THE ANALYSIS OF STUDENTS’ ERROR

Abstract

Abstract

: Negative and interrogative forms are the important elements of English

grammars that have to be mastered by SMP students. The learners need to have

subtantial capability of English grammar in order that they are able to speak and

write correctly.

Therefore, the objectives of this research are (1) to identify the frequencies of

occurance of the students’ grammatical errors based on surface strategy taxonomy

found in their sentences, (2) to identify the frequencies of occurance of students’

grammatical errors based on developmental category that are found in their

sentences, and (3) to find out which types of errors were mostly made by the

students. Descriptive method was used in this research, where the data were taken

from the students to draw conclusions. This research was conducted at SMP

Negeri 8 bandar Lampung. The subject of the research was class VIII.H consisting

of 34 students. The data gained were further analyzed based on surface strategy

taxonomy and developmental category.

Having analyzed the data, it is found that the students commited four types of

errors based on surface strategy taxonomy and developmental category, the

highest frequency of error types based on surface strategy taxonomy is

misformation error (63,17%) followed by misordering errors (23,36%), addition

errors (11,34%) and misordering errors (2,27%). While based on the

developmental category, the errors are: pre-systematic stage (44,75%), systematic

stage (33,14%) and post-systematic stage (22,09%).

The result shows that the highest number of errors occured is misformation. This

Indicates that students have more serious problems in using grammar especially

tenses in present tenses. They might also be influenced by Indonesian grammar.

And based on developmental category the most frequent errorr occured is presystematic

stage. This might be due to the students’ lack of knowledge about

grammar. The errors students produced were possibly caused by some factors

such as insufficient grammar mastery, lack of knowledge of present tenses and

lack of awareness. In line with the result, it is suggested that English teachers

should not ignore the errors made by them. The teachers can give remedial

teaching for the students and provide some tasks or exercises which enable them

to practice using tenses.

Key words : Students errors, present tenses sentences, negative and interrogative

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