Abstract
In this age of globalization, EFL writing skills are essential for Chinese undergraduates, especially in the areas of communication, education and business cooperation. The objective of this study is to study and analyze EFL descriptive writing errors among Chinese undergraduates, according to gender and faculty of study. Descriptive research design was employed in this study. The undergraduate students in the study were given a descriptive writing test and their essays were marked by a lecturer using rubric provided by the researchers. The sample of the study consisted of 400 Chinese undergraduate students (200 males and 200 females,) from Hunan City University in Hunan Province, China. Stratified random sampling was employed in selecting the samples. Students’ errors in EFL writing were analyzed based on Corder’s error analysis and James’s classification of errors. The findings from quantitative data revealed that male students made significantly more errors than female students in their overall writing, mechanical, coherence and cohesion, grammar, lexical and sentence structures. There is also significant difference in the mean errors among students from the four faculties. Moreover, the results indicated that the students from the faculties of Education Management and Chinese Language Studies (social sciences) performed better than the students from the other faculties. In terms of pedagogical implications, the findings suggest that further research should be carried out to minimize male students’ errors in their writing skills as well as the students from the Information Technology and Civil Engineering faculties.
Highlights
Is there a significant difference in the total number of writing errors in descriptive writing among Chinese undergraduates according to gender?
The findings of the quantitative data of the current study reveal that female students made significantly less errors than their male counterparts in the overall number of errors as well as in mechanics, coherence and cohesion, grammar, lexical items and structure
This study indicates that students from different faculties perform differently in their descriptive writings
Summary
In the process of language learning, language learners inevitably commit errors. These errors convey information and messages about the process of language learning, learners’ language competence and the roots of those errors. Analyzing learners’ errors has become an essential requirement for answering some questions and proposing solutions to different aspects of language teaching. In the age of globalization, good English writing skills are essential for communication, education and business cooperation (Kelly-Riley, 2015). The essays written by ESL or EFL students who learn English as a second or foreign language usually contain different types of errors. In other words, acquiring English writing skills has always been a challenge for English learners. By analyzing the writing errors committed by English learners, teachers can know the sources and types of these errors, so as to adopt more effective teaching methods and strategies and to improve the English writing ability of English learners (Hart Research Associates, 2015)
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