GRAMMATICAL ERRORS
ON STUDENTS’ ANALYTICAL
EXPOSITION WRITING
A THESIS
Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of
Sarjana Pendidikan
By:
AFRIANDO TERMA SIMANJUNTAK
Registration Number: 2113121003
ENGLISH AND LITERATURE DEPARTEMENT
FACULTY OF LANGUAGES AND ARTS
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ABSTRACT
Simanjuntak, Afriando Terma. 2113121003. Grammatical Errors on
Students’ Analytical Exposition Writing. A Thesis. Faculty of Languages and Arts, State University of Medan. 2016.
This study deals with grammatical errors on students’ analytical exposition writing. This study was conducted by using qualitative design in which the data were taken from the students’ writing. The population of the study was the students of grade XI Science 1 of SMA Negeri 3 Tebing Tinggi about 32 students in 2015/2016 academic year. The data of the study were obtained from the students’ writing test. The analysis found that: 1) There are four types of errors; namely omission: 135 cases (33%); addition: 103 cases (25 %); misformation: 143 cases (35 %) and misordering: 29 cases (7 %). 2) The dominant type of errors made by the eleventh grade students in writing analytical exposition text is misformation. 3) The causes of errors; Interlingual transfer contributes 56.34 % and intralingual transfer contributes 43.66 %. All types of intralingual occurred with the occurance presentation; overgeneralization contributes 38 %; ignorance of rule restriction 4%; incomplete of rule application 32 % and false concept hypothesize 26 %.
Keywords: Grammatical Errors, Analytical Exposition Text, Eleventh Grade
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ACKNOWLEDGMENT
First of all, the writer would like to express his deepest gratitude to the most merciful and gracious the Almighty God, Jesus Christ, for His amazing grace, love, countless blessings, sincerity, countenance and strength given to the writer during his study and in completing this thesis which entitled: Grammatical Errors on Students’ Analytical Exposition Writing. This thesis is aimed to fulfill one of the requirements for the degree of Sarjana Pendidikan of the English Department, Faculty of Languages and Arts, State University of Medan (UNIMED).
In completing this Thesis, the writer realized that he faced some problems and he had received the academic guidance, suggestions, and comments and got a lot of assistance and moral supports from many people. Therefore, the writer would like to express his gratitude and special thanks to:
Prof. Dr. Syawal Gultom, M.Pd., as the Rector of State University of
Dra. Meisuri, M.A., as the Secretary of English Department
Nora Ronita Dewi, S.S., S.Pd., M.Hum, as the Head of English Education
Study Program.
Drs. Lidiman S.M. Sinaga, M.Hum., his Academic Advisor and Thesis
Advisor
Prof. Amrin Saragih, M.A. and Prof. Dr. Berlin Sibarani. M.Pd., as his
Thesis Reviewer and Examiner, who have given their precious time, guidance, suggestions, and comments.
All the Lecturers of English Department who have taught, guided, and
advised his throughout the academic years.
Eis Sri Wahyuningsih, M.Pd., as the Administration Staff of English
Department,
Albert Napitupulu, M.Pd., as the Headmaster of SMA Negeri 3 Tebing
Tinggi and Johanes Manik, S.Pd., the English Teacher, for their permission, opportunities and guidance in allowing the writer to do observation and to collect the data.
His beloved parents, B.E Simanjuntak and L. Tambun, his lovely sister,
Agnes Dwi Sari Simanjuntak and his lovely brother, Oky Satria Simanjuntak, his lovely cousin, Nesta Alesandro Tambun and all his
families for their endless love, pray, inspiration, motivation, mental and everything they have given to the writer.
His friends in Reguler Dik. A 2011, as his great class for the love and togetherness throughout four years.
Arnita, Devi, Dora, Roslinda, Evelin, Harni, Fitry and Martina aka The L Power Puff Girls for their innocence and support for completing this
iii
His family in Paduan Suara Filadelfia and all the members for their loyalty, prays, motivation, laughters, loves, services and unforgettable moments during these four years
His lovely friends, Novilda Angela Saragih, S.Pd and Renol Aprico
Siregar, S.Pd for all of their innocence, supports, prayers, motivation,
laughters, tears, and togetherness through ups and downs, thick and thins and their endless loyalty.
His friends in PPLT SMA Negeri 1 Siantar Narumonda 2014 for many experiencies and togetherness, especially for Yusni Simanungkalit, S.Pd.,
Christin Sinaga, S.Pd. and Dameria Sitinjak, S.Pd.
The last, but not the least, Tomato Foundation Group members; Mhd.
Fakhrur Rozi, S.Ked., Tania Suri W, S.I.Kom., Febrina Audina, SKG., Nur Shabrina Sinulingga, S.H. and Fadra Sirvy, S.Ked., for all their silly
yet endless supports, pray and motivation in completing this thesis.
The writer realizes that this thesis still has the paucity, he conveniently welcomes any suggestions, comments, critics, and advices that will improve the quality of this thesis. He hopes that this thesis would be useful for those who read and are interested in the field of this study.
Medan, February 2016 The writer,
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CHAPTER IV DATA ANALYSIS, FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 32
A. Data Analysis ... 32
1. Types of Errors ... 32
2. Causes of Errors ... 38
B. Findings ... 44
C. Discussions ... 45
CHAPTER V CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS ... 48
A. Conclusions ... 48
B. Suggestions ... 49
REFERENCES ... 51
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LIST OF TABLES
Pages
Table 1.1. The Percentage of Students’ Writing ... 3
Table 2.1. Patterns of Simple Present Tense ... 9
Table 2.2. Adverbs of Frequency in Simple Present Tense ... 10
Table 4.1. The Percentage of Data Analysis of The Grammatical Errors in
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LIST OF FIGURES
Pages
Figure 4.1. The Diagram of the Causes of Grammatical Errors ... 38
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LIST OF APPENDICES
Pages
Appendix A. Writing Test. ... 53
Appendix B. Students’ Work Sheet ... 54
Appendix C. The Classification of Errors (I) ... 58
Appendix D. The Classification of Errors (II) ... 62
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CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
A. The Background of The Study
Language has been widely and commonly used as a means of
communication by human beings in this world. It is a vehicle to share information
to other people. Today, there are many languages spread in this world and have
made the people master two different languages at least, which includes English,
in order to get information fast and well. Furthermore, English has grown rapidly
and become a lingua franca. A lingua franca can be defined as a language widely
adopted for communication between two speakers whose native languages are
different from each other and where one or both speakers are using it as a ‘second’
language (Harmer 2001:1). Therefore, as an international language, English needs
some basic skills that consist of speaking, listening, reading and writing.
Due to the importance of English, Indonesia has made English as a subject
in school; started from primary school up to university level, which is based on
curriculum, such as the Educational Unit Oriented Curriculum ( Kurikulum
Tingkat Satuan Pendidikan; KTSP) 2006 of Senior High School for instance. It
requires the students to be able to write various types of writing genres, such as
descriptive, narrative, anecdote, analytical exposition, hortatory exposition,
recount, report, news item, procedure and spoof.
Based on the researcher’s experience in Field Practice Experience
(Pengalaman Praktik Lapangan = PPL) at State Senior High School 1 (Sekolah
2
writing and did not exceed the Minimal Completeness Criteria (KKM), which is
about 75. The students did not pay attention and give enthusiasm in writing
because they did not know what to write, lack of vocabularies and lack of
grammar mastery. The lack of grammar mastery has been a common difficulty for
students in learning English and writing English text. They said that it was very
hard to them to remember and master all English grammar at once because
grammar itself governs the composition of clauses, phrases and words in English.
By having good grammar, a writing, such as analytical exposition text, will have a
meaningful meaning,
Analytical exposition text is a kind of writing that elaborates the writer’s
ideas about phenomenon surrounding which functions to argue that something is
the case, with thesis, arguments and reiteration as its structural organization.
Therefore, by learning how to write the analytical exposition text, people are
expected to be able to convey their ideas and arguments logically. They also will
be capable to convey them orderly so that the readers can believe and accept the
reasons. However, to write an analytical exposition, there are some grammatical
features required, and using of simple present tense is the main features found for
it is concerned with generalized phenomena. As an analogy of Clark and Clark
(1977:7), they state that the function of a bicycle, which is to transport one person
plus baggage for moderate distances at moderate speeds, cannot be served if the
bicycle did not have structure it did. Thus, an analytical exposition will not
deserve its function if it does not have the structure it does and use simple present
3
However, it cannot be denied that people do some errors in using correct
tense on analytical exposition text. Errors can be caused by ignorance of just one
word and that affects the entire sentences and is affected in unpredictable ways
(Sanders and Sanders, 1987). For example: Human beings known as a novelist,
dramatist or short story writers who have created literary works. This sentence
should be human beings are known as a novelist, dramatist or short story who
have created literary works. In addition, many more errors we can find on
students’ writing. Thus, this learning can be as an evaluation of materials for
learners, awareness of the needs of teachers in terms of teacher training (Taylor,
2002:36).
The same situation is also faced by the researcher when he did an
observation at grade XI SMA Katolik Mariana Medan. He found that the students
got low scores in writing simple present tense sentences because they did some
errors in using the tense, such as ‘she drink’, ‘Ani make cake every week’ and
‘We studying English every Monday. From all the students, only one of them
could surpass the Minimal Completeness Criteria (KKM) which was about 75. It
can be seen from the table below.
Table 1.1. The Eleventh Grade Students’ Score of Making Simple Present Tense Sentences
Class Score Students Percentage
XI IPA 1 >75 1 7.14%
4
From the explanation above and observation that the researcher did, the
researcher is interested to take the problem. It is supposed that by analysing
grammatical errors on analytical exposition, can improve the students’ writing and
grammar mastery. This study will become a useful research to make the readers
aware of using grammar correctly.
B. The Problems of the Study
In relation to the background explained above, the problems of this study
can be stated as follows:
1. What type of errors are found on the students’ analytical exposition writing?
2. What kind of errors is dominantly found on the students’ analytical
exposition writing?
3. Why does the dominant type occur the way it is?
C. The Objectives of the Study
The objectives of the study are to investigate:
1. Type of errors on students’ analytical exposition writing
2. Kind of grammatical errors dominantly found on students’ analytical
exposition writing
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D. The scope of the study
This study is only limited to the grammatical errors on students’ analytical
exposition writing. It will be based on the language features of analytical
exposition text which uses simple present tense in it.
E. The significance of study
Findings of the study are expected to give theoretical and practical
significance
1. Theoretically, findings of the study are expected to add up more horizon in
theories of grammatical errors. In addition, the findings can be reference for
further studies.
2. Practically, the findings can be useful for teachers and students. For
teachers, the findings can be information about grammatical errors on
students’ writing. For students, the findings can be a tool to make them
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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
and other researchers.
A. Conclusions
Based on the data analysis of research at eleventh grade students at SMA
Negeri 3 Tebing Tinggi, the writer gets conclusions. The conclusions consist of
several points that are related to the problems of the study. They are:
1. The types of errors which are found on analytical exposition texts written by
the eleventh grade students are omission, addition, misformation and
misordering
2. The dominant type of errors which are found on analytical exposition
written by the eleventh grade is misformation because they do not pay
attention to the modals and changing some irregular plural noun with
percentage about 35% (143 errors of 410 errors)
3. The way the errors occurences occures because of interlingual transfer and
intralingual transfer. Interlingual transfer happens because of the
interference of language mastery of the learner’s first language into target
language, such as omitting –s in plural nouns. While intralingual transfer
happens because the learners are still affected by the influence of one target
49
B. Suggestions
Considering the conclusions above, some suggestions are presented in
purpose this thesis can give advantageous information both theoretically and
practically.
1. For teachers
a. The teachers are expected to give stronger emphasis about simple present
tense. They must give the explanation, examples and exercises about this
topic to avoid the error occurences such as omission, additional,
misformation and misordering.
b. The teachers are expected to discuss and remind the students of simple
present tense. They can put them in group to do some error exercises
such as misformulation of noun and verb. As a result, the students will be
more aware of simple present tense and are avoided to omit, add,
misformulate and misorder the sentences that they probably are going to
make.
c. The teachers are expected to give more excercises continuously to the
students about grammatical errors such as errors occurances on
underlined words and ask the students why it is called error by giving
their reasons towards the cases.
2. For students
a. The students are expected to learn and have a group discussion to discuss
about simple present tense harder to avoid them from omission, addition,
50
b. The students are expected to work in team to list some examples of
singular nouns and plural noun on their notebook to avoid them from
misformation which is the dominant error occurs on their writing.
c. The students are expected to do exercises and practice more about simple
present tense to train their ability in using it. Hopefully, they will be
avoided from omission, addition, misformation and misordering on their
writings
3. For other researchers
It is suggested to the researchers to do research in the same topic about
grammar, especially simple present tense, but with different sample of subject in
case the result will be different. Hence, if any research will be conducted one day,
this paper can be guidance and information because they have already known
about types of errors such as omission, addition, misformation and misordering
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