Common errors and causes in sentence writing of firstyear English majors

LAC HONG UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE RESEARCH REPORT COMMON ERRORS AND CAUSES IN SENTENCE WRITING OF FIRST-YEAR ENGLISH MAJORS AT LHU Student: NGUYEN THI MY PHUOC Class: 15AV112 BIEN HOA, DECEMBER 2019 LAC HONG UNIVERSITY FACULTY OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE RESEARCH REPORT Common errors and causes in sentence writing of first-year english majors at LHU Student: NGUYEN THI MY PHUOC Advisor: PHAM THI NGHIA, MA BIEN HOA, DECEMBER 2019 COMMON ERRORS AND CAUSES IN SENTENCE WRITING OF FIRST-YEAR ENGLISH MAJORS AT LHU CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENT LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Statement of the problem Purposes of the study Significance of the study The scope of the study Research Questions CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW The overview of writing Errors 10 2.1 Error definition 10 2.2 Error significations 10 2.3 Error analysis 11 Classification of writing sentence errors 12 3.1 Sentential level errors 13 3.2 Word level errors 18 Causes of errors in sentence writing skill 24 4.1 The influence of the mother tongue 25 4.2 Characteristics of teaching and learning writing 26 4.3 Incomplete application of rules 28 CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY 30 Objectives 30 Methodology 30 2.1 Research approach 30 2.2 Research design 30 Population and sampling 30 Data collection instruments 31 Procedure and time frame 32 Data analysis method 32 CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION ON THE FINDINGS 34 Errors Frequently Found in English Sentences Written by first-year majors at LHU 34 1 Punctuation marks 35 1.2 Spelling 37 1.3 Articles 37 1.4 Word choice 38 1.5 Prepositions 39 1.6 Nouns 39 Causes of the Errors 40 2.1 Sources of data 40 2.2 Results gained from the data 48 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 50 Conclusion 50 Recommendation: 50 REFERENCES 53 APPENDIX 588 APPENDIX 599 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT In order to complete the research on the topic "Common errors and causes in sentence writing of first-year English majors at Lac Hong University", excepting my effort, I have received a lot of help and encouragement from so many people who I would like to express my thanks and respect to First of all, my greatest respect is for the Board of Directors of Lac Hong University Thanks to their creating an encouraging education environment, students are enabled to boost knowledge and improve skills Secondly, I would like to express my sincere thanks and deep gratitude to Ms Pham Thi Nghia, who has been devoted to giving me useful guidance and support, and constantly encouraged me throughout the research process Furthermore, I wish to heartily thank to all teachers in Faculty of English language of Lac Hong University for helping me to cultivate my valuable knowledge and sharpen necessary skills so that I can complete this research successfully I would also like to thank Mr Tran Vo Thanh Tung, Ms Trinh Dieu Hien, Mr Nguyen Duc Duy Tan as well as students from classes of 18AV for enthusiastically facilitating me in conducting the survey Last but not least, I would like to thank my family and friends for always encouraging, sharing, helping me enthusiastically and contributing ideas to finish my essay Although I have tried my best to complete my thesis but there may still be many shortcomings, I am looking forward to receiving valuable contribution and suggestions from teachers so that I can gain experience for future research LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS LHU: Lac Hong University EA: Error Analysis L1: First language L2: Second language ESL: English as a Second Language LIST OF TABLES AND CHARTS List of tables Table Types, frequency, percentage, and rank of the sentential level Pages 34 errors found in the English sentences Table Types, frequency, percentage, and rank of the word level errors 35 found in the English sentences Table 3: The students’ methods of studying sentence writing skill 44 Table 4: The students’ means of studying sentence writing skill 44 List of charts Pages Chart 1: The students’ awareness about the importance of writing 42 Chart 2: The interest of students in writing English sentences 43 Chart 3: The students' frequency of borrowing reference documents from 45 library at LHU Chart 4: The frequency of students' asking for correcting their writings 46 Chart 5: The students' procedure of writing sentences 47 Chart 6: Difficulties in writing English sentences 48 CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION Nowadays, English is a language commonly used in international transactions Vietnam is not out of this trend According to Quality Training Solution website, Vietnam education system has made English a compulsory subject in school seats since the elementary years Moreover, many companies and organizations in Vietnam, especially multinational companies, organizations require employees to have English proficiency (the higher the better) Therefore, many students have found the necessity of learning English to meet the needs of modern society Also, Quality Training Solution website mentioned that English is the international language and is considered as the easiest language to learn among the foreign languages that Vietnamese people can access In the four basic skills - listening, speaking, reading and writing, writing is considered to be the most difficult skill to master (Hengwichitkul, 2009), Watcharapunyawong & Usaha (2013), Rattanadilok Na Phuket & Othman (2015) To obtain the style of writing in a proper and coherent manner, students need to master grammar points and accumulate vocabulary Depending on purposes of study and work, the writing style will be different, which makes many students encounter many difficulties in writing, especially for first-year students due to their limited vocabulary and knowledge of English Within the scope of this study, the researcher will point out and analyze the causes of errors that first-year students often make when they write English sentences Next, the author would like to offer a few suggestions to help students avoid making mistakes when learning writing sentences skill Statement of the problem In the world, there have been many studies related to the subject “Common errors and causes in sentence writing of first-year English majors” In fact, A Hinnon (2015) claimed that there are “more than 50 articles on first-year student writing errors published in academic journals since 1780” Studies conducted in China, Thailand, India, and Korea indicated that the students have many difficulties in their first writing of English sentences Findings showed that the main cause of writing error is the interference of the mother tongue (Jenwitheesuk, 2009) and that the two problems that concerned first-year students the most were grammar and vocabulary (Mojica, 2010) In a recent study of Sattayatham and Ratanapinyowong (2008), for first-year students, “writing is more complex in that it tests students” ability to use a language and the ability to express ideas” In Vietnam, although writing English courses are on curricular of most universities, the research topics or official scientific reports on this issue are still less well-documented This is considered as a challenge for university students in Vietnam in general and in Lac Hong University in particular who have been trying to develop their writing skills With the different language, unique culture and socio-political characteristics, great-reference-value researches related to the theme “Common errors and causes in sentence writing of first-year English majors” published worldwide cannot be fully applied to the educational context in Vietnam Therefore, the actual study about it is extremely essential in this context In the curriculum of Faculty of English language at Lac Hong University, there were many basic skills taught, of which writing is one of the most important skills For first-year students, there are two courses of writing, writing and writing 2, which mostly focus on writing sentences The two courses are arranged to provide a steady foundation for students to write academic papers, scientific thesis, because a good graduation thesis is always made up of good sentences In fact, when students want to write an essay in English well, they have to know how to write good paragraphs To Specifically, the influences of transliteration are usually only visible when there is a big difference between Vietnamese and English on the language characteristics (vocabulary, grammar) when writing In this case, it is called negative transfer Negative transliteration occurs when the writer converts word units or linguistic constructs which are not equivalent between English and Vietnamese Although students have tried their best, the result is that their writing become misunderstood or not even able to understand 2.2.1 The characteristics of teaching and learning writing Limited time for teaching and learning is really a big problem With 180 hours per week to teach writing and writing 2, teachers cannot fully take over both transmitting theory and correcting students’ errors Besides, teachers have to spend a huge amount of time to undertake other subjects, which makes the time they spend in improving students’ sentence writing skill shorter Based on the data gained from the interviews and questionnaires, the lack of writing activities and students’ laziness are responsible for their errors in the sentence writing skill Moreover, students not orient themselves with a specific goal or objective for the skill 2.2.3 The incomplete application of rules in English sentences Data from interviews and questionnaires indicate that students' English grammar and vocabulary need to be improved The participants show their situation that their grammar and vocabulary knowledge in English is not good enough to create good writings Data from the students’ pieces of writings show clearly the weakness of students in applying grammar and vocabulary in their sentences Many grammar errors and vocabulary errors are found, which arises from the thing that the students ignore the rules of writing English sentences or apply them incompletely 49 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS Conclusion From these findings, the negative effects from Vietnamese can be a major source of the errors These effects may arise from the students’ limited knowledge of English language because when the knowledge of English is very limited, students tend to switch to relying on their first language It is also concluded that the way they write sentences clearly shows their weaknesses in vocabulary and the basic principles of English grammar Therefore, teachers should consider the difference between vocabulary and grammar of English and Vietnamese Last but not least, the researcher also found that the students were quite passive in learning to write sentences They have spent less time practicing writing sentences, being passive in finding sources of knowledge to practice and improve their sentence writing skill In addition, another reason is that many students have yet to find suitable learning methods to improve their writing skill Therefore, teachers need to create more creative activities and use more complementary tools to help encourage students' interest in writing The author believes that students' errors in writing sentence can be minimized if up-to-date techniques and methods for teaching writing are applied Sentence writing skill need be more attached because mastering the skill of writing sentences is the basis of better writing ability Recommendation: - For teachers Teachers should increase the amount of homework so that students will have to write a lot in their free time Teachers should also suggest additional references for students to practice writing sentences From those they will read many English documents and think in English In addition, if teachers Team Work in class and get students to work in groups on their assignments, students will have the opportunity to 50 practice together to develop their sentence writing skill, they will also have the opportunity to speak English together, which can improve their speaking skills simultaneously Besides, they will have the opportunity to correct each other Teachers can suggest a few more error analysis exercises to help students identify a complete sentence more accurately On the other hand, teachers should help students pay attention to the differences between Vietnamese and English When learning English in general and learning to write sentences in particular, students need to avoid imposing Vietnamese in English because in the field of foreign language learning, all language impulses only bring unexpected results If students are aware of these differences, they will be able to help students reduce errors There is no doubt that indigenous languages play an important role in learning and using other languages, especially in foreign language learning situations where learners' exposure to the target language is limited in a few hours a week teaching in class Vietnamese students who learn English in such situations use Vietnamese to solve learning and communication problems in English - For students As the results, the students are fairly weak at English vocabulary and grammar, so students have to pay more attention to improving the knowledge of grammar and cultivating vocabulary Besides studying in class, students need to be more active to study at home In addition, there are a huge number of sources of valuable references which are easy to download from the Internet Students should take full advantages of these sources Recommendations for further researches Due to time and knowledge limitations, this study has not covered all other aspects of errors in learning writing sentences in English The researcher just collected 91 pieces of writing from students to analyze errors In addition, the total number of questionnaire is just 50 copies for 50 students from classes (18AV) That is a rather small number, which may make the results less persuasive Besides, the criteria that the 51 researcher applied to classify errors and causes of errors are still a controversial aspect That means there may be some inaccurate results Also, the researcher has just studied the writing sentence errors made by first-year English majors for a year, so in following years, it will be appreciated if there are more different studies on that These issues are suggested for further researches 52 REFERENCES Abushihab, Ibrahim, Abdallah H El-Omari, and Mahmoud Tobat "An analysis of written grammatical errors of Arab learners of English as a foreign language at Alzaytoonah Private University of Jordan." 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(2001) Valette,R.M.(1991) Proficiency and the Prevention of fossilization: An editorial Modern language Journal, 75(3),325-328 57 APPENDIX INTERVIEW QUESTIONS Theo thầy cô, thầy cô đánh giá kĩ viết câu sinh viên năm khoa Ngôn Ngữ Anh trường ta nào? In your opinion, how you evaluate the sentence writing skill of our school's firstyear students of Faculty of English Language? Trong thi viết câu (writing 1&2) sinh viên thường mắc lỗi nhất? Ngun nhân gây lỗi gì? In the writing tests (writing & 2), what are the most commonly mistakes made by students? What are the causes of these mistakes? Khi giảng dạy môn viết câu, thầy cô đánh giá mức độ tập trung sinh viên? When teaching sentence writing, how you assess the student's concentration level? Thầy cô có thường xuyên giao tập lớp tập nhà cho em sinh viên luyện tập viết câu hay không? Do you regularly assign homework for students to practice writing sentences? Thầy cô thường tổ chức hoạt động lớp để nâng cao kĩ khuyến khích tính chủ động luyện viết câu sinh viên? What activities you usually organize in class to improve their skill and encourage students' proactive writing practice? 58 APPENDIX PHIẾU KHẢO SÁT Chủ đề: Các lỗi viết câu thường gặp nguyên nhân gây lỗi sinh viên năm khoa Ngơn ngữ Anh – Trường Đại học Lạc Hồng Topic: Common errors and their causes in sentence writing skill of first-year English majors at Lac Hong University Chào bạn, Mình Nguyễn Thị Mỹ Phước, sinh viên khoa Ngơn ngữ Anh trường Đại học Lạc Hồng Mình làm nghiên cứu để tìm hiểu lỗi sai viết câu sinh viên năm khoa Ngôn ngữ Anh Để thực nghiên cứu thành cơng, cần biết thêm cách học mơn Viết 1, Viết mà bạn vừa hoàn thành năm vừa qua Bạn khoảng 3-5 phút để hồn thành phiếu khảo sát Mình khơng mong đợi câu trả lời hay sai Xin giúp cách trả lời chân thành tất câu hỏi Thông tin lý lịch bạn giữ bí mật câu trả lời bạn sử dụng cho nghiên cứu Cảm ơn bạn giành thời gian để đóng góp cho khảo sát Dear all, My name is Nguyen Thi My Phuoc and I am a student of the Faculty of English Language at Lac Hong University I am doing a research to find out the mistakes when writing sentences of freshman of Faculty of English Language In order to make this research successful, I need to know more about the ways of studying Writing 1, and Writing that you have just completed in the past year It will take about 3-5 minutes to complete this survey I not expect a true or false answer Please help me by answering all the questions sincerely Your background information will be kept confidential and your answers will only be used for this study Thank you for taking the time to contribute to the survey 59 Xin vui lòng đọc câu hỏi sau khoanh tròn câu trả lời bạn Please read the following questions and circle your answers Theo bạn mơn kĩ viết câu có cần thiết ngành tiếng Anh hay không? Tại sao? Do you think sentence writing is necessary for English Major? Why? A: Rất cần thiết/ Very necessary B: Cần thiết/ Necessary C: Bình thường/ Normal D: Khơng cần thiết/ Not necessary Trả lời đây/ Write down your reasons: Bạn có thích kĩ viết câu không? Tại sao? Do you like the writing skills? Why? A: Rất thích/ Really like B: Thích/ Like C: Bình thường/ Normal E: Hồn tồn khơng thích/ Do not like Trả lời đây/ Write down your reasons: Thời gian hàng ngày bạn dành cho việc luyện tập kĩ viết câu bao nhiêu? How much time you spend daily on practicing sentence writing skill? A: Hơn tiếng/ More than hours B: Từ đến tiếng/ From to hours C: Từ 30 phút đến tiếng/ From 30 minutes to hour D: Ít 30 phút/ Less than 30 minutes E: Không luyện tập/ Never Phương pháp học kĩ viết câu bạn gì? 60 What is your method of learning sentence writing skill? A: Tự học tự học mạng/ Self-study or self-study online B: Học theo nhóm/ Study in groups C: Học theo hướng dẫn giáo viên/ Follow the instructions of the teacher D: Khác/ Others Hãy ghi phương pháp khác bạn đây/ Write down your other methods: Phương tiện học kĩ viết câu bạn gì? What are your means of studying writing sentences? A: Máy tính có mạng/ Computer with network B: Giáo trình học trường/ School curriculum C: Sách tham khảo/ Reference books D: Hỏi thầy cơ/ Ask teacher E: Khơng có phương tiện gì/ No means Bạn có lên thư viện trường để mượn sách hay tài liệu tham khảo môn môn viết? Have you ever gone to the school library to borrow books or references? A: Thường xuyên/ Regularly B: Thỉnh thoảng/ Sometimes C: Hiếm khi/ Rarely D: Không bao giờ/ Never Cách thức viết câu bạn gì? What is your method of writing sentences? A: Tham khảo câu mẫu tương tự để viết Refer to similar sample sentences to write B: Viết lại nhiều lần Rewrite many times C: Viết theo trình tự bước: viết nháp, đọc tìm lỗi sai sữa chữa, viết lại (nếu có sai sót) 61 Write in order of steps: write draft, read and find errors and correct, rewrite (if there are errors) D: Nghĩ từ câu tiếng Việt viết tiếng Anh Think of Vietnamese sentences and write them in English E: Không viết nháp, tự nghĩ viết trực tiếp Do not write drafts, think and write directly Bạn có thường xuyên nhờ giáo viên sửa bài? Do you often ask teachers to correct your writing? A: Thường xuyên/ Regularly B: Thỉnh thoảng/ Sometimes C: Hiếm khi/ Rarely D: Chưa bao giờ/ Never Bạn có thường xuyên nhờ bạn lớp sửa bài? How often you ask classmates to correct your writing? A: Thường xuyên/ Regularly B: Thỉnh thoảng/ Sometimes C: Hiếm khi/ Rarely D: Chưa bao giờ/ Never 10 Nguyên nhân khiến bạn không hứng thú với môn viết câu? What causes you not interested in sentence writing? A: Chưa thấy tầm quan trọng kĩ viết câu/ Have not seen the importance of sentence writing skill B: Chưa tìm phương pháp học phù hợp/ Have not found a suitable learning method C: Thiếu quan tâm giáo viên/ Lack of teacher attention D: Thiếu sách, tài liệu tham khảo/ Lack of books, references E: Yếu ngữ pháp/ Weak grammar F: Thiếu tư vựng/ Lack of vocabulary G: Ý kiến khác/ Your ideas: 62 11 Khi viết câu, bạn gặp khó khăn phần nào? When writing the sentence, which part were the most difficult for you? A: Ngữ pháp/ Grammar B: Thiếu từ vựng/ Lack of vocabulary C: Trật tự từ (sắp xếp từ ngữ)/ Word arrangement D: Tìm ý diễn đạt ý tiếng Anh/ Find ideas and express ideas in English 12 Nếu tự đánh giá khả viết câu bạn, bạn đánh giá thuộc mức nào? If you assessed your writing ability yourself, how would you rate yourself? A: Tốt/ Good B: Khá tốt/ Quite good C: Khá/ D: Chưa tốt/ Not good E: Yếu/ Weak 13 Bạn mong muốn GV dạy bạn hay cho bạn tập hoạt động để giúp bạn học môn viết câu tốt hơn? What you want teachers to teach you or give you exercises or activities to help you learn sentence writing better? …………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………… 63 ... learning writing background of English majors and common errors they found when teaching sentence writing skill The researcher will interview teachers being in charge of writing and writing courses... habit of thinking in English before writing Therefore, they make quite a lot of errors in their writing 4.2.2 Characteristics of first-year English majors in learning writing sentences Writing is... Classifying the errors Step Explaining the errors Step Evaluating the errors Classification of writing sentence errors In discussing the classification of writing sentence errors, Halliday and Hasan