ERROR ANALYSIS

SYNTACTIC ERRORS BY THE STUDENTS OF PRIVATE AND PUBLIC

COLLEGES IN WRITING ENGLISH PARAGRAPH AT INTERMEDIATE
LEVEL, KOHAT, (KP).

BY
ANEELA ANBAR
Registration No. ENG320182004
Program: MS English

Supervisor–I Dr Abdus Samad Department of English

KUST, Kohat
Signature

Supervisor–II Dr Mansoor Ali Department of English

KUST, Kohat
Signature

Chairman Dr Abdus Samad Department of English

KUST, Kohat
Signature

Department of English
Kohat University of Science & Technology, Kohat-26000,
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan
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1.1 Introduction:

Error-analysis is defined as a way of identifying, classifying, and systematically

interrupting the unacceptable forms produced by someone learning a foreign language,
using any of the principles, and procedures provided by the linguistics (Crystal, 2003, p.
165). James defines error analysis as “a process of determining the incidence, nature,
causes, and consequences of unsuccessful language” (James, 1998, p. 1). Hendrickson
(1987) mentions that errors are signals that indicate an actual learning process taking
place, and that the learner has not yet mastered a well-structured competence in the target
language.

1.2 Focus Of The Study:

Language learning like any other human learning entails the making of mistakes
and errors. In a foreign language, learning-errors made by the learners are intrinsic parts
of the complex learning process. Richard (1974) claims that “it is a matter of common
observation that even the most intelligent, motivated learners do make errors even when
learning under the best possible conditions.” Committing errors is unavoidable in any
learning (James, 1998), and learning a language is no exception. So EFL learners are
liable to commit errors despite a long period of English study (Lasaten, 2014; Wee, Sim
and Jusoff, 2009, p. 016).

English is one of the leading languages of international discourse. English is a

language that is used as a communication channel by many in many parts of the world.
Nearly one billion people around the globe know English, as estimated by David Crystal
(2006). It is the Lingua Franca in many regions, and in a professional context, the most
widely learned Second Language. In Pakistan, the standard national education system is
inspired by the English Educational System. English is taught both as a compulsory and
as an optional subject at schools and colleges where students are expected to master the
four basic language skills i.e. reading, listening, speaking, and writing. Students must
pass the compulsory course at school, colleges, for the award of a certificate or degree.
English is the third or fourth language for most students or learners which further
complicates the situation for them.

Learning English or any other language undoubtedly requires the four skills to be
mastered; listening, speaking, reading and writing as well as understanding the phrases
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and sentence structures of the language (Ngangbam, 2016). Among all these skills,
writing is viewed as the most intricate skill because it involves thinking that goes through
different stages, i.e., pre-writing, writing and editing, to achieve the final product. For
many researchers, writing is an art and the writer is an artist, so as per this view, writing
is not considered a piece of cake even for the native speakers. Many native speakers are
hesitant to write and face difficulties in mastering the writing skill. Nonetheless, writing
is an essential skill that is defectively acquired. Nevertheless, expertise in one's native
language does not guarantee excellence in L2 writing (Khansir & Hajivandi, 2013).

Mohammad and Hazarika (2016) view that in countries of non-native speakers of

English, English writing is increasingly vital in educational and professional settings
because of it being the key component of the language as it is of utmost importance in
academic disciplines to examine the performance of students in their respective fields of
study. As writing is a continuous and complex process of expression, it is not in itself a
simple process with its native language and rather, even more, a complicated process if
the language is a foreign language. And thus EFL students commit numerous errors while
writing in a foreign language.

Hence, the focus of the present study will be to scrutinize the syntactic error
committed by intermediate level students in paragraph composition.

1.3 Rationale:

In education, the importance of English cannot be ignored. Writing in a foreign

language is a troublesome task for learners. Error-free English writing is considered a
key to success in academic and practical life. Most of the Pakistani intermediate level
learners come across several difficulties when they are asked to write something in
English. One of such areas of difficulty in English syntax. Even after studying the
language for ten academic years, the Pakistani learners find writing in English hard
because of being poor at English grammar, though writing is inevitable as they have to
write assignments and take examinations in English throughout their academic career.

As a teacher of English at College level, the researcher has observed that most of
the students who come from private schools have better written skills than those who
come from public schools. Why is this difference occurring? This persuaded me to
research this area as it seems quite a new and interesting area to be investigated.
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However, a lot of studies have been conducted on error analysis in Pakistan like by
Shujaat Ali et al. (2020), NOHAIZ MEHMOOD (2019), by KISHWAR SULTANA
(2018), Ahmed et al. (2017), Dr Abdul Malik Abbasi (2017), Nawaz et al. (2017), Jamil
et al. (2016), Javid (2017), Iqbal et al. (2016), Sameera Sultan (2015), Saeed et al. (2015),
Asim et al. (2014), Hussain et al. (2013), Iqbal and Sarwat (2012) and many more but, to
best of the researcher’s knowledge, there is no such study in the context at hand----
conducted in Pakistan, especially in KPK.

Furthermore, a study conducted by Dr Hemabati Ngangbam (2016) on ‘’ An

Analysis Of Syntactic Errors Committed By The Students Of English Language Class In
The Written Composition Of Mutah University: A Case Study’’ recommended to conduct
further Study comparing students who finished from private schools and ordinary public
schools.

In this backdrop, the current study will decipher the “Syntactic Errors by the
Students Of Private and Public Colleges in Writing English Paragraph at Intermediate
Level Kohat (KPK).”

1.4 Significance of the Study:

The subject-matter of this research is highly significant. It aims to provide knowledge

about the syntactic errors committed by the learners of intermediate level. In addition to
that, this study will have great implication at a Policy-making level—at curriculum
development, teaching methodologies, teaching strategies, etc. and even at the execution
level of these policies.

1.5 Research Questions:

1. What are the Syntactic errors committed by the students of intermediate level in
English paragraph composition?

2. Is there any difference in the syntactic errors committed by the students of private
and public colleges at Intermediate Level in their English paragraph composition?

1.6 Research Objectives:

1. To identify the syntactic errors committed by the students of intermediate level in

English paragraph composition.
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2. To analyze the difference in the syntactic errors committed by the students of

private and public colleges at Intermediate Level in their English paragraph
composition and to investigate the reasons behind it.

2.1 Methodology:

This study aims to explore the “Syntactic Errors by the Students Of Private and
Public Colleges in Writing English Paragraph at Intermediate Level Kohat (KP).” It will
utilize a mixed-method approach. Mixed method approach contains both quantitative and
qualitative research method to collect data. Dornier (2007) also recommended this
approach. He states that by incorporating both qualitative and quantitative method, one
can get the best of both.

2.2 Population:

The population of this research study will comprise the intermediate level students
of Kohat colleges, KP.

2.3 Sample:

The researcher will use the primary source for this work. For Data collection
written paragraph of 100 students will be collected from two private colleges (FIC and
Iqra public school and college Kohat, 25 from each) and two public colleges (GPGC
Kohat and F.G Degree College for Woman Kohat Cantt, 25 from each) through random
sampling technique. The students will be asked to write a paragraph on the topic ‘’Pros
and Cons of the Internet’’. Then these paragraphs will be analyzed to find syntactic errors
made by the students through error analysis. All the students of F.SC part 1 will be the
target population of the study.

After paragraph analysis, 4 English teachers one from each college will be
interviewed (semi-structured through purposive sampling) about their opinion regarding it
and the interviews will be then analyzed via content analysis.

2.4 Research Instrument:

As the present study will be mixed-method research design, hence two research
tools will be used for data collection:
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The first will be the descriptive writing test for students and the second will be semi-
structured interview questions for the ESL teacher. The students will be given a
descriptive writing test of 350 words paragraph to be completed within 90 minutes. The
descriptive writing task will be distributed to the students and collected by the researchers
with the help of their class ESL teacher.

The second research instrument will semi-structured interview questions of the

teacher.

3. Data Analysis:

The tool for data analysis is error analysis, which falls within the descriptive
research method. Errors will be analyzed following Corder's (1967) model: data will be
collected, and the errors will be identified by carefully examining all erroneous sentences.
Then, the errors will be described and classified into different types. Finally, findings and
conclusions will be drawn from the analyzed data. The paragraph will be checked online
through the software called Ginger sentence and grammar checker. This will enable the
researcher to collect the required information without any biases.

The researcher will then use the formula on Corder theory { 𝑝 =n1/∑𝑛x 100 % }
theory to find the types of grammatical error in Guided students’ Writing. P=percentage,
n1= total of the errors, Σn= total of the whole errors. After paragraph analysis, teachers
will be interviewed (semi-structured through purposive sampling) about their opinion
regarding it and the interviews will be then analyzed via content analysis.

4. Time Frame:

S. Research Component Time Required

No
.
1 Literature review Two months:
2 Data collection Three months:
3 Analysis Two months:

4 Thesis writing Three months:

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5. References:

1. Dr Hemabati, N (2016). AN ANALYSIS OF SYNTACTIC ERRORS

COMMITTED BY THE STUDENTS OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE CLASS IN
THE WRITTEN COMPOSITION OF MUTAH UNIVERSITY: A CASE
STUDY. European Journal of English Language, Linguistics and Literature Vol.
3 No. 1, 2016 ISSN 2059-2027
2. Dr Malik, A (2017). Error Analysis of English Paragraphs by Pakistani
Undergraduates
3. Jamil et al. (2016). Analyzing Common Errors in English Composition at a
Postgraduate Level in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (Pakistan). Bulletin of Education and
Research December 2016, Vol. 38, No. 2 pp. 53-67
4. Karim et al. (2018). Error Analysis in EFL Writing Classroom. International
Journal of English Linguistics; Vol. 8, No. 4, 2018.
5. Mushtaq et al. (2019). A Corpus-Based Analysis of EFL Learners' Errors in
Written Composition at Intermediate Level. Indian Journal of Natural Sciences
Vol.9 /Issue 52 / February / 2019 ISSN: 0976 – 0997
6. Nohaiz, M (2019). Error Analysis of English writing problems faced by
undergraduate students of GCU Lahore, Pakistan. American Research Journal of
Humanities & Social Science (ARJHSS) E-ISSN: 2378-702X Volume-02, Issue-05,
pp-24-29 May-2019
7. Saira et al. (2018). Error Analysis of English Language Speakers in the Use of
Articles
in Pakistan. Journal of Educational Research, Dept. of Education, IUB, Pakistan
(Vol. 21 No. 1) 2018
8. Sultana, K (2018). Common Syntactic Errors in English Composition Committed
by Pakistani Learners of Various Linguistic Backgrounds. National University of
Modern Languages.
9. Shujaat et al. (2020). Punctuation Errors in Writing: A Comparative Study of
Students’ Performance from Different Pakistani Universities. Sir Syed Journal of
Education & Social Research Vol. 3, Issue 1, 2020 (Jan – March)
10. Sajjad et al. 2015. Prepositional Errors in the Writings of Pakistani ESL Students.
International Journal of English Linguistics; Vol. 5, No. 3; 2015 ISSN 1923-869X
E-ISSN 1923-8703