THE ERROR ANALYSIS ON DIFFERENT TEXT GENRES OF THAI EFL STUDENTS

Abstract

The aims of this research are to 1) analyze writing errors and 2) identify the sources of errors in three different genres: narration, description, and comparison/contrast. The samples were 80 third year English Liberal Arts students. The instrument used in this research was an error analysis form based on Surface Strategy Taxonomy. Statistics involved were frequency and percentage.
The results were as follows: 1) The most frequent error found in narration was the omission of past simple tense (40.29%). For description, the omission of pluralization (31.25%) was found with the most frequency. A type of errors found in comparison and contrast with the most frequency was the omission of singular verb (28.07%). 2) The sources of errors were interlingual interference of the mother tongue and intralingual interference consisting of overgeneralization, ignorance of rule restrictions, incomplete application, and false concept hypothesized. This research provides some pedagogical implications for EFL writing teachers as they will become aware that different highest-frequency errors are found in different text types. This leads to the preparation of appropriate supplementary grammar instruction and remedial exercises resulting in students’ writing improvement.