Written by Indonesian Students from the English Education Department | 186. Regardless of the various nomenclatures, become the place where these learners’ train to improve their writing The way that their teachers deliver the teaching-learning materials is various, depending on their teaching styles, the approaches they use and the description of the course in their respective institutions. Despite emphasising writing activities, writing classes require learners to be able to use their grammatical competence as the marking criteria normally consist of contents, organisation, and language use, in which grammatical aspects are embedded (Hartfield et al, 1985)

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