Pupils’ Written Language in the Latvian Language and History State Examinations in Riga in 2021

Abstract

The research examines pupils’ text creation skills in the Latvian language and history state examinations in 2021. It compares the quality of written language in two examination papers by 15 pupils. The statistical method has been used to evaluate the types of errors in orthography and syntax and establish the frequency of the use of the language means. Pupils’ skills in orthography vary. Only 4 examination papers in Latvian and history do not contain orthographic errors. Writing complex proper names and the use of macrons cause problems for pupils. Similarly, the skills of separate spelling of some words have been underdeveloped. Also, an unjustified lack of a letter or unjustified use of it can be observed. Pupils pay more attention to orthography in the Latvian language examination. Pupils’ skills in syntax are also varied. Syntactical means used in text creation are uniform. In the Latvian language examination papers, 143 instances when coordinated parts of sentence were used have been registered; 78 such instances have been registered in the history examination. In both examinations, a connection of two coordinated parts with the conjunction un ‘and’ was used most frequently, with 78 cases in Latvian and 32 in history. Also, the participial clause, including the undeclinable participle with the suffix -ot and auslaut -oties, was dominant (60% in history, 40% in Latvian). In the third part of the Latvian language examination, insertions were used more often than in the history examination, 63% and 37%, respectively. Other syntactic means were rarely used. It can be concluded that there are no significant differences in the types of orthographic and punctuation errors in the Latvian language and history examination papers; the differences are visible in the choice of language means and their quantity.