ERROR ANALYSIS ON ONLINE JOURNAL WRITING: A CASE STUDY
MAZLIA BINTI MAHADI
Laporan Projek Ini Dikemukakan Sebagai Memenuhi
Sebahagian Daripada Syarat Penganugerahan Ijazah
Sarjana Muda Sains Serta Pendidikan (TESL)
Fakulti Pendidikan
Universiti Teknologi Malaysia
2003
ii
To:
my mother, Jamilah Ali
My soul-mate,
Khairil Rizman Amiruddin
And
to the man who I love the most
Arwah Mahadi B.Che Mat
iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to praise and thank Allah for blessing me and guiding me all the way
in completing this thesis. I would also like to express my heartiest gratitude and
appreciation to my finest supervisor, Pn. Rohaya Kahar for her encouragement, guidance
and supported me with her endless patience. I would also like to thank my course mates
and my housemates for their encouragement and advice. A big thanks to my mum,
Jamilah Ali and to both of my sisters, Marzila and Mazlina Mahadi for the care and
support. Also to my soul mate, Khairil Rizman and his family for being so understanding
and caring. Thanks for being there when I need a shoulder to cry on and gave me all the
support I need when I was lost. May Allah bless you all. Thanks a lot.
ABSTRACT
Errors in writing have always been a major concern of Second Language
(L2) teachers. Thus, a study was conducted to investigate the common errors
occurred in students’ writing via online and to determine the factors that lead to
these errors. It was also hoped to investigate whether online journal writing
promoted motivation for students to write in English. A group of five UTM
students who were doing their final semester for semester I 2003/2004 were
chosen as the subjects. They had visited the online journal website
(www.diaryland.com) and had signed up as members to allow them to write their
journal, online. Subjects had to write a journal of not less than 150 words. From
their writing, the common errors and the factors of these errors were identified.
The subjects were then interviewed to discover if there was any sign of motivation
enhanced in students’ perception of writing in English. The results showed that
there were six common errors found in which five of them were inter-lingual
errors meanwhile the other one was intra-lingual error. The subjects also claimed
that writing journal online did promote motivation for them to write in English.
They also claimed that they were more comfortable had their writing been
corrected online. At the end of this research paper, the limitations and some
pedagogical implications for future study are also included.
vi
ABSTRAK
Kesilapan yang terdapat dalam penulisan adalah dititikberatkan oleh guru-
guru pengajaran bahasa kedua. Kajian ini dibuat untuk mengenalpasti kesilapan-
kesilapan yang sering berlaku didalam penulisan secara online oleh pelajar dan
mengenalpasti faktor-faktor yang menyebabkan kesilapan-kesilapan ini. Adalah
diharapkan agar penulisan jurnal secara online akan memotivasikan pelajar untuk
menulis dalam Bahasa Inggeris. Sekumpulan pelajar UTM yang sedang
menjalani semester akhir untuk semester 1 2003/2004 telah dipilih sebagai subjek
kepada kajian ini. Subjek-subjek telah melawat laman web jurnal secara online
iaitu www.diaryland.com dan telah mendaftar sebagai ahli untuk menulis jurnal
didalam laman web tersebut. Berdasarkan dari penulisan mereka ini, kesilapan-
kesilapan yang sering terdapat dalam penulisan mereka dan fator-faktor kepada
kesilapan-kesilapan telah dikenalpasti. Para subjek kemudiannya telah
diwawancara untuk mengetahui samada terdapatnya sebarang tanda peningkatan
motivasi terhadap penulisan dalam Bahasa Inggeris. Daripada keputusan yang
diperolehi, ia menunjukkan terdapat enam jenis kesilapan yang telah dibuat
dimana lima diantaranya tergolong dalam faktor yang disebabkan oleh kesilapan
“inter-lingual” manakala satu jenis lagi adalah kesilapan “intra-lingual”.
Subjek-subjek bersetuju bahawa menulis jurnal secara online memotivasikan
mereka untuk menulis dalam Bahasa Inggeris serta berasa lebih selesa dengan
pembetulan yang dilakukan secara online. Pada akhir laporan kajian ini, beberapa
batasan dan unjuran turut dimuatkan sebagai panduan untuk kajian yang akan
dilakukan pada masa hadapan.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER CONTENTS PAGE
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT iv
ABSTRACT v
ABSTRAK vi
TABLE OF CONTENTS vii
LIST OF TABLES xi
LIST OF APPENDICES xii
ONE INTRODUCTION
1.1 Introduction 1
1.2 Background of the Study 2
1.3 Statement of Problems 4
1.4 Research Questions 5
1.5 Research objectives 5
1.6 Purpose of the Study 6
1.7 Scope of the Study 6
1.8 Significance of the Study 7
1.9 Definition of terms 9
viii
1.10 Conclusion 11
TWO LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Introduction 12
2.2 Errors and Second Language Acquisition 13
2.2.1 Errors 13
2.2.1.1 Inter-lingual Error 14
2.2.1.2 Intra-lingual Error 15
2.2.2 Second Language Acquisition 16
2.3 Online Journal Writing 20
2.3.1 Journal Writing 20
2.3.2 Online Journal Writing 21
2.4 Error Analysis on Online Writing 22
2.5 Conclusion 24
THREE METHODOLOGY
3.1 Introduction 25
3.2 Subjects of the study 26
3.3 Research Design 26
3.4 Research Instrument
3.4.1 Online Journal Writing 27
ix
3.4.2 Interview 27
3.5 Procedures 28
3.6 Data Analysis 29
3.7 Assumptions 29
3.8 Conclusion 30
FOUR FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
4.1 Introduction 31
4.2 Common Error 31
4.3 Factors that lead to the error 33
4.3.1 Inter-lingual Errors 33
4.3.1.1 L1 words in text 33
4.3.1.2 Wrong verb-to-be form 34
4.3.1.3 Mis-spelling 35
4.3.1.4 Inaccurate vocabulary 36
4.3.1.5 Wrong question form 36
4.3.2 Intra-lingual Errors 37
4.3.2.1 Overgeneralization of grammar 37
4.4 Writing style preferred 37
4.5 Subjects’ responses on online journal writing 39
4.6 Subjects’ responses on being corrected online 41
4.7 Problems encountered while writing
journal online 41
x
4.8 The motivation level 42
4.9 Conclusion 44
FIVE CONCLUSION, IMPLICATIONS AND LIMITATIONS
5.1 Introduction 45
5.2 Limitation 45
5.3 Conclusion 46
5.4 Implications 47
5.4.1 Pedagogical Implications 49
BIBLIOGRAPHY 50
APPENDICES Interview Questions 54
Transcribed Answers 55
Samples Of Written Journal 67
xi
LIST OF TABLES
TITLE PAGE Table 1 The Frequencies of Errors Occurred in the Data 31
xii
LIST OF APPENDICES
TITLE PAGE
APPENDIX 1 Interview Questions 53
APPENDIX 2 The Transcription of Interviews 54
APPENDIX 3 Samples of Online Journal 66
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Introduction
Errors in writing have always been a major concern of Second Language
(L2) teachers. What are the most errors made by students in writing and why these
errors occur in second language learners’ writing? What are the factors that lead to
these errors in L2 learners writing?
With the intrusion of the internet in education system, formal classrooms
have now gradually been replaced by virtual classrooms which apparently are
more practical. This gives a new approach to writing teaching/ learning. Internet
provides such a huge opportunity of education for teachers and learners. This is an
advantage that English language teachers should take to enhance their teaching
pedagogy especially in teaching writing and for learners as well to improve their
knowledge. As a teacher-to be, the researcher is interested in interactive learning
in which for her, it gives a new alternative and a more interesting environment
into English classrooms. Furthermore, with a new affection to the internet by
2
learners lately, it is an advantage for teachers to manipulate this media into their
teaching especially in teaching writing.
This paper will focus on the errors occurred in writing via the internet by a
group of students in Universiti Teknologi Malaysia.
This chapter will elaborate on background of the problem, statement of the
problem, research question, purpose of the study, importance of the study, scope
of the study, definition of terms and conclusion of the chapter.
1.2 Background of the problem
The use of English language is widespread all over the world. In this
globalization era, those who are proficient in the language possess great advantage
especially those who are working in professional fields. Malaysia as a fast
developing country needs employees who are proficient in English to keep up
with the government needs.
However, what is happening here in Malaysia actually contradicts to what
is expected from these workers. The actual scenario found here is that some of
Malaysian professionals are not proficient in English language especially in
writing. This phenomenon is obvious because the written texts are printed and the
mistakes made will be permanently stated for everybody to read and laugh at. This
3
situation will cause people from other countries doubting the Malaysian
professionals’ ability. What is the factor that contributes to this problem? Is the
methodology of teaching writing by Malaysian teachers is to be blamed?
Writing assignment is frequently being seen as a difficult task in our
students’ mind. The frequent reasons given by students are lack of ideas and they
are petrified to make mistakes especially grammatical mistakes. To the students, if
they make mistake, it will show their weaknesses where they are often ashamed to
confess about the errors in their writing.
Errors made by second language learners are often seen as a weakness of
the learners and teachers as well. The questions aroused in relation to this
scenario would be: are the students aware of the errors that they make? Are
teachers aware of the errors made by their students? If yes, what do they do to
overcome these problems? Here is where journal writing plays its part. By giving
the students the journal writing tasks, this will encourage students to practice
writing in English. Furthermore, by writing journal, students will not be bound by
a title. They are free to write about anything. It could be their own reflection of
anything that they observe or things they do in their daily life. Latulippe (1992)
defines journal as notebooks that writers keep to record daily thoughts. Writing a
journal helps them examine and reflect upon their ideas. In journal writing,
teachers can see how well the learners write. This is because they will write about
things that they have in mind.
4
With the rapid development of information technology, journals are now
could be written via online. With an encouraging interface, writers could get
more inspiration to write.
1.3 Statement of the problem
As university students, writing errors should be avoided especially
when they are writing a report or an academic paper, especially when these papers
are written in English. But what is actually happening contradicts to the statement
as mentioned above. Most of Malaysian university students are not competent in
English language particularly, in writing skills. This is a sign of weaknesses in
teaching and learning of English language where it shows that the language is not
fully acquired by these students.
One of the factors that contributed to the problem is the students
are lack of motivation to write in English. For them, writing task is always seen
as the most difficult part of English language learning. The challenge here is to
engage these students into the writing activities. Thus, this study was conducted
to look into the errors that occurred in student’s writing and whether online
journal writing promotes motivation for students to write in English.
5
1.4 Research questions
In this study, the researcher wishes to seek for answers to these questions:
1) What are the common errors that occur in students’ writing
via online?
2) What are the factors that lead to the errors in students’
writing via online?
3) Does writing online promote students’ motivation to write
in English?