GRAMMATICAL ERRORS IN WRITING NARRATIVE TEXT BY THE EIGHT GRADE STUDENTS AT SMPN 2 TIGABINANGA.

THE

STUDENTS’ GRAMMATICAL ERRORS

IN WRITING NARRATIVE TEXT

A THESIS

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirementsfor the Degree of SarjanaPendidikan

by:

PUTRI SRI MURNITA BR BANGUN

Registration Number 2112121025

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

FACULTY OF LANGUAGES AND ARTS

STATE UNIVERSITY OF MEDAN

DECLARATION

I have familiarized myself with the University’s Policy on Academic

integrity. Except where appropriately acknowledged, this thesis is my own work,

has been expressed in my own words and has not previously been submitted for

assessment.

I understand that this thesis may be screened electronically or otherwise

for plagiarism.

Medan, April 2016

i ABSTRACT

Bangun, Putri Sri Murnita. Registration Number: 2112121025. Grammatical Errors in Writing Narrative Text by the Eight Grade Students at SMPN 2 Tigabinanga. A Thesis. English Educational Program, State University of Medan, 2016.

This research deals with the eight grade students’ grammatical errors in writing narrative text. This research uses a qualitative design in which the data are taken from the sentences of texts. The data are collected by writing test and interview. The analysis found that: 1) There are four types of errors; they are ommision 6 cases (20.1%), addition 6 cases (20.1%), misformation 17 cases (58.8%), and misordering 0 case (0%). 2) The causes of errors; Interlingual transfer contributes 13.7% and intralingual transfer contributes 86.3%. So, the most dominant type of errors made by the tenth eight students in writing narrative text is misformation. It is hoped that the result of this research is useful for everyone who wants to study about grammatical errors.

ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The greatest thanks to the Almighty God for His blessings, the writer gives the greatest thankfulness for everything that has been given along her life, so the writer is able to complete this thesis. This thesis is aimed to fulfill the requirements for S-1 Degree of Sarjana Pendidikan at the English Department, Faculty of Languages and Arts in State University of Medan.

The writer would like to express her gratitude to those who helped her in completing this thesis, because without the suggestion, guidance, pray and support it could be not fulfilled. In this occasion, the writer would like to express her special gratitude to:

 Prof. Dr. Syawal Gultom, M.Pd., as the Rector of State University of Medan.

 Dr. Isda Pramuniati, M.Hum., as the Dean Faculty of Languages and Arts, State University of Medan.

 Prof. Dr. Hj. Sumarsih, M.Pd., as the Head of English Department and her Reviewer and Examiner.

 Nora Ronita Dewi, S.S., M.Hum., as the Head of Education Program of English Department.

 Dr. Anni Holila Pulungan, M.Hum., as her first Thesis Advisor.

 Dr. I Wy. Dirgeyasa, M.Hum., as her second Thesis Advisor.

 Alm. Drs. Bachtiar, M.Pd., as her Academic Advisor and Indra Hartoyo, S.Pd., M.Hum., her Reviewer and Examiner.

 All the Lecturers of English Department.

 Eis Sri Wahyuningsih, M.Pd., the Administration Staff of English Department.

 Mr. Pantas, the Administration Staff of English Department.

 Remon Sebayang, S.Pd., as the Headmaster of SMP Negeri 2 Tigabinanga.

 Alm. Irwan Bangun and Juliana Br Sebayang, her beloved parents for their prayer, love, lessons, spiritual supports, spirit, motivation, and material support during the writer’s whole life. The writer’s sincere gratitude also goes to her dearest brother Angga Putra Jaya Bangun for the supports and pray.

 Her beloved grandmother, uncle, and aunty, Astina Br Kaban, Ir. Agus T.A Sebayang and dr. Endang Br Sitepu, Mery Deliana Br Sebayang, S.Pd. and Liasta Karo-karo, Suranta Sebayang and Maya Sari Br Ginting for theirs prayer, support, and motivation given to the writer as long as she did this thesis.

iii

 Jusup Purba, S.Pd, for love, time, laughter, happiness, supports, togetherness and everything he gave that can make the writer experienced other sides of life.

 Her friends in IMKA FBS and IMKA Rudang Mayang UNIMED, Lisma Br Gintings, Nella Br Tarigan, Sri Apulina Ginting, Emi Br Bukit, Evi Br Barus, Feber Br Sembiring, Gita Br Ginting, Elsa Br Ginting, Mia Br Barus, Arie Milala, Dede Bangun, Rio Barus and Prima Purba, for their spirit, motivation and prayer to the writer.

 Her friends in Karang Taruna Tualah Sirulo, Dina Br Ginting, Suran Br Depari, Inoy Br Brahmana, and Valen Br Kembaren, for their motivation and prayer to the writer.

 Her friends in the class Reg. B 2011, Mey Three Purba, Mira, Dora, and Arnita, for their motivation and prayer to the writer.

 Her friends in Agnus Dei, Bang Derael Sijabat, Permadi Pasaribu, Jetty Napitupulu, Fytri Siregar, Dedi Simangunsong and Norita Purba.

vi

LIST OF TABLES

Pages

Table 1.1. The English grade students’ score on ... 3

Table 1.2. Example of narrarive text ... 10

vii

LIST OF APPENDICES

Pages

Appendix A. Observation Data of Writing Score ... 40

Appendix B. Writing Narrative text Procedure ... 41

Appendix C. The Classification of Errors ... 42

1 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

A. The Background of the Study

Writing is important skill that should be mastered by the students. By

writing, students understand the grammar of the text, how the students get the

information about the text after they write and then how the students retell about

the story after they write. Langan (2003:168) states that writing is an act of

discovery and knowledge creation by means and language. And then the purpose

of the writing is how the students can make their creation with the writing.

In the process of teaching and learning English, writing errors is one of the

problems that are faced by mostly students. When teaching students to write in

English, it is important for the teacher and the student to have a basic

understanding of how English operates and functions as writing and the ways in

which writing is substantially different from speech. When students first start to

write, their attempts closely resemble their speech. Harmer (2004:31) states

thatwriting is often not time-bound in the way conversation is. When writing,

students frequently have more time to think than they do in oral activities. They

can go through what they know in their minds, and even consult dictionaries,

grammar books or other reference material to help them. Students not only need to

2

Purpura (2004:1) states that the study of grammar has had a long and

important role in the history of second language and foreign language teaching.

Then, errors in foreign language teaching especially in English are the cases

which are difficult enough to avoid. Some errors are made when the students do

not understand well about the English grammar. Grammar is whole system and

structure of language. Grammar is important to learn or to teach in a foreign

language. Having known the definition of grammar, it is not hard to understand

why grammar is useful and important. Without knowing the grammar of a

language, one cannot be said to have learned the language.

Penny Ur (2004:4) states that grammar may be roughly defined as the way

a language manipulate and combines word (bits of words) in order to form longer

units of meaning. Grammatical errors are the mistakes in using grammar while

writing. Besides that, many students do not know to write a good text because

they do not know about grammar position in a text well. Many students learn

English from elementary school, but in junior high school they do not know to

write a good text. It is a problem, because English is important language for us. In

around the world, most countries use English as their second language, such as

Malaysia, Singapore and India. In those countries learning English is not difficult

for them, because have habituated themselves in using English both in oral and

writer form. It is so contrast to Indonesia, not all Indonesian students are familiar

3

According to English School Curriculum 2006, the Educational Unit

Curriculum (Kurikulum Tingkat SatuanPendidikan: KTSP) students of Junior

High School, are expected to understand and to write some genres of text that they

learn at school, especially narrative text. Narrative text is one type of genre that

students make some errors in their narrative text writing. The most common errors

they made are in conjunction, simple past tense, and preposition. To support this

fact, this study takes writing of students in eight grade, such as:

a. She was beautiful and bad.

It should be: She was beautiful but bad.

Using but as conjuntion in that sentence is correctbecause the sentence contrast

between two sentences.

b. She was live with her stepmother.

It shoul be: She lived with her stepmother.

Using lived as past tense in that sentence is correct because the verb made by

adding e/ed and do not used tobe before verb in the sentence.

c. She saw him on the morning.

It should be: She saw him in the morning.

Using in as preposition in that sentence is a correct because in used with a part

of the day.

From the data above, it can be seen that students’ grammatical writing is

4

in their grammatical errors consists on conjunction, simple past tense and

preposition.Then, the researcher asked their English teacher about the minimum

criteria mastery (KKM) for writing narrative text. From 40 students it is found

that there are only 12 students could pass the KKM and 28 students still get score

below KKM which is made by the teacher, the score of the passing grade (KKM)

is 75. Here is the data about students who get the score of writing narrative text

below KKM :

Table 1.1 The English grade students’ score of writing narrative text in the first semester at SMPN 2 Tigabinanga in Academic Year 2014/2015

Semester Score Students %

B. The Problems of the Study

Based on the previous discussion in the background of the study, the

research problems of the study are formulated as follows:

a. What are the types of errors made by the students in writing narrative?

5

C. The Objectives of the Study

Based on the research statement, this particular study aimed at finding out:

a. To find out the types of errors made by the students in writing narrative

text.

b. To find out the causes of the students errors in writing narrative text.

D. The Scope of the Study

This research only focuses on errors found in students’ writing narrative

text especially in grammar errors. There are also many kinds of grammar errors

but this research only focuses on conjunction, simple past tense and preposition.

E. The Significances of the Study

The result of the study are expected to be used theoretically and

practically:

1. Theoretically

The result of the study are expected to enrich the literature on English teaching in

writing a narrative text and to provide a beneficial reference for further research

on a grammatical error analysis of students’ skill in writing a narrative text.

2. Practically :

a) For the students, to help students to use grammar correctly when they

write their writing particularly writing narrative text and improves their skill in

6

b) For the teachers, to provide some benefits for them in their teaching

learning process in applying a correct grammar in order to notice whether or

36

CHAPTER V

CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS

This chapter presents the conclusions of the result of study that has been

discussed in previous chapter and also suggestions for English teacher, students,

readers and other researchers.

A. Conclusions

Based on the data analysis of research at eight grade students at SMPN 2

Tigabinanga, the reseacher wants to present the conclusions. The conclusions

consist of several points that are related to the problems of the study. They are:

1. The types of errors in narrative texts writen by students are ommision,

addition, misformation, and misordering. Misformation highest of highest the

types of errors with the percentage 58.8%.

2. Interlingual and intralingual transfer con tribute in causing errors occur. And

intralingual transfer (86.3%) dominantly causes the errors occur.

B. Suggestions

Considering the conclusions above, some suggestions are presented in this

past. As discussed in chapter I, this study hopefully can give advantageous

information both theoretically and practically.

1. For teachers

a. The teachers are expected to give stronger emphasis about grammar to

37

b. The teachers are expected to discuss and remind students about grammar

related to the English topics that they learn, by doing this students will be

more aware about grammar.

c. The teachers are expected to give more exercises continuously to the

students and discuss it together if the grammatical errors occur.

2. For students

a. The students should be able to comprehend about the grammar.

b. The students are expected to be more aware about the grammar rules for

the sake of their mastery in using English spoken and written.

c. The students are expected to learn more about English grammar.

d. The students are expected to do exercises and practice more about the

grammar to train their ability in using it.

3. For readers

It is suggested to readers to improve and increase their knowledge about

38 REFERENCES

Alam, Syamsul. 2012. The Grammatical Errors in Narrative Text Made by the Eight Graders at Laboratory Junior High School.Unpublished Thesis.UniversitasNegeri Malang

Ali Akbar Khansir. 2004. Error Analysis and Second Language Acquisition.

Theory and Practice in Language Studies. 2 (5), 1027 – 1032

Astasari, Isani. 2009. Grammatical Errors in Students’ Narrative

Writing.Unpublished Thesis.UniversitasNegeri Malang

Azar, Betty Schrampfer, 1992. Understanding and Using English Grammar.Jakarta:BinaRupaAksara

Best, Jhon W, Kahn, James V. 2006. Research in Education. Boston: UnitedStated of America

Brown, H. Douglas, 2000. Principle of Language Learning and Teaching.New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

Brown, Doughlas. 1987.Principles of Language Learning and Teaching. NewYork: Prentice Hall

Corder,S. p. 1981.Error Analysis and Interlingua.London: Oxford University Press

Dirgeyasa, I Wayan. 2012. Maritime English Skills: A Genre Based Approach.Medan :Unimed Press.

Dirgeyasa, I Wayan.2014. Collages Academic Writting:A Genre Based Perspective. Medan: Unimed Press.

Ehrlich, Eguene. 2004. English Grammar. Jakarta: Erlangga

Erdagon, Vaside. 2005. Contribution of Error Analysis to Foreign Language Teaching. Journal of The Faculty of Education. 1 (2), 261-270

Firas Ali Suleiman Zawahreh. 2012. Applied Error Analysis of Written Production of English Essays of Tenth Grade Students in Ajloun Schools, Jordan. International Journal of Learning & Development.International

39

Harmer, Jeremy. 2004. The Practice of English Language Teaching. New York : Longman.

Harmer, Jeremy. 2001. The Practice of Language and Teaching. New York: Pearson EducationLimited

Ibrahim Abushihab. 2014. An Analysis of Grammatical Errors in Writing

MadebyTurkish Learners of English as a Foreign Language. International Journal of Linguistics. 6 (4), 1948-5425

James, Carl. 1998. Errors in Language Learning and Use: Exploring Error Analysis. London: Longman.

Knapp, Peter, Watkins, Megan. 2005. Genre, Text, Grammar: Technologies for Teaching and Assessing Writing. Australia: A USNW Press book

Kurikulum Tingkat Satuan Pendidikan (KTSP) BahasaInggris SMP. 2006. JakartaDepartemen Pendidikan Nasional.

Langan, J. 2003. College Writing Skills (5�ℎ _{Ed). New York : McGraw Hill.}

Moleong, Lexi. 2010. Metode Penelitian Kualitatif. Bandung: RemajaRosdaKarya

Morley, G. David. 2000. Syntax in Functinal Grammar: An Introduction to Lexicogrammar in SystemicLinguistics. London: Continuum

Palaguna, Indriawan. 2013.The Error Analysis of Students’ in Writing Narrative Tetx at the Eleventh Grade of SMA Negeri 1 Paliamanan. Unpublished Thesis.UniversitasSwadayanaGunungJati

Pooneh Heydari, Mohammad S. Bagheri. 2012. Error Analysis: Sources of L2 Learners’ Errors. Theory and Practice in Language Studies. 2 (8) 1583 – 1589

Setiyadi, Bambang. 2006. Metode Penelitian untuk Pengajaran Bahasa Asing: PendekatanKuantitatifdanPendekatanKualitatif. Yogyakarta: GrahaIlmu

Sugiyono.2013. Metode Penelitian Kuantitatif Kualitatif. Bandung :Alfabeta

Thornbury, Scott. 1999. How to Teach Grammar. London: Longman