BANKING ACADEMY OF VIETNAM FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES GRADUATION THESIS AN ANALYSIS OF COMMON WRITING ERRORS IN GRAPH/CHART DESCRIPTION AMONG ATC SENIORS AT THE BANKING ACADEMY Fu
INTRODUCTION
Rationale of the study
In the workplace, people can communicate with each other in one way or another One typical form is written communication that plays a vital role from organisations to organizations A routine type of written communication in the bussiness settings includes emails, letters, memos and reports, which are written to exchange the information or to give out the solutions to deal with the problems Of these workplace texts, reports have a significant degree of use and is a rather challenging task in writing (Keane & Gibson, 1999; Wu&Chin, 2010; Chan, 2014; Takino,
2020) Reports can be presented by either formal or informal way; however, in a working environment, people tend to use the formal way to express their respect with their coworkers Reports play an essential role because these are the summary of data from the company in a particular period of time Basing on a considerable amount of information in the reports, managers and decision-makers can understand the situation of organizations and give the solutions if necessary
Report writing can be described as a career skill Not only is it a task that forms part of an increasing number of business jobs, but also it can make a huge difference to how writers are perceived and even how well they get on in their career Today, good communication skills and the ability to write effective reports are essential competencies for every successful businessperson (Bowden, 2008)
Understanding the importance of writing a report, many universities around the world have incorporated the subject “Report writing” in their curricula to familiarize students with the steps of writing a complete report
Although students study writing report skills in their universities, they may not apply everything they learn to their own writings Especially, to those who study English as a second language, challenges to writing this genre can be exacerbated by language barriers They can face problems related not only to how to write a report but also to how to use the English language properly Naturally, a variety of
2 writing errors, though serious or minor, emerge as part of their learning process The situation is also mirrored by Vietnamese learners when it comes to report writing
Nowadays, there are many research papers on writing errors committed by ESL learners in general First, Corder (1975, p.218) focused on analysing the effects of interlanguage on errors Then, Myles (2002) investigated the sources of errors Next, Ferris (2011) emphasized the treatment of the errors to give feedbacks for learners Finally, Chaudhary and Zahrani (2020) explored the types, frequency and sources of errors However, the number of reports on writing errors made in report writing, especially in graph/chart description remains limited
Given all the things mentioned above and the critical demand for mastering English, this report was conducted to investigate common writing errors made by English major seniors at the Banking Academy when it comes to graph/chart description.
Objectives of the study
In order to realise the research goal, this study focuses on
examining the common types of writing errors made by English major seniors at the Banking Academy;
recommending some measures to fix these errors.
Significance of the study
1.3.1 For the ATC students & ATC seniors
This study will be an important basis for ATC students in general and ATC seniors in particular because it points out the common writing errors and possible causes of these errors, which can help students to avoid making them Accordingly, students can reflect on essay writing during their writing process Hourani (2008) commented that students can learn from the errors made by other students, which enables them to have a clear view about the writing errors and gain their target scores
Lastly, they are important for the learners themselves as they can learn about language accuracy
1.3.2 For ATC lecturers & those who are in charge of report-writing skills
Report-writing teachers can have an objective perspective about students’ errors From that, they can figure out suitable teaching methods to improve student's performance in this subject Hourani (2008) indicated that errors were important in three different dimensions The first dimension is errors can demonstrate to teachers how much progress students made Moreover, Peng (1976) emphasized that error analysis helped teachers to conduct remedial teaching in teaching a foreign language All things considered, although making errors is not desirable, it can be asserted that errors are regarded as valuable materials to be studied in the process of learning a foreign language
1.3.3 For other researchers in the relevant aspects
This research plays a part in the contextualization of the research topic Describing graphs/charts is not a new task, but currently, there is little research on it Thus, this research serves as a basis for future researchers to rely on and continue to develop new and more diverse dimensions of their study in the report writing genre As stated by Hourani (2008), errors provide evidence for researchers on how language is learned or acquired and what strategies or techniques learners use in exploring the language.
Scope and limitations
The research centers on studying the types of common writing errors as well as solutions to the problems
This study was conducted at the Banking Academy (Hanoi, Vietnam) among English major seniors for about 2 months from March 2021 to May 2021 according to the graduation thesis completion schedule set by the Faculty of Foreign
Languages There were 29 students who are fourth-year students in the same report writing class participating in the study by filling in the consent form and providing their personal writings
In graph/chart description, this research concentrates on some types of graph/chart that include: line chart, bar/column graph/chart, and pie chart (circle graph) The reason is the report writing skill module for English majors at the Banking Academy is mainly associated with these types of graph/chart
The sample size of the study is 29 English major seniors in the same report writing class It was difficult to take more samples because other student groups have different features regarding years of study and language levels In fact, the sample size remains small, which poses a significant difficulty in making generalizations The results from student writings which were analyzed by only an evaluator may be vulnerable to subjectivity.
List of key terms
An error is “the use of a word, speech act or grammatical items in such a way it seems imperfect and significant of an incomplete learning” (Richard, 2002), whereas Ferris (2011) defines the term basing on three linguistic aspects: “errors are a morphological, syntactic, and lexical forms that deviate from rules of the target language, violating the expectations of literate adult native speakers”
Report is an organized presentation of factual information, often aimed at multiple audiences that may present the results of an investigation, a trip, or a research project For any report—whether formal or informal—assessing the readers’ needs is essential (Alred, 2011) A report is a more highly structured form of writing than an essay, and is designed so that it can be read quickly and accurately; though reports are not necessarily read from the beginning to the end Structure and convention in written reports stress the process by which the information was gathered as much as the information itself Reports should be organised for the
5 convenience of the intended reader Reports are written on a wide range of subjects for a wide variety of reasons
Visuals are tables, graphs/charts and charts used to simplify financial and other statistical information in a report, or the photos and other graphics used to have a major impact on how readers will judge one’s work (Kolin, 2012)
Writing skill is conveying the message through symbols written on a piece of paper, the act or process of producing and recording words in a form that can be read and understood Writing is a form of communication that allows writers to put their feelings and ideas on paper in convincing arguments (Tariq, 2009)
A graph is “a picture that shows how two sets of information or variables are related, usually by lines or curves” while a chart is “a drawing that shows information in a simple ways, often using lines and curves to show amounts”, according to Cambridge Dictionary
LITERATURE REVIEW
Report writing
Understanding the importance of report writing in the workplace, Njemanze et al
(2017) highlighted 7 qualities of a good report that need due attention
Accuracy: A report is written upon the request of a superior or a colleague to describe a past event or provide mainly facts so that the parties involved can make informed decisions It follows that the information should be accurate and thoroughly handled
Logicality and Objectivity: A logical order of organising ideas is preferable as it shows the reasoning in giving factual information Besides, the neutral language that is free from emotions and bias is the common norm in report writing
Clarity: Given that the information is fact-ladden, being straight to the point is more highly recommended The ideas are presented in a clear manner to convey the intended message and the words in use tend to have literal meanings This is in a start contrast to other writing genres like creative writing
Coherence: Like other types of writing, coherence should be maintained to centre on the topic reported or the main purpose of the report and present the logial relationship among ideas
Formality: A formal style of writing is needed in the report Slangs and spoken language are not allowed
Brevity: A lengthy writing style is not the way an effective report writer adopts In most of the cases, a report is to inform the reader in a prompt manner and superiors, colleagues or external parties do not have much time to ponder so long at the given information Thus, being concise in writing is the best policy in this context
2.1.2 Types of visuals in a report
There is a vast array of visual aids in presenting data in a report However, some common types found in the report writing skills course for English majors at the Banking Academy (table, bar, pie & line graphs, flow charts) are selected for illustration Each type is visualized and accompanied by a brief introduction of its functions Figures and images in this section are adapted from the study by Alred
• present the data in its raw manner and many categories in rows and columns
• depict trends and comparisons with precise data
Illustration image Bar & column graph/chart can …
• visualize data in vertical or horizontal bars and columns to compare between categories
• show part of the whole by percentage or trends
• highlight a project progress from the beginning to the end
Number of Closings Number of Calls
Illustration image Line graph/chart can …
• show variables changing over time by amount, number, percentage and rate
• give a clear view of trends and predictions
• compare between sets of variables during the same time frame
Illustration image Circle graph can …
• give a vivid illustration of different parts of a whole by percentage
• compare among categories within a pie or across pie charts
Police and Fire protection Salaries
Steps Taken During Widespread Power Outage • arrange information in a sequence of time
• show steps taken to perform task or handle a problem
• show a natural or manufacturing process
In summary, this study focuses on investigating the writing errors in the description of graphs and charts only; therefore, in this part, three types of graph/chart are shown as follows
Figure 2.1: Three main types of graph/chart
Downed live wires and hospitals or public safety buildings
Transmission lines serving thousands of customers
Main distribution lines serving large numbers of customers
Gr aph /C har t Line chart/graph
Bar chart/graph Pie chart/graph
2.1.3 Description of graphs/charts in a report
2.1.3.1 Qualities of a good graph/chart description a Content
According to Lowrie & Diezmann (2014), the representation of information plays a key role in determining students’ understanding of concepts and capacity to make sense of a range of mathematics situations From the perspective of the learner, the manner in which information is represented plays a pivotal role in sense making, particularly in relation to how information is interpreted The information in the writing needs to be facts, not personal perspectives or predictions b Organisation
A graph/chart description should be well-organised and divided into three main parts: introduction, overview of the main features/ main findings, analysis of the data(“IELTS Academic Writing Task 1: Describing a Graph”, n.d.)
The graph/chart needs to begin with one or two sentences that state what the graph/chart shows As specified by Biggerton (2010, pp.11-12), the introduction needs to answer the following questions a) What is the type of graph /chart shown? b) What is the data? c) Where was the data gathered? c) What are the units of measurement? d) Is there a period of time? e.g The given line graph highlights the changes in the levels of exports from Australia to four countries between 1990 and 2012 The data are measured in percentage terms
When giving the detail in a body paragraphs in the description, writers must make reference to the data The key to organizing the body paragraphs for a graph/chart description is to group data together where there are patterns To do this writer
11 needs to identify any similarities and differences Therefore, in this section, three important ideas can be conveyed: (1) present the data by group of similar patterns
(2) select imporant data, not all to illustrate the pattern (3) arrange the figures in a descending order e.g Of all 5 countries listed, A was the biggest spender on leisure & travel with 4.22% of the total consumer expenditure This was followed by country D where 3.35% was invested in this category Ranked in the last position was country B with 2.20% of the spending going for it c Language use
When the raw data is visualized, normally approximations are commonly used for description to ensure language accuracy and a reader-friendly data presentation Also it is not important to give the precise number (Duigu, 2001, p.43) Some popular words or phrases such as about, almost, approximately, around can be put in front of the rounded figures e.g almost 50% (instead of 49%); close to 35% (instead of 34%)
Duigu (2001, pp.16-18) defined the proper use of language about proportions or quantity The differences among percentage, proportion, ration and rate can be shown below:
PERCENTAGE = amount of something or a group out of 100% e.g The percentage of students using motorbikes was 90%
PROPORTION = amount/number of something or a group out of the whole e.g The proportion of motorbike commuters was far higher than that of cyclists RATIO = relationship of something to something else e.g The ratio of motorcycles to cars in our country is 7:3
RATE = change in the relationship of something to something else, involving over time (death rate, birth rate, interest rate) e.g The rate of car ownerfship is increasing every year in Vietnam
Language of fractions or multiplication
Theoretical framework and conceptual framework
Since the 1970s, researchers around the world have made many attempts to work out valid and reliable ways to assess language learner performance (Michel, 2017) Among different assessment criteria developed by various scholars, language accurary, the degree to which learners comply with rules or proper use of the target language, tends to stand out Language teachers may not have to go at lengths or face many building blocks in diagnosing some improper grammatical or vocabulary use of learners This assessment approach is usually associated with a common concept in the field, i.e error analysis first introduced by Corder (1967, p.163) Accordingly, on the pedagogical ground, learners’ errors are seen as a way for teachers to see what aspect of teaching remains inadequate and focus on finding out remedial methods to deal with them To learners, as a natural learning process, they can have self-reflection and gradually know how to use the language more correctly Ozkayran and Yilmaz (2020) made a vivid analogy: analyzing errors is like taking a blood or urine test The results of the test keep patients informed of their illnesses or health problems and likewise, error analysis can diagnose what problems can stay in the language learning process and where they come from
2.2.2 Distinction between errors and mistakes
Some people believe that there is an overlap between Error and Mistake however Errors and Mistakes are different An error results from incomplete knowledge; a mistake is caused by lack of attention, fatigue, carelessness, or some other aspects
17 of performance (Richards and Schmidt, 2010:201) Brown (2010: 217) also had the same view of the distinction of error and mistake; a mistake is considered a performance error which can be self-corrected while an error, a noticeable deviation from the adult grammar of native speakers, reflects the competence of the learner
Further Brown (2007: 257) distinguished between Mistake and Error He explained that “A mistake refers to a performance error that is either a random guess or a slip‟, in that it is a failure to utilize a known system correctly All people make mistakes, in both native and second language situations Native speakers are normally capable of recognizing and correcting such “lapses” or mistakes, which are not the result of a deficiency in competence but the result of some sort of temporary breakdown or imperfection in the process of producing speech An error is a noticeable deviation from the adult grammar of a native speaker, reflecting the competence of the learner
It indicates that Error shows the learner’s knowledge of the target language, while Mistake is the learner’s temporary imperfection in the process of utilizing the language Meanwhile, Corder (as cited in Larsen-Freman and Long (1991: 58-59)) gave more explanation that: Corder made a distinction between a mistake and an error, i.e.: Whereas a mistake is a random performance slip caused by fatigue, excitement, etc, and therefore can be readily self-corrected, an error is a systematic deviation made by learners who have not yet mastered the rules of the L2 A learner cannot self-correct an error because it is a product reflective of his or her current stage of development, or underlying competence Rather than being seen as something to be prevented, then errors were signs that learners were actively engaged in hypothesis testing which would ultimately in the acquisition of target language rules
It can be concluded that mistake is related to the students„ quality performance caused by some factors such as fatigue, lack of attention and motivation, carelessness, and some other factors but it can be self-corrected because actually, the students know the language rules when they focus on Error is students’ deficiency competence It means that students do not know about the knowledge of
18 the language at all because they have not mastered it yet therefore it can’t be self- corrected The explanation above can be summarized in the table below:
Table 2.1: Differences between error and mistake
Relation Related to the student’s deficiency competence
Related to the students’s quality performance
Reflection Reflected the students’s understanding or competence in the target language
Reflected the students’s temporary impediment or imperfection when utilizing the target language
Deviation Consistent deviation Inconsistent deviation
Causes Caused by learners who have not mastered yet the L2 rules
Caused by some factors such as fatigue, lack of attenton and motivation, carelessness, ect
In conclusion, this is the framework that this study based on to analyze the writing errors and ignore the effects of mistakes
Dulay (1982, as cited in Agustina & Junining, 2014) recommended 4 main approaches to categorizing errors: (1) the linguistics category, (2) the surface structure taxonomy, (3) the comparative taxonomy, and (4) the communicative effect taxonomy Taxonomy here means putting errors into groups with similar characteristics
Many error taxomies have been based on the linguistic item These linguistic category taxonmies classify errors according to either or both the language component and the particular linguistic constituent the error affects Language
19 components include phonology (pronunciation), syntax and morphology (grammar), semantics and lexicon (meaning and vocabulary) and discourse (style) Constituents include the elements that comprise each language component
The surface structure taxonomy describes the ways surface structures of a language are altered: Learners may omit necessary items (omission) or add unecessary ones (addition); they may misform items (misformation) or misorder them (misordering) Analyzing errors from a surface strategy perspective holds much promise for researchers concerned with identifying cognitive processes that underlie the learner’s reconstruction of the new language based on some logic
The classification of errors in a comparative taxomy is based on comparsions between the structure of second language errors and certain other types of construction Errors have most frequently been compared to errors made by children learning the target language as their first language and to equivalent phrases or sentences in the learner’s mother tongue
While the surface strategy and comparative taxonomies focus on different aspects of the error, the communicative effect classification deals with errors from the perspective of their effect on listener or reader It focuses on distinguishing between errors that seem to cause miscommunication and those that don’t
Finding some problems of the previous error classification approaches, a number of recent writers built up their own ways Error taxonomies, when used as the basis for corpus annotation, then, are supposed to yield reliable results At the same time, they should also be plausible to learners and teachers so that they could be used as a basis for effective feedback (Dobrić & Sigott, 2014)
Dobrić & Sigott (2014) studied to divert attention from the notion of error in favour of more global and intuitive descriptions of learner performance The samples of study are the student writings but the classification of errors in this study was different The model is based on the grammatical hierarchy described in A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech & Svartvik 1985, as cited in Dobrić & Sigott, 2014) Central to the model is the distinction between scope and substance
Moreover, Lee (2016) supposed that the present study suggests that some parts of taxonomies used for the previous studies are illogical and generated from the native speakers' or researchers' perspectives In many EA studies, errors are classified superficially, ignoring the nature of the errors Based on the discussions section, a more learner-oriented linguistic category taxonomy is suggested with three categories: morphology, syntax, and others
Third person singnlar verb incorrect
Sim pie past tense incorrect
Omission of S-V in the 2nd clause
Simple omission of words/phrases
Simple addition of unnecessary words
Error happened because of some reasons One of the obvious driving factors is interference from the native language One of the strategies to prevent students from making the same errors is by looking at the causes of errors themselves To know the causes of error in order to identify the troubles faced by students in the language learning process
Brown (2007: pp 263-266) and James (1998: 179-200) have the same idea about categorizing the two main sources of error:
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Locale of the study
This study was conducted at the Banking Academy, Hanoi, Vietnam, which was established in 1961 BA is a university providing training and scientific research in the field of applied economics, focusing on the field of finance - banking and contributing to the sustainable development of the country.
Research design
With the purpose of examining the common writing errors among the English major seniors, the study deploys the qualitative cross-sectional research design for two main reasons First, cross-sectional researchers usually collect the data from the study population only once at a particular time to identify the prevalence of a problem or attitude Hence, the cross-sectional study can be a suitable choice to provide a general view of the situation as Kumar (2011, p.106.) suggested Second, the qualitative research is associated with the collection of non-numerical data like texts This type of research attempts to understand “how” and “why” a problem occurs, giving an insight into it.
Data gathering procedure
The procedure of this study is carried out as follows:
The consent forms were sent to fourth-year ATC students for inviting them to participate in the study The students providing the writing test of graph/chart description were in a same writing report class After being allowed to be printed the test papers of the students to analyse, the researcher started to process data.
Population, Samples and Sampling technique
The target population of the study is the English major seniors at the Faculty of the Foreign Languages of the Banking Academy The reasons for this selection vary
This group of students can be at a high level of language ability and they are preparing for the world of work To the students having majors related to banking and finance, visual interpretation is an important skill which can be transferrable in their later world of work The results of the study will help them to be aware of writing problems they have, thereby finding their own solutions to improving their writing To teachers, they can be partly kept informed of the quality of the students’ writing in the final stage of training and have adjusted teaching methods to enhance the quality of teaching for up-coming students in the program
The samples of this research were 29 writing test papers of senior students who studied report writing skills at the Banking Academy and they are at the age of 22-
25 years old All participants studied in the same report writing class The midterm test question on a graph/chart description requires a 150-to-200-word response within 30 minutes
The researcher adopted the convenience and purposeful sampling technique The researcher’s supervisor was also an instructor of the report writing skills course Thus, asking her for permission to approach the samples was not rather difficult then Also, most of the students in the class were the final year ones like the researcher, so it seems they were quite willing to support However, the researcher based on the target students’ approval to join the study on a voluntary basis The class size is 37 students including third-year and fourth-year ones; there were 3 seniors in this class who did not accept to take part in the survey Therefore, the sample size of the study was 29 students
The sample were purposefully chosen with the following criteria:
- They are the seniors of ATC at BA
- They are studying graph/chart description in a same report writing class
- They volunteer to participate in the survey, contribute their ideas to the survey and provide the writing test
Research instrument
The primary source of data used for the analysis of errors was the writings of 29 English major seniors who attended the report writing skill course They were taken from a 30-minute midterm test paper on graph/chart description Through these writings, writing errors can be analyzed and quantified by their frequency
The course syllabus (see Appendix 3) was also explored for a better understanding of the nature of the course and the learning process the students underwent The focus of the module is on how students can present and interpret the data in an appropriate manner and at the end of the course, students can write a report of 500-
2000 words, basing on fundamental principles of report writing and relevant strategies and putting visual description skills learned into real practice
The report writing skill course has a duration of 8 weeks with two lessons per week and the lessons on graph/chart description occupies about 3-4 weeks The first midterm test is on graph/chart description and the second one on a common type of short reports specified in the syllabus The main source of references to visual description comes from IELTS-oriented books or materials.
Data analysis
The data was analyzed by counting the number of students per each error There were reasons why the data was not based on any fomula The first reason is the number of samples was small If the researcher caculates the data by percentage, the readers can be misleded by the figures The next reason is the aims of this study are to examine the types and source of errors so the frequency of errors is not a priority
The data analysis process adapted from Corder (1974, as cited in ệzkayran & Yılmaz, 2020) underwent 5 steps: collection of a sample of language learners, identification of errors, description of errors, explanation of errors, and evaluation of error
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
Types and frequency of writing errors in graph/chart description
Seven writing errors were identified, representing a varying degree of frequency (see Table 4.1 and Figure 4.1) Some types of errors are branched into their sub- types for a further insight into the problem The total number of the students commiting each error is shown to see the error frequency As can be seen, tenses- related errors (20) formed the most troublesome area, followed by faulty sentence structures (16), wrong words (8), wrong word form (6), preposition errors (5), passive voice errors (4) and wrong word order (1) (the least troublesome area)
Table 4.1: Types and frequency of errors in graph/chart description
Sub-types of errors Frequency
Wrong word use/ wrong collocation
Findings and discussion
For each following section, the researcher pay attention to fixing the focused, so other errors that the participants made within a sentence are left original without modification
The EFL learners tend to face some difficulties in the use of English prepositions that lead to the occurrence of such errors There are 10 papers having this type of error errors and there is a repetition of the same preposition errors across the samples Some of the examples are given below:
Example: Each student spent for a three-year degree course (wrong preposition) Correction: Each student spent on a three-year degree course
Example: At the lowest level was Germany with total cost about $50,000 dollars
Correction: At the lowest level was Germany with total cost of about $50,000 dollars
Preposition errors Wrong word forms Tenses-related errorsPassive voice error Faulty sentence structure Wrong word order
Most preposition errors were due to the students’ lack of knowledge of the English preposition system As the researcher mentioned in chapter 2, students can be affected by the L1 Influenced by the mother tongue, Vietnamese students tend to use Vietnamese language structures in English writing; they may learn single words instead of phrases It leads to a problem that they cannot remember which preposition needs to go with the words In the samples collected from students, some students say “spend for” as in the Vietnamese language “tiêu cho việc gì” instead of “spend on” and each student misused prepositions more than two times in their writings It is clear that writing such wrong phrases took shape in their mind Moreover, the incorrect usage of the preposition in the above sentence can be categorized as an error of misinformation according to the surface strategy taxonomy (Dulay, 1982) The learners might have omitted, added, and misinformed the prepositions under the influence of L1 Evidently, being unaware of the proper use of English prepositions will result in a negative transfer from L1
This type of errors happens when the writers choose the wrong types of word form
Example: The year of 1900 experienced the most popularly used of railways with 70%, surpassing all the data of the record, over 6 times as much as those of canals and roads in the same year
Correction: The year of 1900 experienced the most popular use of railways with 70%, surpassing all the data of the record, over 6 times as much as those of canals and roads in the same year
Example: The goods which were transported by canals and roads had dramatically decline
The goods which were transported by canals and roads had a dramatical decline (Another correction: The goods which were transported by canals and roads had dramatically declined)
Word form errors occur when the correct word is chosen but an incorrect form of the word is used Nguyen et al (2008) stated in their report that Vietnamese is an isolating language, which is characterized by the following specificities: It is a monosyllabic language; its word forms never change, which is contrary to occidental languages that make use of morphological variations all grammatical relations are manifested by word order and tool words In this respect, L1 may affect the ways of choosing correct word forms of Vietnamese On the other hand, in English, most words have different forms for different parts of speech but some words look the same but have different parts of speech Students may remember some regular words but forget some irregular words when they tend to change the word forms For example, in English, there is a rule to change from an adjective to an adverb by adding “ly” behind the adjective However, this rule is not applicable to all cases e.g: independent-independently, popular-popularly, …; far-far, low- low, long-long, etc
Phrases are combinations of words that appear together very often and have evolved into natural phrases in English For example, "heavy rain" and "strong wind" are naturally collocated phrases
Example: The living cost in Germany is bigger than the tuition fees
Correction: The living cost in Germany is higher than the tuition fees
Example: Railways were reported as the largest means of transport in 1900
Correction: Railways were reported as the most popular means of transport in
The cause of using a wrong adjective for “cost” may stem from inactive habits in the teaching process (induced errors) It is not easy to identify errors except for skills learning devices, teaching tips that are applied to learners In other words, the application of inappropriate learning methods to students has a great influence on
34 the effectiveness of the language learning Moreover, L1 influence and the translation of L2 to L1 are also the reasons of this error When learning a new word, students tend to translate the word into Vietnamese without putting it into the context of communication For example, “large” and “popular” in some cases can be translated from English into Vietnamest is “rộng rãi”; thus, some students believe that the words “large” and “popular” can be paraphrased each other
Linking words play an essential role in writing a graph/chart description because they connect ideas between sentences and paragraphs
Example: When its percentage made up half of the pie chat, and it went up to 70% in 1900
Correction: When its percentage made up half of the pie chat, it went up to 70% in
Example: Although Australians spent most of money on the study fees, but in Germany study fees are lowest
Correction: Although Australians spent most of money on the study fees, but in Germany study fees are lowest
The cause of this errors is mother- tongue influence; the writer tends to transfer Vietnamese to English and tries to use the linking words without understanding the use of each linking word For example, in Vietnamese, “Athough + clause 1, clause 2” means “Tuy/cho dù ….nhưng” while “nhưng” can be translated into English
The wrong tense or wrong verb occurs when learners use the wrong tense of the verb in a certain sentence The results of this study showed that the participants
35 were not aware of the correct application of the tense to the verb in the matching sentence 20 students made this error, which is the most popular error in this study
Example: There is a slight fall from 30% to 20%
Correction: There was a slight fall from 30% to 20%
Example: European country use railways most, which stand for the largest proportion of 70%
Correction: European country used railways most, which stood for the largest proportion of 70%
The usage of verbs in Vietnamese is different from the usage in English In Vietnamese, verbs do not change when expressing time Therefore, they do not change their form to expess the past, present or future tense But in English it is quite the opposite, the verbs usualy have different forms when the tenses are changed Moreover, most of errors were recorded in the student writings because a simple present tense verb form was used instead of a simple past tense verb form One reason to explain for this problem is all the data in the figures was recorded in the past so the graph/chart description in the test paper required students to write in past simple tense Moreover, the errors may stem from an inappropriate writing process from learners before and after writing Before writing, learners need to determine the tenses of verbs applied to their writing and they need to recheck the verbs again after finishing the texts
The student made this error 4 times with some verbs: spend, must, rise
Example: The bar chart provides data about how much money students spended on a three-year degree course
Correction: The bar chart provides data about how much money students spent on a three-year degree course
Example: The budget for living cost that a student must spend was documented at
Correction: The budget for living cost that a student had to spend was documented at $40,000
In the English past simple tense, there are many words that do not follow the rule of changing from infinitive to past forms If students have an inapropriate practice and model from the fomula, they may cause this error many times
In the writings of the students, they had 4 errors of using uneccessary passive voice for the intransitive verbs such as: fluctuate, plung, increase
Example: They were fluctuated between $35000 and $42000
Correction: They fluctuated between $35000 and $42000
Example: The transportation were plunged by 38%
Correction: The transportation plunged by 38%
The reasons that lead students to this type of cause are they cannot distinguish the intransitive verbs and transitive verbs Intransitive verbs describe the internal actions of the speaker or person or subject performing the action Intransitive verbs have no or no direct object (direct object) to form a meaningful sentence These are verbs that have full meanings by themselves, do not directly affect any other object; these verbs will not have an object following and are not used in the passive voice Transitive verbs are verbs that describe an action that has a direct effect on a person or something else, verbs that are followed by an object to clarify it and can be used in the passive voice Transitive verbs do not go alone but must be accompanied by a direct complement to form a meaningful sentence
This error occurs when the writers write too many independent clauses in sentences and abuse conjunctions (and, but, so, because…) or relative clauses (more than 2 relative clauses in a sentence) to make the sentence long and difficult to understand
Example: Overall, Australia was the country which had the highest total cost about
$100,000 dollars just a head of the US and the UK and Germany was at the lowest level was with total cost about $50,000 dollars
Correction: Overall, Australia was the country which had the highest total cost about $100,000 dollars a head of the US and the UK Meanwhile, Germany was at the lowest level with a total cost of about $50,000 dollars
Example: Another interesting point is that highest study fees country and the lowest study fees country had similar amount of living cost which were about
$40,000 dollars, just ahead of the UK and the United States students were who spent less money for living cost than others
Correction: Another interesting point is that Australia with highest study fees and Germany with the lowest study fees had a similar amount of living costs at about
$40,000 dollars The students in those two counries spent more money on living costs than those of the UK and the United States did
Graph/chart description requires complex sentences so the writers try to make each sentence more complicated to satisfy this requirement However, the sentences become redundant because of inappropriate knowledge of sentence structures and links among sentences
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS
CONCLUSION
The findings section shows that the main purpose of the paper was achieved First, basing on linguistic taxomy (Dulay, 1982), there are seven common writing errors found among 29 English major seniors at the Banking Academy They are wrong tense use, faulty sentence structures, wrong words, wrong word form, preposition errors, passive voice errors and wrong word order Tense use problems and faulty sentence structures were prevalent among the participants From the results of the findings, lecturers can dertermine the types of errors that the students made and they need to figure out the effective teaching methods to reduce the errors In terms of students, they can recognize what language aspects still have some shortcomings, so they can be more careful when doing writing tasks The research results of this study are based on 29 people, so future studies which have more samples may give out the generalizable outcomes for readers This research serves as a basis for future researchers to rely on and continue to develop new and more diverse directions.
SUGGESTIONS
According to the definition of errors that the researcher introduced in chapter 2, the writers do not recognize and fix the errors by themselves Therefore, they may need the help of others However, thanks to the development of technology, students can independently fix the errors with the aid of the Internet The researcher highly recommends the website “Grammarly”, which is a useful tool for English learners to fix the errors, especially the grammatical errors (tense, passive voice, word form,…) Thanks to the websites, students will realize errors that have been made and fix them automatically on the Internet without paying money
Another method for learners to self-check their writings is that they can create their own error checklist for graph/chart descriptions After finishing their writings, they can use the checklist to check for errors Here is my suggested checklist table:
A drawback of fixing errors by using “Grammarly” is that students can depend on the website to help them to correct every error Moreover, students will not remember the wrong words or sentences that they made because the errors just graze their eyes and they can immediately fix them by “clicking on the mouse” without considering Therefore, peer correction can support students in this case Writers get comments and suggestions from their friends to edit their compositions Peer correction does not only happen in the classroom Nowadays, there are many study groups on Facebook where students can connect from a long distance Students can know the errors they made and how to cope with these through classmates' feedback Furthermore, it can be easier for students to approach their friends and share their performances with them Therefore, if students can get
“productive feedback”, they can correct their own errors and avoid making similar errors in the later writing tasks
Apart from the two recommendations above, students can correct some types of errors but not all errors can be fixed because of limited professional knowledge Therefore, they need the support of teachers to help them understand the errors and why the errors are caused Normally, teachers directly fix the errors for students by marking the types of errors in their writings However, the teacher can consult some suggestions as follows:
Learners’preferred style of teacher’s correction
Teachers give students a table of abbreviation correction symbols and the students are required to write those symbols in the wrong sentences and the cause of errors if they can If students can not recognize the errors, teachers can help them This method enables students to remember the errors and deeply understand the sources of errors
Teachers can let students speak or write freely in class, record common errors and then correct them for the whole class but avoid the situation of raising an individual error that will make students lose their face with classmates Teachers and students discuss errors and give examples by showing common errors by showing them on a projector
Teachers can guide their students to correct the errors by groups Students work in groups, practice writing essays, and correct cores Group correction will make the class feel less stressed
For example, students in group 1 can give a chart/graph description to group 2 students and via versus, then cross-check each other and create a list of errors in the other group's work Use Powerpoint to present in front of the teacher and friends about the errors other groups have made as well as give some suggestions to let the other group avoid making the same errors next time Teachers can provide feedback during and after the correction process
The results of the study showed that wrong tense and faulty sentence structure are common among students because of mother tongue effects The researcher gives out some following suggestions Students can learn the right tense and right sentence structures by using them in the right context of communication For instance, students do not just write down the formula of each tense, they need to think about the real situations that they actually face in their life Before writings, students can think and write the tense they use in the texts and recheck it after finishing To have time for rechecking the text, students need to plan for the writing progress i
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Categories Definitions Examples of errors Corrections
The relationship between the form of the verb and the time of the action or state it describes
I have studied English for 6 years
We didn’t meet since we went to HCM city
We haven't met since we went to HCM city
A type or group of a words often placed before nouns, pronouns, or gerunds to link them grammatically to other words
When I listen music, I feel interested
When I listen to music, I feel interested
Nothing can escape his eyes
Nothing can escape from his eyes
A wrong collocation is a sequence of words or terms that co-occur more often than would be expected by chance
Wrong linking words is the wrong use of words to connect sentences to
They have to do hard to have a better life
They have to work hard to have a better life
I started to cry when the plane flied
I started to cry when the plane took off vii sentences, ideas to ideas
Word forms Word forms refer to part of speech
I’m so worry I’m so worried Today was a bored day
Problem with formation of passive sentences
The job were taken by a manager
The job was taken by a manager
He was arrived early He arrived early
The sentence with the problems about run-on, fragment, stringy, choppy, parallel errors
I ran across the road it was very dangerous
She has a black shirt Her shirt is long
She has a long black shirt
Word order The order of word in a sentence is wrong
The traffic in Viet Nam has many problems serious
The traffic in Viet Nam has many serious problems
People should have solutions suitable
People should have suitable solutions viii
Name of Researcher : Nguyen Thi Hong Tham
An analysis of common writing errors in graph description among ATC senior students at Banking Academy
Please read and complete this form carefully We would also appreciate it very much if you are willing to participate in this study Please select the suitable answer, then date and sign at the end If you need any further any information, please contact me at my email: havi.nguyenhoang2207@gmail.com
I have been explained clearly about the research in verbal form by the researcher YES / NO
I know that the study will include 3 rounds of the research: collection of student papers, survey questionnaire, error analysis of student samples YES / NO