Errors and variations of TESL students’ written description

The focus of this study was to highlight different kinds of errors and variations that emerge in the writings of ESL students. The participants of the study were twelve TESL undergraduate students from the Faculty of Educational Studies at Universiti Putra Malaysia. Students’ written descriptions o...

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Main Authors: Ahour, Touran, Mukundan, Jayakaran
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Universiti Putra Malaysia Press 2012
Online Access:http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/40655/
http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/40655/1/Errors%20and%20variations%20of%20TESL%20students%E2%80%99%20written%20description.pdf
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author Ahour, Touran
Mukundan, Jayakaran
author_facet Ahour, Touran
Mukundan, Jayakaran
author_sort Ahour, Touran
building UPM Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description The focus of this study was to highlight different kinds of errors and variations that emerge in the writings of ESL students. The participants of the study were twelve TESL undergraduate students from the Faculty of Educational Studies at Universiti Putra Malaysia. Students’ written descriptions on a picture stimulus were collected and qualitatively analyzed. Then, the emerging errors in their descriptions were categorized into the linguistic and surface structure taxonomies. The findings revealed different grammatical errors in their writings which were basically related to the categories of verb phrases and noun phrases in either simple or compound/complex sentences that resulted in giving misinformation, one of the categories in surface structure. Some variations were also found in the word choice of the students in the three ethnic groups of the study, whereby these choices might be the reflections of their cultural background and world view. The results could help material developers to develop the necessary tasks and exercises and teachers to devise the best teaching strategies for overcoming these kinds of errors in ESL learners’ writings.
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spelling upm-406552015-10-26T01:59:02Z http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/40655/ Errors and variations of TESL students’ written description Ahour, Touran Mukundan, Jayakaran The focus of this study was to highlight different kinds of errors and variations that emerge in the writings of ESL students. The participants of the study were twelve TESL undergraduate students from the Faculty of Educational Studies at Universiti Putra Malaysia. Students’ written descriptions on a picture stimulus were collected and qualitatively analyzed. Then, the emerging errors in their descriptions were categorized into the linguistic and surface structure taxonomies. The findings revealed different grammatical errors in their writings which were basically related to the categories of verb phrases and noun phrases in either simple or compound/complex sentences that resulted in giving misinformation, one of the categories in surface structure. Some variations were also found in the word choice of the students in the three ethnic groups of the study, whereby these choices might be the reflections of their cultural background and world view. The results could help material developers to develop the necessary tasks and exercises and teachers to devise the best teaching strategies for overcoming these kinds of errors in ESL learners’ writings. Universiti Putra Malaysia Press 2012-03 Article PeerReviewed application/pdf en http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/40655/1/Errors%20and%20variations%20of%20TESL%20students%E2%80%99%20written%20description.pdf Ahour, Touran and Mukundan, Jayakaran (2012) Errors and variations of TESL students’ written description. Pertanika Journal of Social Sciences & Humanities, 20 (1). pp. 55-64. ISSN 0128-7702; ESSN: 2231-8534 http://pertanika.upm.edu.my/Pertanika%20PAPERS/JSSH%20Vol.%2020%20(1)%20Mar.%202012/11%20Pg%2055-64.pdf
spellingShingle Ahour, Touran
Mukundan, Jayakaran
Errors and variations of TESL students’ written description
title Errors and variations of TESL students’ written description
title_full Errors and variations of TESL students’ written description
title_fullStr Errors and variations of TESL students’ written description
title_full_unstemmed Errors and variations of TESL students’ written description
title_short Errors and variations of TESL students’ written description
title_sort errors and variations of tesl students’ written description
url http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/40655/
http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/40655/
http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/40655/1/Errors%20and%20variations%20of%20TESL%20students%E2%80%99%20written%20description.pdf