AN ANALYSIS ON STUDENTS’ GRAMMATICAL ERRORS IN

WRITING DESCRIPTIVE PARAGRAPH

(A Case Study at the Second Grade of SMPN 3 Tangerang Selatan)

By:

Santi Noviyanti

108014000077

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH EDUCATION

FACULTY OF TARBIYA AND TEACHERS TRAINING

STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH

JAKARTA

1434 H/2013 M

i

ABSTRACT

AN ANALYSIS ON STUDENTS’ GRAMMATICAL ERRORS IN

WRITING DESCRIPTIVE PARAGRAPH. A Case Study at the Second Grade

of SMPN 3 Tangerang Selatan. Skripsi of English Education Department at

Faculty of Tabiyah and Teacher’s Training of State Islamic University Syarif

Hidayatullah Jakarta, 2013.

Keywords: Error Analysis, Types of Error.

This study was carried out to analyze and to classify the types and the

sources of student’s grammatical errors in writing descriptive paragraph. The

error collected was classified based on Corder’s theory. Besides, the purpose of

this study was to find out their frequency of in writing descriptive paragraph.

The method used in this study was qualitative. The qualitative design

applied in this study was a case study. Furthermore, the subject of this study was

second year students of 8.8. The writer took 30 students as the sample. The data

were collected through test.

The result of the error analysis process showed that students committed

error into four types: omission, addition, selection, and ordering. From the

frequency of each error types, selection was the error which most frequently

produced by the students. It took 57.9% of the total errors. Moreover, 29.8%

errors fell into error of omission and 7.6% errors fell into addition; whereas, for

Misordering, it only took 4.7%. To sum up, it showed that the usage of the

grammar in writing descriptiveparagraph is difficult for students.

ii

ABSTRAK

ANALISA KESALAHAN-KESALAHAN GRAMMAR SISWA DALAM

PENULISAN PARAGRAF DESKRIPTIF. A Case Study at the Second Grade

of SMPN 3 Tangerang Selatan. Skripsi of English Education Department at

Faculty of Tabiyah and Teacher’s Training of State Islamic University Syarif

Hidayatullah Jakarta. 2013.

Keywords: Error Analysis, Types of Error.

Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk menganalisis dan mengelompokkan

kesalahan-kesalahan yang dilakukan oleh siswa dalam menulis paragraf

deskriptif. Kesalahan-kesalahan tersebut dikelompokkan berdasarkan teori

Corder. Penelitian ini bertujuan juga untuk memperoleh persentasi dari setiap

jenis kesalahan yang dilakukan oleh siswa dalam menulis paragraf deskriptif.

Metode yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah metodekualitatif,

sedangkan pola umum atau rancangan penelitian yang digunakan oleh peneliti

adalah studi kasus (case study). Selanjutnya, peneliti memilih siswakelas 8.8.

Penulis mengambil 30 siswa sebagai subjek dalam penelitian ini. Data dalam

penelitian ini diperoleh melalui tes.

Hasil dari penelitian error analysis menunjukan bahwa siswa melakukan

empat jenis kesalahan yaitu omission, addition, selection, and misordering.

Dilihat dari presentase setiap jenis kesalahan, selection merupakan jenis kesalahan

yang paling sering dilakukan dengan presentase sebesar 57.9%. Selanjutnya,

kesalahan omission sebesar 29.8%, addition sebesar 7.6%, sedangkan jenis

kesalahan ordering hanya sebesar 4.7% dari total kesalahan yang dilakukan oleh

siswa. Sebagai kesimpulan, hal ini terlihat bahwa siswa memiliki kesulitan

menggunakan grammar dalam penulisan paragraf deskriptif.

iii

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

In the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful.All praisebe to Allah,

Lord of the Worlds, who has bestowed strength and healthupon thewriter in

finishing this research paper. Peace and blessing be upon our prophet Muhammad

SAW, his family, companions, and all his followers.

Alhamdulillah by the grace of Allah the Highest, the writer could finish

her research paper after long hard effort of writing. Thus, she would like to

express her greatest gratitude to her beloved parents (Nunu Erwin Siswanto and

Enok Ernawati) who always pray, support, and motivate her in every part of her

life especially in doing this study.

The writer would also like to address her gratitude to her advisors Dr.

Fahriany, M. Pd and Neneng Sunegsih M. Pd for their patient guidance, kindness,

valuable advice, and correction during the development of this research.

She would like to express her deep appreciation and gratitude to:

1. All lecturers of English Education Department who have taught her new

knowledge and have given her gorgeous experiences in study.

2. Drs. Syauki, M.Pd. and Zaharil Anasy, M.Hum. The head and secretary

of English Education Department.

3. Dra. Nurlena Rifa’i, Ph.D,the Dean of Faculty of Tarbiyah and Teachers

Training.

4. The principal and the English teacher of SMPN3 Tangerang Selatan for

permitting and helping the writer to conduct the research.

5. Her beloved best friends who have always been in the researcher side in

facing all the laughter and tears during her study, especially for Annis

Novitsania, Setya Ningrum, Nurma Hudaya, Hani Nur Hanifah and

Endah Mardiani, for their unforgetable memories.

iv

6. All her beloved friends of English Education Department C class of

academic year 2008 whose name cannot be mentioned here, for their

kindness to share their ideas and support in finishing this skripsi.

May Allah, the Almighty bless them all.Amin.

Finally, the writer realizes that this research paper still has some weakness

and shortage. Thus, she would be grateful to accept any suggestions and

corrections from anyone for better writing.

Jakarta, 20 August 2013

The Writer

v

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT .................................................................................................... i

ABSTRAK ...................................................................................................... ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ............................................................................. iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................... v

LIST OF TABLES ......................................................................................... viii

LIST OF APPENDICES ............................................................................... ix

CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION

A. The Background of the Study............................................... 1

B. The Identification of the Problem ........................................ 3

C. The Limitation of the Problem.............................................. 4

D. The Formulation of the Problem........................................... 4

E. The Significance of the Study.............................................. 4

F. The Organization of Writing................................................. 4

CHAPTER II: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

A. Error and Error Analysis …. .............................................. 5

1. The Definition of Error …………. ............................... 5

2. The Distinction Between Error and Mistake ................ 5

3. The Types of Error........................................................ 6

B. The Error Analysis............................................................. 10

1. The Definition of Error Analysis.................................. 13

2. The Procedure in Error Analysis................................... 14

3. Goal of Error Analysis.................................................. 14

C. Writing .............................................................................. 14

1. The Definition of Writing ..................................... 14

2. The Purpose of Writing .......................................... 15

3. The Kinds of Writing ............................................ 16

4. Descriptive Writing ............................................... 18

vi

D. Paragraph............................................................................. 20

1. The Definition of Paragraph................................... 20

2. Types of Paragraph ................................................ 20

E. The Previous Related to Study .......................................... 24

CHAPTER III: REASERCH METHODOLOGY

A. Research Design ................................................................ 26

B. Place and Time of the Study …………. ............................ 26

C. The Subject of the Study .................................................... 27

D. Instrument of The Research ............................................... 27

E. Techniques of Data Collecting ........................................... 27

F. Techniques of Data Analysis ............................................. 29

CHAPTER IV: RESEARCH FINDING

A. The Data Description .......................................................... 31

1. The Result of Test ... .................................................... 31

B. The Data Analysis ... .......................................................... 33

1. The Description of Error ....................................... 33

2. The Explanation of Error ....................................... 42

3. The Evaluation of Error .......................................... 43

C. The Interpretation of the Data ............................................ 44

CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION

A. Conclusion …………………………………………. ....... 45

B. Suggestion …………………………………………… .... 46

BIBLIOGRAPHY ......................................................................................... 47

APPENDIXES

vii

LIST OF TABLES

Table 2.1 Description of Error .................................................................. 12

Table 2.2 Purposes for Descriptive .......................................................... 19

Table 3.1 Table of Specification of Test Instrument ............................... 28

Table 3.2 Table Description of Error ........................................................ 29

Table 4.1 The Recapitulation of Student Error ......................................... 31

Table 4.2 The Description Error of Ommision, Addition, Selection

andOrdering .............................................................................. 34

Table 4.3 The Recapitulation of Error Types, Frequency and its

Percentage ................................................................................. 40

viii

LIST OF APPENDICES

Instrument of the Research (Test)

Students’ Answer Sheets

1

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

A. Background of the Study

English as a foreign language in Indonesia has influenced many aspects

of life. Language has an important role on the intelect, improvement and society.

In Indonesian Schools, English is determined as a compulsory subject in the

national curriculum. It is taught at the beginning from Elementary School up to

the University. In English subject, there are four skill that are learnt by students.

They are Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing. Beside four skills, the

students have to learn linguistics competence. Based on the 2004 English

Curiculum; “Students have to be equipped with the linguistics competence in

order they master the four language skills.”1 it is also supported by Jack and

Rodgers that “one of dimensions of communicative competence is grammatical

competence refers to what Chomsky call linguistic competence.”2 From that

statement, it is clear that the students have to learn linguistic competence to be

proficient in English and one of the linguistic competences is grammar.

Grammar is one of the sub-skills which support in writing. But, the

problem is, some of the students make an errors when they want to make a

sentence until its sentences become a good paragraph. It is known that English

grammar is different from Indonesian grammar. Consequently, it is difficult for

students to develop their English proficiency. The difference between the

grammar of native language and target language is one of the factors, which

induces the students to make many errors. It can affect the content of their

1 Direktorat Pendidikan Lanjutan Pertama, Pedoman Khusus Pengembangan Silabus Mata

Pelajaran Bahasa Inggris, (Jakarta: Departement Pendidikan Nasional, 2003), h.2. 2 Jack and Thedore S. Rodgers, Approach and Methods in Language Teaching, (New York:

Cambridge University Press, 1992),p. 6

2

writing, as the result, their messages do not convey successfully to the reader.

For example; Grammar consists of tenses, word choice, spelling, etc. In tenses,

for example, I buyed a book yesterday. Which is supposed to be I bought a book.

And in word choice, like sentence she have black hair. It should be she has black

hair. And the last is spelling, for example my father stop smoking, whereas the

right sentence is my father stopped smoking.

Based on the explanation above, that grammar undoubtedly has important

role in writing especially in descriptive text that the writer is going to analyze.

Kind of writings which started to be taught at the beginning level as at first of

junior high schools are description and procedure. The problem which is often

found in writing descriptive text is the students forget about the generic

structures of descriptive text. They are straight to describe the thing that they

want to describe. But the crucial thing is in grammar. And there are still many

other errors that occur in writing English paragraph. That is why the students are

confused in writing grammatically and make some errors even though they have

studied English for many years and have learned the grammar until the university

level.

From the description above, the writer tries to classify the errors based on

Corder’s theory, there are error of omission, error of addition, error of selection

and error of missordering. Therefore, an error analysis has an important role to

reveal what kinds of error that the students do most. Finally, the writer is

interested in conducting an error analysis by proposing Skripsi under the title:

“An Analysis On Students’ Grammatical Errors in Writing Descriptive

Paragraph by the Second Grade Students of Junior High School at SMPN 3

Tangerang Selatan”

3

B. Identification of Problems

There are some problems faced by the students in writing descriptive

paragraph such as: The students often forget about the generic structure of

descriptive. However, the crucial problem is in grammar which consists of verb-

tenses, word choice, spelling, etc. So that the writer tries to identify the problem

related to the student’s errors in writing English paragraph based on Corder’s

theory, there are error of omission, error of addition, error of selection and error

of missordering.

C. Limitation of Problem

From the writer has explained above, there many problems faced by the

students in writing English paragraph. So that, In this study, the writer focused on

analyzing the second grade students’ grammatical errors on writing descriptive

paragraph at SMPN 3 Tangerang Selatan. To be more focused, the problem is

limited on analyzing the students’ grammatical errors on English writing through

descriptive paragraph that are based on Corder’s theory.

D. Formulation of Problem

Based on the background of study, the writer would like to seek the answer

by the following problem; what are the common grammatical errors that the

students do in writing descriptive paragraph?

E. Objective of the study

The main goal of the study is to know the most frequent errors that the

students make in writing descriptive paragraph.

4

F. The Significance of Study

The result of the study will be benefit for English teachers to improve the

teaching techniques and to encourage students to be more cautious in using every

aspect of grammar in writing descriptive paragraph. For the students, this

research may assist them in writing descriptive paragraph correctly. For the

writer, this research becomes an input about the most typical grammatical errors

that the students do and the last benefit is for the other researchers, the result may

serve as guidelines for the future study related to the subject.

G. The Organization of Writing

To make this Skripsi is easy to read, the writer, proportionally, divides it

into five chapters:

Chapter I is an introduction which consists of background of the study,

identification of the study, limitation of the study, formulation of the study,

objective of the study, significance of the study, and the organization of writing.

Chapter II is theoretical framework which consists of theoretical

framework, study question, and relevant reference library.

Chapter III is research methodology which consists of place and time of

the research, the subject of the study, research design, instrument of the research,

techniques of data collecting, and techniques of data analysis.

Chapter IV is research finding which consists of data identification, data

description, and data explanation.

Chapter V chapter is conclusion and suggestion.

5

CHAPTER II

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

A. Error and Error Analysis

1. The Definitions of Error

To get clear understanding about the error, it is better for the

writerto consider several opinions given by some linguists. According to

Harmer as quoted by Brown, “Errors are part of the students‟ interlingua

that is the version of the language which a learner has at any one stage of

development, and which is continually reshaped as he or she aims toward

full mastery.1

While, according to Dullay, error is the flawed side of learner

speech or writing, those are part of conversation or composition that

deviates from some selected norm of nature language performance.2

Brown has different opinion. He gives more attention on the Interlingual

competence of the speaker. He defines an error as noticeable deviation

from the adult grammar of a native speaker reflecting the Interlingual

competence of the learner.3

From all definitions above, the writer can summarize that error is

flawed side of learner speech caused by the factor of competence. On the

other hand, they do not understand well the use of linguistics‟ system of

the target language; it will lead the students to make errors consistently.

2. The Distinction between Error and Mistake

Error and mistake are not the same thing. But most the people still

misunderstand about the definition of both. To be more clarified between

1Jeremy Harmer, Principle of Language Learning and Teaching, (New York: Prentice

Hall Regents, 1987), p. 170. 2Heidi Dullay, et/al, Two (New York: Oxford University Press), p.139.

3H. Douglas Brown, Principle of Language Learning and Teaching, 4th edition, (New

York: Longman, 2000), p. 215

6

error and mistake. Julian Edge suggests that mistake can be devided into two

broad categories: “slips (that is mistakes which students can correct

themselves and which therefore need explanation), and attempts (that is when

a student tries to say something but does not yet know the correct way to

saying it).”4 Hubbard et al, said “error caused by lack of knowledge about

the target language (English) or by incorrect hypothesis about it, and

mistakes caused by temporary lapses or memory, confusion, slips, of the

tongue and so on.”5 From explanation above, it can be concluded that error is

systematic and the students cannot be self-corrected, because it reflects the

student‟s competence in the target language. On the contrary, a mistake is an

error that students can be self-corrected,because it is only the result of the

students‟ performance.

3. The Types of Error

Error may be viewed as being either global or local error.These errors are

divided into two kinds of error:6

a. Global errors

Global errors are errors that affect overall sentence organization

which possibly influence the flow of communication. For example the

wrong order of major constituents, “English language use many people.”

The sentence should be, “Many people use English language.”

b. Local errors

Local errors are errors that affect one element or constituent in a

sentence which usually do not break the flow of communication. These

errors include errors in noun and verb inflections, articles, and

auxiliaries. For example, “Why you like him?” The listeners of the

utterance will still understand the speaker‟s message although the

4Jeremy Harmer, The Practice of English Language Teaching 3rd edition, (London:

Longman,2001), p. 99. 5Johanna Klassen, Using Student Error for Teaching, (English Teaching Forum, January

1991) Vol. 29, N. 1, p. 10. 6Ibid, p. 259.

7

sentence does not contain auxiliary. In addition, in classifying the

student‟s errors in writing descriptive paragraph the writer would like to

use Corder theory. He stated five types error which will be explained

below. The types of errors are error of omission, error of addition, error

of selection, error of ordering.

a. Error of Ommision

Error of omission is the absence of an item that should appear.

“Errors of omission where some element is omitted which should be

present.”7 The learner omits the item that should appear in the good

utterance. “Omission has two types of morphemes that are omitted more

than others. They are content morphemes and grammatical morphemes.”8

Content morphemes are morphemes that have meaning like nouns, verbs,

adjectives, adverbs. Grammatical morphemes are little words that have

minor play in sentences like noun and verb inflections, articles,

auxiliaries, and preposition.Example: Angelina is an actress. From the

explanation and example above, the word Angelina and actress are

content morphemes because Angelina and actress is noun and has a

mayor meaning. The words is and an are grammatical morphemes

because they are verb auxiliaries and article, and they are also play a

minor meaning in that sentence.

“Omit grammatical morphemes are more frequently than content

words.”9 It is caused by the grammatical morphemes are more complex,

for example in using tenses, the learner should be aware of the addition

of the ending of the verb (-ed,-ing,-s) correctly. Omit content morphemes

are typically made by the learner in the early stage. It happens because

the learner still has limitation of the vocabulary which is used in the

sentences.

7Ibid, p. 259.

8 Heidi Dulay, Marina Burt, and Stephen Krashen, Language Two, (New York: Oxford

University Press, 1982), p. 150. 9Ibid.,p.155.

8

b. Error of Addition

Addition is the opposite of omission. Addition isthe presence of an

item that must not appear in well-formed utterences.10

In addition, the

learners add the utterance which is not needed in a sentence, or the

learners add some unnecessary element. For example: She didn’t studied

yesterday. From the example above, the learner want to tell that she

didn’t study yesterday. She knows that to tell the past event, she has to

use the past verb, but she puts two items for the same features; didn’t and

studied.

c. Error of Selection

This error is made by the learner where the learner chooses the

wrong items in the right place. Different from omission where the items

are not supplied at all, in errors of selection, the learner supplies

something even though that is incorrect. For example; I buyed a novel

two days ago. A past tense marker is put by the learner, but it is incorrect.

d. Error of Ordering

Error of ordering is the error where the items presented are correct

but wrongly sequences. For example, I have pen blue. From the example

above, the items are correct, but the writer doesn‟t put the items in the

appropriate order.

B. Error Analysis

1. The Definition of Error Analysis

It is inevitable when students make an error inprocess of language

learning. Fundamentaly, learning is a process that involves the making of

mistakes, erors, misjudgment, etc. So, that is why students will make an error

in their process of acquiring new language because students find many

10

Rod Ellis, The Study of Second Language Acquisition, 2nd

Edition, (New York: Oxford

University Press, 2008), p. 52.

9

different characteristic of language which is different in their own mother

tongue. However, it is important for the teacher to recognize the errors. Thus,

for the students will not do the same errors.

The study of learner‟s error is called by the linguist as Error Analysis. It

is away of looking at errors made by the learners of the target language. Error

analysis is an independent source of valid data. It provides information on

student‟s error and also improves the effectiveness of their teaching.

Apparently, errors give the sign to the teacher and researcher how target

learning is successfully achieved. According to Corder as quoted by Brown: “

A learner‟s error ... are significant in that they provide to the researcher and

the learner is employing in the discovery of the language.11

The writer tries to

conclude that error analysis is a way of looking at errors that made by the

students because inevitably the students will make errors in the process of

acquiring new language system.

Error analysis was born as a response of Contrastive Analysis theory

which claimed that L1 is the source of errors made by students. Contrastive

Analysis is based on theory of behaviorism which assumes that language is a

set of habit formation. On the other hand, Error Analysis believes that

learner‟s errors are not only caused by L1 but alsodeal with the learning

process in the classroom. Therefore, making mistakes is unavoidable in

learning process; it is natural. Errors indicate three important aspects of

language learning: the first aspect is show what the learner has acquired and

what remains to be learned, secondly, provide information on how language

is learned and acquired, and what strategies and procedures a language

learners is utilizing, the last aspect is serve as a guide to the language learners

with aspect to hypothesis about the nature of the target language.

11

H. Douglas Brown, Principle of Language Learning and Teaching, Fifth Edition, (New

York: Longman, 2007), p. 257.

10

To be more detail, Error Analysis was first introduced by W.R. Lee in

1957, and it gained popularity in the 1970s.12

Even though, the field of error

analysis in SLA (Second Language Acquisition) was established in the 1970

by Corder and collegues, error analysis was an alternative to contrastive

analysis.13

According to Crystal, “Error analysis in language teaching and

learning is the study of the unacceptable forms produced by someone in

learning a language, especially foreign language.”14

So the writer tries to conclude that the errors analysis is a way of

looking at errors made by the learners of the target language, as a source of

information to the teachers, which in turns helps them correct the students‟

errors, and improves the effectiveness of their teaching.

2. Procedures in ErrorAnalysis

In analyzing students‟ errors, there are some steps to be followed. Many

linguists have already discussed how to analyze students‟ errors in their book.

One of them is Corder; he suggests five steps in analyzing students‟ errors,

they are: collection of sample of learner language, identification of errors,

description of errors, explanation of errors and evaluation of errors.15

a. Collection of Sample of Learner Language

The first step of analyzing errors which suggested by Corder is

collection of sample. In this step, the researcher must decide a number of

students which is being sample for the research. Then, they will be given

regular examination in order to get data.

12

Nuril Huda, Language Learning and Teaching: Issues and Trends, (Malang : IKIP

Malang Publisher, 1999), p. 5. 13

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/second language acquisition. 27 Agustus 2012. 14

David Crystal, An Encyclopedic Dictionary of Languages, (Oxford: Blackwell, 1992),

p.125. 15

Ellis, op.cit., p.46

11

b. Identification of errors

In this step the researcher must identify error from data collection.

For identifying error, the researcher must compare the sentence that was

produced by students to the correct sentence in the target language. For

examples:

Sari watched TV, and Rudi sleeped in his room.

The correct form in target language is

Sari watched TV, and Rudi slept in his room.

By comparing two sentences it can be seen that the student

produced an error in constructing simple past tense sentence where she

used –ed after sleep instead of using irregular verb.

c. Description of Errros

After identifying errors, the next step is description of errors. In

this step, all errors that have been identified, then they would be classified

into the types of errors. In description of error James introduces a table to

make it easy. This table can be seen as below.16

16

Carl James, Error in Language Learning and Use: Exploring Error Analysis, (New

York: Wesley Longman Inc., 1998), p. 274.

12

Table 2.1

Description of Errors

LEVEL

MODIFICA

TION

SUBSTANCE

TEXT DISCOURSE

GRAMMAR LEXIS

Graphology

Spelling

RANK:

Clause-Phrase-

Word-

Morpheme

CLASS:

Noun,Verb,Adjecti

ve,

Adverb,Preposition

,

Conjunction,etc.

SENSE

RELATION

COLOCATI

ON

COHESION

COHERENCE

GENDER-

FIDELITY

FELICITY

Ommision

Addition

Selection

Ordering

The horizontal columns indicate the levels of errors: substance, text

and discourse whereas the vertical columns show the types of errors which

consist of omission, addition, Misformation/misselection, and misorder.

d. Explanation of Errors

This step will explain why errors occur. This explanation concerned

on the sources of errors. From example above, the researcher may consider

that the student above does an error in using –ed (regular verb) instead of

using irregular verb whether because of interlingual

transfer/overgeneralization, ignorance of the rule restriction, incomplete

application of rules, or false concept hypothesis.

13

e. Evaluation of Errors

In this step, the researcher must decide the criteria of errors which will

be corrected because some errors can be considered more serious than

other. The aim of evaluating errors is to distinct which errors will be

corrected so the learner, which made an error, will not be stress of getting

correction.

3. Goal of Error Analysis

According to Norrish, “Error analysis can give a picture of the type of

difficulty that learners are experiencing. If carried out on a large scale such as

survey, it can be helpful in drawing up a curriculum.”17

Based on this opinion,

error analysis can be helpful for syllabus designers because errors found in

language learning can be data for them to determine which materials are

important to be included and which ones need to be improved.

While Corder makes a distinction between the theoretical and applied

goal of error analysis. They are:18

a. Applied goal aspect is, correcting and eradicating the learner's error at the

expense of the more important and logically prior task of evolving an

explanatory theory of learner's performance. In other word, the applied

goal serves to enable the students to learn more efficiently by exploiting

their knowledge.

b. Theoretical goal aspect is as worthy of study in and on itself as is that of

child language acquisition and can, in turn, provide insights into the

process of language acquisition in general.

17

John Norrish, Language Learners and their Errors, (London: The Macmillan Press

Ltd., 1983), p.80 18

Pit Corder in Jacek Ficiak, Contrastive Linguistics and Language Teacher, (Oxford:

Pergamon Press, 1981), p. 225.

14

C. Writing

Writing is the most difficult skill among other language skills, Richards

stated that “Learning to write in either the first or second language is one of

the most difficult tasks, a student encounters and one that few people can be

said to fully master.19

Because of that, to make a good writing, the students

need a hard thinking and they must have an extent knowledge to get correct

writing.

1. Definition of Writing

There are several opinions about the definition of writing that have

been given by the experts: Ur said that: “writing is a learned skill”.20

From this statement the writer tries to identify that writing is a skill which

can be learned by anyone by practice intensively because writing is not an

automatic skill. Writing is used as a tool for communication by the people

who want to communicate with others. Remembering that writing is more

than the language is used to express and communicate with others.

According to Hairstone “writing is a tool for discovery. Writing

generates new ideas by helping us to make a connection and see

relationships.21

This opinion is supported by Raymond on his book;

Writing is an unnatural Act, stated:

Writing is more than a medium of communication. It is a way of

remembering and a way of thinking as well ..., writing has a private

importance as a tool for clear thinking, for sharpening our awareness

of the realities around us, for solving problems and shaping

arguments, for developing that short of knowledge – clear, specific,

detailed – that makes human consciousness different from every other

form of consciousness on earth. Writing also a way of learning. It is a

way of finding out what we know and what we need to learn.22

19

Jack C Richards,Language Teaching Matrix, (New York: Cambridge University Press,

1990),p. 101 20

Penny Ur, A Course in Language Teaching, (United Kingdom: Cambridge University

Press, 1996),p. 161 21

Maxine Hairston, Contemporary Composition, (Boston: HoughtonMiffin Company,

1986), p. 2 22

James C. Raymond, Writing Is an Unnatural Act, (New York: Harper &Row Publisher,

Inc., 1980), p.2

15

From the definition above, it can be concluded that writing is more

than a language. Writing is a skill which can be learned by anyone who

want to express their thought, ideas, feeling, etc. In addition, it is a tool of

communication, so that writing is a hard skill becauseit is an unnatural

act which is need a hard thinking and it is a way of remembering and a

way of thinking as well.

2. Purpose of writing

In general, people write either because they are required to or

because they choose to write for their own reasons. If we ask ourselves

why we write at all, the first answer will be to get information to someone

we cannot presently talk to. Thus writing allows us to transcend time. The

second answer might be (especially when we needs of society as a whole.

To solve the problem of volume, of having to store more than the human

brain can remember. A less likely, but nevertheless important, the third

reason for writing might be to filter and shape our experience.23

The

purpose of writing is not only to teach someone to convey idea to the

readers but also to reinforce all aspect of languages that have been

learned by the students. There is some additional and very important

reason why writing is needed in teaching English. According to Ur in her

book, “A Course in Language Teaching, she explained that the purpose of

writing, in principle is the expression of ideas, the conveying of a

message to the reader, so the ideas themselves should arguably be seen as

the most aspect of the writing.”24

Furthermore, Miller, on his book; Motives for Writing explained the

motives of writing. Purpose of writing is essentially the same as motive of

23

Arthur Brookes and Peter Grundy, Beginning to Write; Writing Activities for

Elementary and Intermediate Learners, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991), p.3 24

Penny Ur, op. cit., p. 163

16

writing; both terms are used to describe what a writer hopes to

accomplish. There are motives of writing such as:25

a. Writing to understand experiences.

b. Writing to report information.

c. Writing explain information.

d. Writing to evaluate something.

e. Writing to analyze images.

f. Writing to analyze texts.

g. Writing to persuade others.

h. Writing to inspire others.

i. Writing to amuse others.

j. Writing to experiment with form.

The writer tries to conclude that many reason when people want to

write somehing because the purpose of writing is the essentially the same

as the motive of writing. It depends on what the writer‟s need. It can be to

get the information, to explain information or to amuse others or etc like

what the writer mentioned above.

3. Kinds of Writing

There are a number of types of writing task that most of us will be

familiar with, both as teacher and from our own language learning

experienced simplifying for the moment, they can be listed under three

broad headings.26

a. Free writing

Free writing is writing without stopping. It means writing

comes to the mind without worry that everything they write is correct

or incorrect. The purpose is to free up the mind so that is can make

association and connection.

25

Robert Keith Miller, Motives for Writing, (New York: Mc Graw-Hill Companies, Inc.,

2006), pp.47-69 26

Jo. McDonough and Christopher Shaw, Materials and Methods in ELT: A Teacher’s

Guide, (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1993), p. 173

17

Apparently, at the other end of the spectrum, a „free

writing‟task requires learners to „create‟ an essay on a given topic,

often as part of a language examination. Sometimes students are

simply invited to write on a personal topic, their hobbies, what they

did on holiday, interesting experiences and the like. Other material

provide a readingpassage as stimulus for a piece of writing on a

pararel topic, usually with comprehention questions spread between

the two activities.

b. Controlled writing

If the focus of a language programme is on accuracy, then

schemes for controlling learners‟ writing output will obviously

predominate. The students will focus to practice on getting words

down on they paper and they have to concentrate one one or two

problems all the time. Controlled writing focuses the student‟s

attention on specific features of the written language. It is a good

method of reinforcing grammar, vocabulary, and syntax. The range of

activity types is considerable, and typical approaches include:

1) providing a model sentence and asking students to construct a

pararel sentence with different lexical items.

2) inserting a missing grammatical form.

3) composing sentenses from tabular information, with a model

provided.

4) joining sentences to make a short paragraph, inserting supplied

conjuctions (but, and however, because, although).

c. Guided Writing

It is an extension of controlled writing; it is less controlled

than controlled writing. In using this kind of writing to teach writing,

students are given a first sentence, a last sentence, an outline to fil out,

a series of question to respond to, or information to include in their

piece of writing, students should be able to discuss, make notes, and

share finding together before they begin to write. In guided writing,

18

the students will not make a serious errors if they follow the instrution

which are given by their teacher.

4. Descriptive Writing

a. Definition of Descriptive

Description reproduces the way things look, smell, taste, feel, or

sound; it may also evoke moods such as happiness, lonelines, or fear.

It is used to create visual image of people, place even units of time-

days, times of day, or a reason. It‟s maybe used also to ilustrate more

than outward appearance of people. And this kind of writing may tell

about the traits or character or personality.27

A paragraph that

describes is called a descriptive paragraph, in a descriptive paragraph,

the writer describes.28

The purpose of writing is to give a picture or to

describe about something.

Futhermore, Hogins on his book; Contemporary Exposition

stated that description calls for specific details and accurate, fresh

ways of characterizing a particular object, setting it apart from all

others.29

However, Good descriptive writing can stimulate the

reader‟s imagination to form sensory responses from all five senses.

Frequently, the reader has no choice: many people cannot read an

article about taste of citrus fruits, for example, without having a

physical response to the imagined taste. And a passage about specific

food left out of the refrigerator too long will produce a shudder from

readers as they imagine the resulting smell.

Based on the explanation above, the writer tries to conclude that

description is the way things look, smell, taste, feel, or sound, it can

27

John E. Lincoln, Writing a Colledge Handbook, (New York: W. W. Norton &

Company, 1986), p. 86 28

James A.W. Hefferman and John E. Lincoln, Writing A College Handbook(New York:

W. W Norton A Company Inc, 1986), Second Edition, p. 83 29

James Burl Hogins, Contemporary Exposition, (New York: J.B Lippincott Company,

1978), p.116

19

stimulate the reader‟s imagination to form sensory responses from all

five senses.

b. Purpose of Descriptive Writing

Simon stated that description can serve several purposes as

follow:

1) it can ilustrate the basis on which you are making inferences, that

will allow readers to imagine the physical object involved in the

writer experience.

2) it can provide visual images to make the essay lively and concrete

3) it can reflect criteria for comparing two subjects.30

Fink stated in her book that the purpose of description is to

present the reader with a picture of a person, subject, or setting.31

Table 2.2

Purposes for Descriptive:32

30

Linda Simon, A Guide and Source Book for Writing Across The Curriculum, (New

York: St. Martin‟s Press, 1998), pp. 21-23. 31

Lila Fink, et al., A Text for Writing and Reading, (Boston: Little, Brown Company,

1983), p. 3. 32

Barbara Fine Clouse, The Student Writer, (New York: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2000),

p. 143

Purpose Description

To entertain An amusing description of a teenager‟s

bedroom

To express feeling A description of your favorite outdoor

retreat so your reader understand why

you enjoy it so much.

To relate experience A description of your childhood home

to convey a sense of the poverty you

grew up in.

To inform (for a reader unfamiliar with

the subject)

A description of a newborn calf for a

reader who has never seen one.

20

D. Paragraph

1. Definition of Paragraph

In written form, English is divided into paragraph to distinguish one

main idea. According to Brown “A paragraph is a group of sentences that

work together as a team to discuss a single main idea.33

Cowad said paragraph

is composed of a sentence or a chunk of sentences which the writer has

grouped together for some definite reason.34

In addition Oshima and Houge

said paragraph is a group of related statement that a writer develops about a

subject. Each paragraph is separate unit marked by indenting the first word

from the left-hand margin, or by living extra space above and below the

paragraph.

The definition above can be cloncluded that a paragraph is a basic unit

of organization in writing in which a group of related sentences develop one

main idea. And it can be seen as a group of sentences that work together as

team work.

2. Types of Paragraph

a. Description

A description iswriting about the way persons, animal, or things

appear.35

In description, the writer takes a scene or an object captures it in

language. That is, he or she organizes the details of the object or scene

33

Ann Cole Brown, et. Al., Grammar and Composition, (Boston: Houghton Miffin

Company, 1984), p.276 34

Elizabet Cowan, Writing, (Glenview: Scott, Foreman and Company, 1983), p.119

To inform (to create a fresh

appreciation for the familiar)

A description of an apple to help the

reader rediscover the joys of this

simple fluit.

To persuade (to convince the reader

that some music videos degrade

women)

A description of a degrading music

video.

21

they wish to describe in the way that will most effectively convey the

sensual image.36

Therefore, the important thing in descriptive writing is to

combine three essential elements such as mood, dominant impression, and

logical development in writing. Language features of descriptive writing

are; it focuses on specific participants as I, you, animals, place, or people;

it uses atributive and identifying processes, and it uses the simple present

tense. Moreover, there are two schematic structures of description such as

identification and description. This structural form is the guidance for the

writer to write the description paragraphs.

Descriptions usually include the following grammatical features:37

a) verb in the present tense

b) adjectives to describe the features of the subject

c) topic sentences to begin paragraph and organize the various aspects

of the description.

d) proper nouns (e.g. Hana, my dog).

e) action verbs (e.g. dance , go)

Here is the model of the descriptive paragraph:

My apartment is a very small but comfortable. It has living room, a

kitchen, a bedroom, and a bathroo. At the enterance, two doors lead

into the bathromm and the bedroom. The bedroom is on the far left,

and the bathroom is next to it.Directly in front of the entrance is the

kitchen. Between the bedroom and the kitchen is a large storage closet.

On the right side of the enterance is the living room. The living room

is a quite large, for it also serves as a dining room. In the back wall of

living room, a door leads to a narrow balcony. In nice weather, you can

sit outside and enjoy the view. In summary, my apartment is a

comfortable place to live.38

b. Narration

According to Oshima and Houge, Narration is story writing.

When you write a narrative paragraph, you write about events in the

36

Robert Scholes and Nancy R. Comley, The Practice of Writing 2nd edition, (New York:

St. Martin‟s Press), p. 11 37

Anderson, Mark and Kathy, Anderson. Text Type in English, (Melbourne: Macmillan

Education Australia Ltd, 1998). 38

Alice Oshima and Ann Hogue, Introduction to Academic Writing, (New York: Addison-

Wesley Publishing Company, Inc., 1988), p. 47

22

order that they happen. Moreover, Mark and Kathy Anderson propose

that narrative is a text that tells a story and, in doing so, entertains the

audience. The purpose of narrative, other than providing entertainment,

can be to make the audience think about an issue, teach them a lesson,

or excite emotions.39

Narrative can be presented as written or spoken texts. Written

narratives often take the form of novels. The story is usually told by

narrator. If the narrator is one of the the characters in the story, the

story is said to be told in the first person. If a person outside the story

is the narrator, then the story is being told in the third person.

Narrative text can be found in diaries journals, newspapers,

biographies, and autobiographies. The examples of narrative text are;

myths, fairytales, aboriginal dreaming stories, science fiction,

historical fiction, and romance novels.40

Moreover, the schematic

structures of narration are orientation, evaluation, complication,

resolution and reorientation. These structures make the readers easier

to read the text or the narrative writing. The language features are

focusing on specific participant, it uses past tense, it uses temporal

conjuctions and temporal circumtances, and also the material or action

processes.41

c. Recount

A recount is a piece of text that retells past event, usually in the

order in which they occured. Its purpose is to provide the audience

with a description of what occured and when it occurred. A recount

consits of the reconstruction of a past experience or event; usually one

in which the author has been involved, although there are some

recounts that are imaginative and are not written within the author‟s

experiences. The information in all recounts is arranged in a time

39

Anderson, loc. cit, p.3 40

Ibid., p.3 41

Rudi Hartono, Genres of Texts, (English Department, Faculty of Languange and Art,

Semarang State University, 2005), pp. 6-7

23

sequence with appropriate language usage to link the events and to

show the passing of time. A recountmay involve the stating of

observations and the inclusion of a personal comment.42

A recount text usually has three main sections. The first

paragraph gives background information about who, what, and when

(called an orientation). This is followed by a series of paragraps that

retell the events in the order in which they happened (events). Some

recounts have a concluding paragraph. However, this is not always

necessary (re- orientation).

Recounts usually include the following grammatical features:

a) proper nouns to identify those involved in the text.

b) descriptive words to give details about who, what, when, where,

and how.

c) the use of past tense to retell the events.

d) words that show the order of events (for example, first, next, then).

e) the elimination of irrelevant details so that only the important

aspects of the event are included.

f) the use of personal pronouns in recounts in which the author was a

participant.

Below is the example of recount paragraph:43

Last Saturday I woke up early, but I didn‟t get up because there was no

school. Suddenly, my telephone was rung. It was my friend Fanny, she

asked me to go out at 10.00 o clock. She wanted to buy something in

traditional market. Finally, we were out. In the street, I saw a piece of

pink coupon. Interested with its colour, I took it, then Fanny and I read

this out. We were fully shocked, it was a receipt of a four nights tour to

Lombok !! The expired date was that day. To our surprised, the name

was Fanny Fenita and the birth date was exactly the same like Fanny

my friend, and it was also valid for two persons. My God!! We were

thinking that maybe the coupon just fell from the sky and it was there

for us. We were in hurried to the address of the tour agency that issued

42

Lesly Wing Jan., Write Ways: Modeling Writing Forms, (New York: Oxford

University, Press, 1991), p.78 43

Artono Wardiman, Masduki W Jahur and Sukirman Djusman: English in Focus for

grade VIII, Junior High School, (Jakarta, Depdiknas, 2008)p. 62

24

the coupon. The tour agency took care of everything. We went home

and still could not believe what was going on. Two days later we were

on the Senggigi Beach, lied in the warmth sun. Moreover, we had long

public holiday, so we could enjoy the “gift” happily. We also bought

some presents for our family and friends.

(Adapted from: English in Focus for Grade VIII Junior High School)

E. Previous Related Study

There are some studies related with the grammatical errors in writing.

Firstly, a research done by Emmaryana, Fajariani entitle “An Analysis on

Students Grammatical Errors in the Student’s writing (A Case study of the

First Year Students of “SMA Negeri 1, Ciledug-Bogor)”, the writer used

qualitative descriptive method with the purpose of the research wasto know

the most grammatical errors made by the students in writing recount text,

where the result was the highest grammatical errors was in tenses done by 19

students or 95% .

Another study researchwas a research done by Natalina Margawati,

entitle “Error on Students’ descriptive Writing (Case Study at the first grade

of SMP PGRI 2 Ciputat)”, the writer used descriptive analysis in form

qualitative. The purpose of the reseach was to know out the most type of

common errors in descriptive writing. Where the causes of errors the students

made in descriptive writing was because of the influence in the mother tongue

with the highest error is in word-order is 28, 10%.

The last study research is a research done by Mawaddah Z. A, entitle

“An Analysis on Grammatical Errors in Student’s English Writing in

Argumentative text (A case study in the second year of XI of Madrasah Aliyah

Pembangunan UIN Jakarta)”. This study was carried out to identify what

kinds of Grammatical errors were commonly made by the students. The

method used in this study was descriptive analysis or quantitative method,

classifying them into the grammatical errors based on Betty Azar. With the

result is the most error made by the students of XI Science I of Madrasah

Aliyah Pembangunan UIN is in verb tenses which caused by intralingual

transfer.

25

Based on the previous researchers above, it is known that grammatical

factors in writing descriptive paragraph still become the most difficult

material. Thus, in this research, the writer intends to analyze what cause and

type of errors that made by the students in writing descriptive paragraph.

By understanding the source and types of students‟ errors, the writer

expects that she could give beneficial suggestions to solve students‟ problem.

So the difficulty of understanding these material would be reduced.

26

CHAPTER III

RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

A. Research Design

The method uses in this researchis qualitative method. As Bogdan and

Biklen state that qualitative is descriptive that data collected take the form of

words or pictures rather than a numbers.1So that the writer presented the data

collected in words rather than numbers. Furthermore, this research is

designed in a case study and she only examine a single subject like Bogdan

and Biklen state that a case study is a detailed examination of one setting or a

single subject.2To get the data the writer uses test.The test is done twice to

know whether it is a mistake or an error. Finally, the errors that have been

collected were analyzed to determine the types of errors after by following

Corder theory. In this term, error broken down into five categories: error of

omission, error of addition error of selection, and error of ordering. While the

analysis on error types are presented in tables by following James table.

Futhermore, to know the frequency of occurency of each error type the writer

used descriptive analysis technique (percentage).

B. Place and Time of The Research

The writer will conduct this research at SMPN 3 Tangerang Selatan

which is located on Jl. Ir. H. Juanda I No. 1 Ciputat, Tangerang Selatan,

Banten.She is conducting the research at the school from 19th

of June to

26th

of July 2013.

1Robert C. Bogdan and Sari Knopp Biklen, Qualitative Research for Education an

Introduction to Theories and Methods, (Boston: Pearson, 2007), p. 5 2Ibid., p. 59.

27

C. The Participant of The Research

The subject of the research is the eighth year students of SMPN 3

Tangsel which is devided into Eighth regular classes 8.1, 8.2, 8.3, 8.4, 8.5,

8.6, 8.7, 8.8. the writer uses purposive samplingto take the sample that is a

class 8.8.The writer only took 30 students.

D. Instrument of The Research

The instrument of the research is test. The test is an essay writing test

about ‘Describing your idol’ which is guided by four question. So that the

students need to make a paragraph based on the insruction given.

E. Techniques of Data Collecting

To measure the ability of students, the writer takes essay writing in the

paper that is given as the test to the second grade student of SMPN 3

Tangerang Selatan.The writing test that students made indicates their

understanding in using grammatical in descriptive text.Before the students do

the test, the writer givesthe explanation and direction about what the students

should do with the test.

28

Table 3.1

Table of Specification of Test Instrument

No Standard of

Competence

Basic

Competence

Indicators Instrument

1. Writing

Expressing

meaning in the

simple short

fuctional

written text

and essay in

form of

descriptive and

recount related

to students’

immediate

environment

Expressing

meaning and

step of rhetoric

in simple short

written text

using kind of

language

accurately,

fluently and

related to

environtment

in written

descriptive and

recount form.

The students

are expected

to be able to

write an

essay writing

in the form of

descriptive

and recount

Type of

instrument

Descriptive

writing

Instrument

Write a

descriptive text

about your

idol! Write the

text in two

paragraphs.

Based on

generic

structure of

descriptive

text.

F. Technique of data analysis

The data collected will be analyzed by using procedures in doing error

analysis. The procedures consist of five steps based on Corder.It consists

collecting of the sample, identification of error, describing student’s errors

after that she explanation of the error.This step attempts to account for why

the errors occur. It means to determine the sources (causes) of the errors based

on Corder theory beside that the writer uses interview as supporting data.

Thus, the James table can be seen as below.

Table 3.2

Description of Error

LEVEL

MODIFICATI

-ON

SUBSTANCE

TEXT DISCOURSE

GRAMMAR LEXIS

Graphology

Spelling

RANK:

Clause-Phrase-

Word-

Morpheme

CLASS:

Noun,Verb,Adje

ctive,

Adverb,Preposit

ion,

Conjunction,etc.

Sense

Relation

Colocati-

Ons

Cohesion

Coherence

Gender-Fidelity

Felicity

Ommision

Addition

Selection

Ordering

29

30 33

Finally, the last procedure is evaluation of the error which means to

distinct which errors will be corrected so the learner, which made an error,

will not be stress of getting correction. To do the last step which is

quantifying each percentage of error, the formula below is used:3

P =

Note:

P: Percentage;

f: Frequency of a type of error;

n: Number of total errors occur.

3 Allan G. Bluman, Elementary Statistics: A Step by Step Approach, (New York:

McGraw-Hill, 2004), p. 68.

31

CHAPTER IV

RESEARCH FINDING AND INTERPRETATION

A. The Data Description

1. The Result of Test

The writer has given an essay writing test. There were 38 students on

the class, but the writer only took 30 students as a sample. Actually the total

of the student was 46 and most of them did not attend the class. The test is an

essay writing test about „Describing your idol‟, which is guided by four

question. So that the students need to make a paragraph based on the

insruction given. After conducting the test, the writer analyzed the data from

the students‟ test to find out the errors that students made in his/her answer by

circling each erroneous item. The result of this identification can be seen as

the following table.

Table 4.1

The Recapitulation of Student’s Error

No. STUDENTS‟

NUMBER

Types of Error

Error of

Omission

Error of

Addition

Error of

Selection

Error of

Misordering

1 Student 1 2 - 2 -

2 Student 2 1 - 2 -

3 Student 3 2 - 1 -

4 Student 4 1 - 1 -

5 Student 5 5 1 1 -

6 Student 6 - - 1 -

7 Student 7 - 1 4 1

8 Student 8 3 - 1 1

9 Student 9 2 - 2 -

10 Student 10 1 2 4 1

11 Student 11 3 2 5 -

32

12 Student 12 1 - 3 -

13 Student 13 1 - 4 -

14 Student 14 3 - 2 -

15 Student 15 3 - 2 -

16 Student 16 2 - 6 1

17 Student 17 5 2 5 1

18 Student 18 2 - 7 -

19 Student 19 2 1 4 -

20 Student 20 - 1 5 1

21 Student 21 2 1 2 -

22 Student 22 1 - 4 1

23 Student 23 2 - 4 -

24 Student 24 1 - 4 -

25 Student 25 - 1 4 -

26 Student 26 1 - 4 -

27 Student 27 2 - 2 1

28 Student 28 1 - 1 -

29 Student 29 1 1 4 -

30 Student 30 1 - 8 -

TOTAL = 51 13 99 8

As the calculation above, the writer describes the examples and the causes

why the errors occur as follow:

1. The Error of Omission =

29.8%

2. The Error of Addition =

3. The Error of Selection =

4. The Error of Misordering =

33

B. Data Analysis

The procedure of error analysis has been explained clearly in the

preceding chapter and some of those procedures have been done well such as

collecting data and identifying students errors. Moreover, the other

procedures would be described clearly as follows:

1. The Description of Error

After identifying the data, the writer analyzed the errors and

classified them based on the Surface Taxonomy Categories to know

whether these errors involve in omission, addition, selection, or

ordering. This is the following example is taken from the student‟s

answer sheet. (Students number 17).

a. Error of Ommision

*he have oval face. The correct sentence is he has an oval face.

Actually the student omit the article there must be exist before the

adjective in that sentence that is an oval face.

b. Error of Addition

*he is was born in Medan. The correct sentence is he was born in

Medan. The student add the verb „is‟ which does not need it in that

sentence.

c. Error of Selection

*he have black hair. The correct sentence is he has a black hair. In

this form the student is select the wrong verb, it must be „has‟ for third

singular person „he‟

d. Error of Ordering

*he is a idola cilik 2013 runner up. The correct form is he is a runner

up in idola cilik 2013.

Besides the examples above, the writer recognises the other

errors done by the students. This classification is presented in the table

as the following below.

34

Table 4.2

The Description of Error

(Numbers in bracket indicate students’ list number)

LEVEL

MODIFICATION

SUBSTANCE

TEXT DISCOURSE

GRAMMAR LEXIS

Graphology

Spelling

RANK:

Clause-Phrase-Word-

Morpheme

CLASS:

Noun,Verb,Adjective,

Adverb,Preposition,

Conjunction,etc.

SENSE

RELATION

COLOCATIONS

COHESION

COHERENCE

GENDER-

FIDELITY

FELICITY

Ommision

*love/loved (student 1)

*Ɵ/a good voice

*Ɵ/is (student 3)

*Ɵ/me (student 4)

*Ɵblack hair/ black

hair

*her eyes is/her eyes

are

*he taller/he is taller

*Ɵ pointed nose/ a

pointed nose

*Ɵbasket ball/a basket

ball (student 5)

*Ɵ/ black hair

*Ɵ/and fat

*I like/I like him

(student 8)

*Ɵ/ black hair

*Ɵ/a good voice

(student 9)

*Ɵ/ flat nose (student

10)

35

*he smart/he is smart

*he play/he plays

*he smart/he is smart

(student 11)

*Ɵ/ blue hair (student

12)

*Ɵ/his full name

(student 13)

*Ɵ/an

*he is old man/he is an

old man

*flat Ɵ/flat nose

(student 14)

*Ɵ/an idol

*Ɵ/an old man

*flatƟ/flat nose

(student 15)

*Ɵ/a smart girl

*Ɵ/her skin (student

16)

*Ɵ/his nick name

*Ɵ/an oval face

*Ɵ/are

*Ɵ/sharp-nose

*Ɵ handsome/he is

handsome (student 17)

*Ɵ/in(2)

*Ɵ/his national team

(student 18)

*he also singer/ he is

also a singer

*Ɵ/his height (student

19)

*Ɵ/him

*Ɵ/and (student 21)

36

*Ɵ/an (student 22,27)

*Ɵ/ black hair

*Ɵ/is playing (student

23)

*Ɵ/a (student no

24,26,28,29,30)

*she Ɵ elegant/is

(student 27)

Addition

*dad and mom

*doing/Ɵ (student 1)

*he is like/he likes

(student 5)

*he is have/he has

(sudent 7)

*someone idol/an idol

*he is have/he has (3)

(student 10)

*a idol/an idol

*because (student 11)

*a black/ black

*he is was bown/he

was born (student 17)

*his tall/his height

(student 19)

*the finally/finally

(student 20)

*he is born on 24 years

old/he is 24 years old.

(student 21)

*his tall /his height

(student 25)

*the/Ɵ (student 29

37

Selection *he‟s/he is

(student 7)

*abelity/ability

(student 10)

*tin/thin body

(student 13)

*sourth/short

(student 22)

*hi/he (student

23)

*tin/thin

(student 24)

*teen/thin

(student 30)

*his born/ he was born

(student 1)

*have/has (student 2)

*because/and (student

4,6)

*play/playing (student

5)

*her beautiful/she is

beautiful (student 9)

*call me/called

*a abelity/his ability

(student 10)

*the second/and then

*play football/playing

football

*the fourth/and the last

(student 11)

*he have/he has

(student 12)

*he is sport playing/he

plays football

*he have/he has

(student 13)

*he is/ he has (student

14,15)

*she have/she has (4)

*playing/plays

*she like/likes

*dance/dancing

(student 16)

*he is/ his

*he/his colour eyes

*he is/he has

*he like/he likes

*play/playing (student

17)

*national/nationality

*he has/his height

*vocal/voice

(student 9)

*abelity/multitalent

ed (student 10)

*he smart in

playing football/he

is good in playing

football (student

11)

*smart/good

*he body/his height

(student 18)

*food/eating

(student 23)

*acting

person/actor

(student 26)

*his/ he (20)

*this/him (student

1)

*his/her (student

2)

*she is/her height

is (student 3)

*a idol/an idol

*he is name/his

name

*he is/his (student

7)

*its/his (student 8)

*he name/his

name (student 11)

*a/an idol (12,16)

*he/his name

(student 12)

*a idol/an idol

(student 13)

*he hair/his hair

(student 14,15)

*her/she (student

16)

*a/an idol

*he/his name

*my/his

*his/he is

*he club/his club

(student 18)

*the/a

*a/an idol

*he/his name

*he nose/his nose

(student 19)

*a/an (student

21,22)

*he/his

38

(student 20)

*is/his

*he is/he has (student

21)

*his/he is

*play/plays (student

22)

*he have/has(2)

*he like dancing/he

likes dancing (student

23)

*he/his

*have/has (student 24)

*he have/has

*he play/he plays

(student 25)

*seriouusly

person/serious person

*humor/humorous

(student 26)

*have/has (student 27)

*national/nationality

*he has tall/his height

(student 29)

*has/I have

*he expert/experts

*play/playing

*he like/likes

*wear/wearing (student

30)

*the/his (student

20)

*a/an (student 24)

*a/an

*he/his (student

25)

*him/his (student

26)

*her/she (student

27)

*luis/louise

(student 28)

*a/an

*he/his (student

29,30)

Ordering

*season

ACmilan/ac

milan season

(student 20)

*I like album

Justin Bieber/ I

like Justin

Bieber‟s album

(student 7)

*body tall/tall

39

After identifying the data, the writer analyzed the errors and classified

them based on the Surface Taxonomy Categories to know whether these errors

involve in omission, addition, selection, or ordering.

This calculation used the formula of descriptive analysis technique as can

be seen as below:

P =

Note:

P: Percentage;

body (student 8)

*hair long/long

hair

*hair

brown/brown hair

(student 10)

*dance good/good

dancer(student 16)

*he is a short to

me/he is shorter

than me.

*he is a idola cilik

2013 runner up/he

is a runner up in

idola cilik 2013

(student 17)

*his short body

tall body 169

cm/his height is

169cm (student

22)

*she has name is

beautuful/she has

a beautiful name

(student 27)

40

f: Frequency of a type of error;

n: Number of total errors occur.

Furthermore, to make it easier to read, she presents it in the following

table below:

Table 4.3

The Recapitulation of Error Types, Frequency and its Percentage

No. Level /

Modification Substance

Text Discourse

Total Of

Error Grammar Lexis

1. Omission 51=29.8 51= 29.8

2. Addition 13=7.6 13= 7.6

3. Selection 7= 4.1 47=27.5 7= 4.1 38= 22.2 99= 57.9

4. Ordering 2= 1.2 6= 3.5 8= 4.7

TOTAL 171 = 100%

Based on the calculation above, it can be concluded that the total errors of

omission are 51 errors or 29,8% (error of omission in grammar text levelis 51

errors or 29,8%), the addition are 13 errors or 7,6% in grammar text level.the

error of selection are 99 errors or 57.9% (error in substance level are 7 errors or

4.1%, in grammar text level are 47 errors or 27.5%, in lexis text level are 7 errors

or 4,1%, and in discourse level is 38 errors or 22,2%), while the error of ordering

is 8 errors or 4,7% in substance level level are 2 errors or 1,2% and in discourse

level are 6 errors or 3,5% . From the calculation of the data, error of selection is

the most frequent errors done by the second grade students of SMP 3 Tangsel with

the percentage 57,9%. Moreover, it is followed by error of omission with

percentage 29,8%, and error in addition and ordering fewer than 8%.

41

To be more clearly the writer explains each of the error below:

1) Ommision

The total error of ommision is 51 errors or 29,8%. Ommision error

occurs when the learner ommitted a necessary element of word.

Omission errors fell both in the substance and in the grammar level.

Most students committed errors by omitting a letter which must exist

within a morpheme. For examples:*he has black hair. While he is

supposed to write, he has a black hair.*he taller than me.While he is

supposed to write, he istaller than me.

From the example above it is clear that the students did not use an

article and a verb. The reason they made this error is in Indonesian

writing, they do not use the article and verb. The source of this error

comes from interlingual transfer. The students did not use the rule of

their target language well.

2) Addition

The total errors of addition is 13 or 7,6% in grammar text level. On

the writer‟s opinion, these errors occurred because the students had not

clearly understood of the structure of the sentence. So the source of this

error comes from the interlingual transfer. They add the unnecessary

word that does not needed in their sentence. For example, *his parents

is Scott dad and Lisa mom. The word „dad and mom‟ there must be

ommited because it is not needed. As we know that without the word

„dad’ and „mom‟ we know that Scott is his/her father and Lisa is his/her

mom. So that the right answer is supposed to be his parents are Scott

and Lisa. Or another example is *his body tall. While the student is

supposed to write his height. So that the word body it is not needed in

that sentence.

3) Selection

The total error of selection that the writer found is 99 errors or

57.9% (the error in the substance level are 7 errors or 4.1%, in grammar

42

text level are 47 errors or 27.5%, in lexis text level are 7 errors or 4,1%,

and in discourse level is 38 errors or 22,2%). And this is the highest

error that the students do. These errors happened because the students

having lack of vocabulary and its use. The students were confused in

choosing the appropriate class of words. In this case, the example: *I

like Sule because he is have ability. While the answer is supposed to be

I like Sule because he is multitalented. From this sentence it can be seen

that the student is wrong to choose vocabulary so they misselection

about it.

4) Missordering

While the error of ordering that the writer found is 8 errors or 4,7%

in substance level are 2 errors or 1,2% and in discourse level are 6

errors or 3,5%. This error is sometimes as the result from interlingual

transfer. The students got the influence of the structure or order of their

native language which is Indonesian language. “I like album Justin

Bieber.” The correct one is, “I like Justin Bieber album.

2. The Explanation Of Error

In this step, the writer would like to classify the errors based on their

source of error. she wanted to analyze these errors based on the differences

between Indonesian language system and English, and the target language

system itself (intralingual). So that the writer would not use the sources of

error base on context learning and communication strategies.

a. Interlingual Transfer

Interlingual transfer is an error which is caused by the students use

their own native language as a source. It means what they do are translate

Bahasa Indonesia into English directly. In fact, both Indonesian and

English have different structure. For exampe, *I have someone idol his

name “Entis Sutisna” the correct one is “I have an idol, his name is Entis

Sutisna. The other example is *I have a idol, he smart play foot ball. the

correct one is I have an idol, he is smart in playing football. *I like him

43

because handsome and elegant and he is a idola cilik 2013 runner up.

While he is supposed to write I like him because he is handsome and

elegant and he is a runner up in Idola Cilik 2013. These errors are happen

because the pattern of Both Bahasa – which is their mother tongue- and

English are totally different. The students ommited the verb, -is, -ing. And

the students misselection and ommited the article. As the writer compares

to the result of interview, the students did not really understand about the

rules which is mean the grammar and also they did not really understand

of structure of the sentence. And the teacher did not explain it clearly. So

that the source comes from interlingual transfer because they still

influenced by their own mother tongue.

b. Intralingual Transfer

This errors occur because the students are overgeneralization the

rules in wrong concepts. So that intralingual transfer is happen because of

partial learning. For example, *he is was born in Medan. In this sentences

the student only know to put the verb after the subject but he does not

know the correct one. So he uses the verb –is and –was at the same time.

While he is supposed to write “He was born in Medan.”The source of this

error is intralingual transfer because they overgenerates the rules in wrong

concept.

3. The Evaluation of Error

If the purpose of the error analysis is to help students to study

second language, it is important to evaluate the errors. Some errors can be

considered more serious than others because they could hinder the

message of the communication. In this research, the writer considered that

the errors which are caused by partial learning, this error could hinder the

message to be understood because partial learning tends to have an impact

for the students such as they do not have deep understanding or

misconception from he materials given.

44

C. The Interpretation of The Data

The result of the error analysis process showed that students committed

error into four types: omission, addition, selection, and ordering. From the

frequency of each error types, selection was the error which most frequently

produced by the students. It took 57.9% of the total errors. Moreover, 29.8%

errors fell into omission and 7.6% errors fell into addition; whereas, for

Misordering, it only took 4.7%. These errors were conducted because most of

the students did not understand about the rules of target language as well, so

that the students generalized the rule and applied it incompletely. Besides,

errors occured because their mother tongue and their Indonesian logical

thinking. To sum up, it showed that the usage of the grammar in writing

descriptive paragraph is difficult for students. Therefore, They are still lack of

understanding the English Grammar in term of tenses because in the

Indonesian does not have the tense system that show the time of the event

unlike English. Therefore, they tended to make errors in writing.

The most frequent errors that done by the second grade of SMPN 3

Tangerang Selatan is in error of selection. Like Brown said in his book, the

early stage of language is characterized by a predominance of intra-lingual

transfer, but once the learner has begun to acquire part of the new system,

more and more interlingual generalization within the target language

manifested, and his previous experience begin to include structure within the

target language itself.1

For example, In this case, the students commonly made errors in

selection when they choose the wrong item in the right place. For example;

she have black hair while it is supposed to be she has black hair.

1 H. Douglas Brown, Principles of Language Learning and Teaching, fourth edition,

(New York: Longman, 2000), p. 223-227.

45

CHAPTER V

CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION

A. Conclusion

Based on the explanation in the previous chapters, This research

was carried out to analyze and classify the types of students’ grammatical

errors in writing descriptive. The error collected was classified based on

Corder’s theory. The writer concluded that the types of error that were

made by the students of the second year of SMPN 3 Tangerang Selatan in

their writing from the highest percentage to the lowest are error of

selection, error of omission, addition and error of ordering. The result of

the error analysis process showed that students committed error into four

types: omission, addition, selection, and ordering. From the frequency of

each error types, selection was the error which most frequently produced

by the students. It took 57.9% of the total errors. Moreover, 29.8% errors

fell into error of omission and 7.6% errors fell into addition; whereas, for

Misordering, it only took 4.7%.

To sum up, it showed that the usage of the grammar in writing is

difficult for the students. So that, the analysis of the students’ grammatical

errors in writing is very important because the teachers can know the

factual condition of the student’s ability in writing and what kinds of error

that the students probably do in their writing for the next time.

Theoretically, error is acceptable in learning process and it is as a part of

learning itself. That is why some errors happened when the writer

conducted the research. Her research found that the commonest error

which most the students made is in errors of selection are 99 errors or

57.9%. Its include error in substance level are 7 errors or 4.1%, in

grammar text level are 47 errors or 27.5%, in lexis text level are 7 errors or

4,1%, and in discourse level is 38 errors or 22,2%).

46

B. Suggestion

Error is something unavoidable in teaching and learning process of

foreign language. Therefore, it can be improved by learn more about both

enhance vocabularies and grammatical function. Here are some

suggestions that hopefully can be applied in teaching and learning process.

1. The teachers have to give interesting topics which are familiar for

the students for they can enjoy and motivate them to keep writing.

After that, the topic can be expanded to the difficult ones to give

challenges in order to enhance the students’ vocabularies.

2. The teachers should give exercises regularly. It is started from the

simple topic to the hard one. Because it can improve the students’

vocabularies and their skill in writing.

3. The teachers should explain more about the grammar for the students

can write grammatically correct.

4. The teachers have to pay attention to the students’ errors and make

them aware about their errors so they can make a correction by

themselves and will not do the same error.

47

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49

Nama : .....................

Class : .....................

The Test

Tell about your idol in a paragraph use the following questions as your

guidance!

1. Do you have someone that you adore and he/she becomes your idol?

2. How do you tell others about your idol?

3. Can you tell others about his/her physical appearance?

4. Why do you like her/him?

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