An investigation into errors in writing english paragraphs made by 6th grade students at a junior secondary school in nam dinh city

HANOI UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF POST- GRADUATE STUDIES AN INVESTIGATION INTO ERRORS IN WRITING ENGLISH PARAGRAPHS MADE BY 6TH GRADE STUDENTS AT A JUNIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL IN NAM DINH CITY (Nghiên cứu lỗi viết đoạn văn Tiếng Anh học sinh lớp trường Trung học sở thành phố Nam Định) SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF REQUIREMENTS FOR THE MASTER’S DEGREE IN ENGLISH STUDIES Student: Vũ Thị Thúy Hồng Supervisor: Dr TrầnThị Duyên Hanoi – 2019 HANOI UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES AN INVESTIGATION INTO ERRORS IN WRITING ENGLISH PARAGRAPHS MADE BY 6TH GRADE STUDENTS AT A JUNIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL IN NAM DINH CITY (Nghiên cứu lỗi viết đoạn văn Tiếng Anh học sinh lớp trường Trung học sở thành phố Nam Định) Major: English Studies Code: 8220201 SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF REQUIREMENTS FOR THE MASTER’S DEGREE IN ENGLISH STUDIES Student: Vũ Thị Thúy Hồng Supervisor: Dr Trần Thị Duyên Hanoi –2019 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I certify that this thesis entitled “An investigation into errors in writing English paragraphs made by 6th-grade students at a junior secondary school in Nam Dinh city” is my own work Except where reference is made in the text of the thesis, this thesis does not contain any material published elsewhere or extracted in whole or in part from a thesis by which I have qualified for or been awarded another degree or diploma No other person’s work has been used without due acknowledgment in the main text of the thesis This thesis has not been submitted for the award of any degree or diploma in any other tertiary institution Hanoi, 2019 Vu Thi Thuy Hong i ACKNOWLEDGMENT The thesis could not have been completed without the considerable help and support from a number of people First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Dr Tran Thi Duyen, my supervisor, who has patiently and constantly supported me through the stages of the study, and whose stimulating ideas, expertise, and suggestions have inspired me greatly through my growth as an academic researcher My profound thanks go to all of my teachers from the Post-Graduate Department at Hanoi University, who have been given expert guidance and favorable conditions for the completion of the work I am deeply thankful to five English teachers and 180 students at a lower secondary school Thanks to their help, the thesis would not have succeeded Last but not least, I am greatly indebted to my beloved family and friends for the sacrifice they have devoted to the fulfillment of this academic work Hanoi, 2019 Vu Thi Thuy Hong ii ABSTRACT The present study investigates errors made by the 6th-grade students at a junior secondary school in Nam Dinh City and examines the teachers’ opinions on the students’ errors and their treatment of the errors The study employs qualitative design and uses document analysis and interview as the data collection instruments In particular, document analysis was carried out on 180 pieces of paragraph writing written by 6th-grade students and semi-structured interviews were conducted with five teachers who teach writing skills for the 6th-grade students Findings pointed out types of writing errors commonly made by the students including plurality, article, spelling, punctuation, verb, and preposition at the word level and subject-verb agreement and fragment at the sentential level The findings also reveal that the teachers can realize students’ errors related to verb, spelling, preposition, subject-verb agreement, linking words, sentence structure, word order, and word choice However, some of other common writing errors such as plurality, articles, punctuation, and fragment not seem to be well perceived by the teachers and their common ways to treat the students’ errors are via direct feedback, indirect feedback, focused feedback and unfocused feedback Based on the results of the study, implications and recommendations are proposed to improve the teaching and learning of English paragraph writing at the local school as well as at other junior secondary schools with similar educational contexts ii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CF Correcting feedback EA Error analysis EFL English as a Foreign Language ELT English Language Teaching: the teaching of English to speakers of other languages ESL English as a Second Language iv LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURE Figure 2.1: Runkati’s categories of errors……………………………………………………… Figure 2.2: Corder’s steps in error analysis research………………………………………… Table 2.3: Description of common writing errors…………………………………………… Table 3.2: Justification for Interview Items…………………………………………………… Table 4.1: The most common writing errors committed students at 6th grade………………… v TABLE CONTENTS STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP i ACKNOWLEDGMENT ii ABSTRACT iii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iiv LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURE v TABLE CONTENTS vi CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background of the study 1.2 Statement of the problem 1.3 Objectives of the study and research questions 1.4 Significance of the study 1.5 Scope of the study 1.6 Organization of the study CHAPTER TWO: LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Theory of writing and paragraph writing 2.1.1 Definition of writing 2.1.2 Genres of writing 2.1.3 Paragraph writing 2.1.4 Elements of an effective paragraph 2.2 Teaching paragraph writing 10 2.3 Error analysis 11 2.3.1 Defining errors 11 2.3.2 Errors in Second Language Learning 12 2.3.3 Definition of Error Analysis 13 2.3.4 Classification of Errors 14 2.3.5 The procedure of error analysis 15 2.3.6 Sources of errors 16 2.3.7 Common writing errors 19 2.4 Error Treatment 20 2.4.1 Definition of Error Treatment 20 2.4.2 Strategies of corrective feedback 21 vi 2.5 Previous studies 23 2.5.1 Studies in international contexts 23 2.5.2 Studies in Vietnamese contexts 25 2.6 Gaps in previous studies of the study 26 2.7 Chapter summary 27 CHAPTER THREE: METHODOLOGY 28 3.1 Research design 28 3.2 Participants 29 3.3 Research context 29 3.4 Research instruments 30 3.4.1 Document analysis 30 3.4.2 Semi-structured interview 30 3.5 Data collection procedure 32 3.6 Data analysis procedure 33 3.6.1 Analysis of students’ writings 33 3.6.2 Semi-structured interview 35 3.7 Ethical considerations 35 3.8 Chapter summary 36 CHAPTER 4: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 37 4.1 Data analysis 37 4.1.1 Results from the analysis of the students’ writings 37 4.1.1.1 Plurality 37 4.1.1.2 Article 39 4.1.1.3 Spelling 40 4.1.1.4 Punctuation 41 4.1.1.5 Verb 42 4.1.1.6 Preposition 43 4.1.1.7 Subject-Verb Agreement 44 4.1.1.8 Fragment 45 4.1.2 Results from the interviews with teachers 46 4.1.2.1 The average time to teach writing 47 4.1.2.2 Methods in teaching writing 48 vi version while ignoring two rest ones The nonstandard application of stages in teaching writing is likely to be negative in both students’ making errors and teachers’ correction 4.3 Chapter summary This chapter presents the findings and discussion of the study in detail The findings of the first research question pointed out kinds of writing errors commonly made by the students existing both at the word level (plurality, article, spelling, punctuation, verb and preposition) and at the sentential level (subject-verb agreement and fragment) The findings of the second research question showed that writing errors of students in teachers’ perspectives were verb, spelling, preposition, subject-verb agreement, linking words, sentence structure, word order, and word choice In order to correct their students errors, teachers utilized four treating methods namely direct feedback, indirect feedback, focused feedback and unfocused feedback It is noticeable that there was a considerable difference between the teachers’ perspectives on their learners’ errors and the error analysis from students’ writings In detail, the writing errors namely plurality, article, punctuation and fragment, which were often found in students’ writings, were not mentioned in teachers’ opinions Moreover, the relationship between the results of the current study with the previous studies was also discussed 58 CHAPTER 5: IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSION There are five sections presented in the final chapter First, all of the chapters of this study are summarized Next, some pedagogical implications are shown, following by limitations of the study Four, suggestions for further study to enhance students’ writing skill are drawn Last, a conclusion is given 5.1 Summary of the study The present thesis was conducted at a junior secondary school in Nam Dinh City to investigate errors made by the 6th-grade students and the teachers’ views on the students’ errors and their treatment of the errors, in the context of compulsory improvement in English teaching and learning quality By employing qualitative design including document analysis and semi-structured interview, this study has obtained a general picture on the students’ errors when writing paragraphs in English and perceptions of their teachers on the students’ writing errors The findings showed that there were kinds of writing errors commonly made by the students including plurality, article, spelling, punctuation, verb and preposition at the word level and subject-verb agreement and fragment at the sentential level In terms of the teachers’ perspectives, the teachers seem to notice only the errors related to verb, spelling, preposition, subjectverb agreement, linking words, sentence structure, word order, and word choice The teachers did not seem to pay attention to the errors related to plurality, articles, punctuation, and fragment To treat the errors, the teachers applied different error correction strategies: four out of five employed direct feedback and unfocused feedback meanwhile two other teachers indicated that sometimes they used indirect feedback and focused feedback together with students’ peer and self-correction 5.2 Implications for teachers and syllabus designers 5.2.1 Implications for teachers 59 With the hope to improve the quality of students' paragraph writings, some suggestions about the pedagogical implications for teachers were made First, a progression based on the popularity of errors will enable the teacher to teach the point of error and to emphasize more on those errors where the error frequency is higher For instance, this study shows that plurality, article, punctuation and fragment ranked in the highest forms of errors However, the teachers did not seem to pay attention to these four kinds of errors Hence, it is very essential that the studies of participant errors in learners help teachers identify the problematic areas of attentiongrabbing language at different levels of instruction The second implication for language teachers is that based on theoretical aspect, writing teachers can utilize interlingual and intralingual errors as an indicator of how far towards the goal learners have progressed and what remains for them to acquire (Corder, 1981) In other words, errors are a means of feedback for the writing teachers reflecting how effective they are in their pedagogical methodology Another implication that errors provide feedback, which means they tell the teachers something about the effectiveness of their teaching techniques and show them what part of the syllabus they have been following They further show them whether the pupils have benefited adequately on how they have taught Even where to provide further attention Teachers should increase the number of tasks in form of assignments for the sake of making their learners a lot of writing during their free time, by so doing, they would be reading a lot of English material and thinking in English, especially if they have to make oral presentations for their work In addition, the teachers should employ varied error treatment strategies to help students recognize, correct and avoid making errors in English writing The teachers should combine explicit (direct, corrective) feedback, with implicit feedback (using codes, underlines, symbols, comments in the margin) In addition, the teachers had 60 better provide the student's strategy training in utilizing the teacher response This can be obvious, for example when receiving code feedback from the teacher, the students should be shown some guidelines of error codes which are not confusing Then the students can edit their errors by themselves Next, teachers can prepare supplementary grammar instruction through the inductive method and remedial exercises through reading passages which contain the existing structure the students are acquiring It is suggested to use brief lessons, rather than extensive grammar presentations The lessons should be based on the students’ need, some complicated rules of the language, or untreatable errors selected from the students’ common errors Lastly, if teachers implement teamwork in class and get the learners to work in groups on their projects, learners will have a chance to practice together to develop their writing skill They will also have the chance to speak English with one another In the long-run, this would optimistically make them correct errors in their friends 5.2.2 Implications for syllabus designers Errors are significant to syllabus designers to see what items are important to be included in the syllabus and what items are redundant and should be excluded The analysis of the participants' errors can help identify learners' linguistic difficulties and need at a particular stage of language learning Also, time distribution should be studied more carefully since according to all the teachers’ reflection, time is not enough for all the skills, especially for the writing skill 5.3 Limitations of the study The study has achieved the objectives of investigating the most common writing errors in paragraph writing made by 6th-grade students at a junior secondary school in Nam Dinh city and examining teachers’ opinions the students’ errors and their error 61 treatment practices Nevertheless, limitations are unavoidable due to the limited time and inadequate experience of the researcher The first limitation is attributed to the scope of the study in which the number of participants is not large and the researcher just collected one piece of writing from each student participant, so the generalizability of the research results is rather limited Secondly, the information collected from the interviews may not reflect the real practice carried out by the teachers The study would be better if classroom observations were carried out to triangulate with the teachers’ account of their practice Thirdly, the findings of the research may not ensure the objectivity to some extent because the exploration of errors only focused on teachers’ perspectives and prediction based on theories in Error Analysis Apparently, the investigation would be more meaningful if students’ opinions of their making errors procedure were discovered and supported 5.4 Suggestions for further studies As making errors is an integral part of the learning process, more attention should be paid to the areas of error analysis and error treatment especially in teaching writing since this macro-skill is considered one of the most challenging skills for nonnative language learners The current study has just focused only on one particular small group of students in a particular locality in a very short data collection period Thus, further studies could be carried out with a larger number of participants, in more than one school and employ more data collection instruments such as classroom observations, questionnaires or interviews Another recommendation is that the study is extended to investigating in more details the causes of students’ writing errors from students’ perspectives so that more effective error treatment strategies could be recommended 62 5.5 Conclusion Writing paragraph is one of the important skills in learning a foreign language Pointing out the errors made by learners are significantly beneficial to teachers, learners, as well as researchers This study investigated types of writing errors commonly made by the students existing both at the word level (plurality, article, spelling, punctuation, verb and preposition) and at the sentential level (subject-verb agreement and fragment) The writing errors of students in teachers’ perspectives were verb, spelling, preposition, subject-verb agreement, linking words, sentence structure, word order, and word choice It is worth noticing that there is a significant difference between the teachers’ view of their learners’ errors and the errors made by students To be more detail, the errors which are plurality, article, punctuation, and fragment were found out in students’ writings were not referred to by the teachers In order to treat the errors, teachers should employ varied error treatment strategies such as direct feedback, indirect feedback, focused feedback and unfocused feedback with peer-correction and self-correction Based on the main findings, the pedagogical implications for 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In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia Retrieved November 7, 2017, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writing Zawahreh, F A S (2012) Applied error analysis of written production of English essays of tenth grade students in Ajloun Schools, Jordan International Journal of Learning and Development, 2(2), 280-299 67 Content APPENDIX 1: INTERVIEW PROTOCOL FOR TEACHERS Questions Purposes Introduction Hello, could you introduce To get acquainted about yourself? How long have you taught English? Do you love teaching English? Why? How long have you taught English for grade 6? Teachers’ perspectives of What are the most common To answer the research students’ writing errors errors made by the grade 6th question students? Teachers’ perspectives of Could you show some ways to To answer the research error treating ways treat students’ errors? Are they question effective? Beside the above ways of treatment, are there any other ways? What are they? Do you often use the other ways? How often? Time distribution for the How much time you spend For writing skill discussion teaching writing skill for grade implication 6th students? 68 and Teachers’ methods writing for grade 6th students? teaching writing Frequency of of Could you share how to teach For collecting Do students’ paragraphs you often ask and implication your For students to write paragraphs? discussion discussion and implication Do you often collect your students’ written work to grade and correct errors? How often? Teachers’ perspectives of Why they make those For possible sources of errors while writing? learners’ errors 69 discussion implication and APPENDIX 2: A SAMPLE OF TEACHERS’ INTERVIEWS [ ] Interviewer: How long have you taught English for grade 6? Teacher 1: I have taught English for year Interviewer: How much time you spend teaching the writing skill in English 6? Teacher 1: In the new English 6, the listening and writing skill are taught in Skills According to the curriculum, a half of a period is for the listening skill and the rest time is for the writing skill However, in my opinion, the time is not enough to teach the writing skill carefully Interviewer: Could you tell me how many minutes you teach the skill? Teacher 1: Skills often lasts 45 minutes and the writing skill takes up about 20 minutes [ ] Interviewer: Do you usually collect students’ writings to correct and mark? Teacher 1: Quite frequently because we not have enough time in class […] Interviewer: What are the most common errors in students’ paragraphs? Teacher 1: First, verb conjugation Second, spelling Third, using prepositions Interviewer: Why your students make these errors? Teacher 1: In my opinion, students learn a lot of theories while they not have many opportunities to practice using English especially in real situations [ ] Interviewer: Could you give some ways of treating students’ errors? Teacher 1: They include ✓ Step 1: Peer correction 70 ✓ Step 2: After being received their writings, students consider errors by themselves and discuss them ✓ Step 3: Teacher’s correction Interviewer: Do you think they are effective? Teacher 1: Yes, because while correcting errors for each other, students can realize errors by themselves Interviewer: Could you give any other ways to treat errors? Teacher 1: Yes, I take photographs of errors then show them by a projector for the whole class to watch and discuss those errors Interviewer: Do you often carry out this activity? Teacher 1: Actually sometimes I can it because the class time is not enough for students to practice writing paragraphs as well as to treat the writing errors for students, so I often treat the writing errors for students at additional periods in the afternoon 71 72 ...HANOI UNIVERSITY DEPARTMENT OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES AN INVESTIGATION INTO ERRORS IN WRITING ENGLISH PARAGRAPHS MADE BY 6TH GRADE STUDENTS AT A JUNIOR SECONDARY SCHOOL IN NAM DINH CITY (Nghiên... Hanoi –2019 STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP I certify that this thesis entitled ? ?An investigation into errors in writing English paragraphs made by 6th- grade students at a junior secondary school in Nam. .. this academic work Hanoi, 2019 Vu Thi Thuy Hong ii ABSTRACT The present study investigates errors made by the 6th- grade students at a junior secondary school in Nam Dinh City and examines the teachers’