rabie awwal 1434 - january 2013 - awej.org · subject-verb agreement was one of the errors which...

Running head: ERROR ANAYSIS OF SUBJECT-VERB AGREEMENT 1

Al-Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University

College of Languages & Translation

Department of English Language and Literature

Error Analysis of Subject-Verb Agreement in the Writing of EFL Saudi Female Students: A

Corpus-Based Study

Dalal A. Al-Dubib

Imam Mohammad bin Saud University

Rabie Awwal 1434 - January 2013

A thesis Paper Submitted to the Department of English of the College of Languages and

Translation in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in

Linguistics

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ERROR ANALYSIS OF SUBJECT-VERB AGREEMENT 2


Abstract

The objective of this study is to investigate the written English errors of level four

students at the Languages and Translation College of Prince Noura University, Riyadh, Saudi

Arabia. Error analysis technique was used in this research to find their errors, identify them, and

explain their sources. The corpus of this study was collected from the writing courses of 20

Saudi female students of EFL (level four) at Prince Noura University. Each student has her own

folio that consists of 6–7 essays, divided into different types designed by the teacher. The

students’ teachers used the Writing Process Approach to teach writing skills. The study was

designed to explore whether students are facing problems with subject-verb agreement in terms

of the present tense of the verb to be in their writing and identify the causes of these problems.

The findings are as follows: firstly, EFL Saudi female students at Prince Noura University,

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, do have problems in applying this rule in their written production. There

were 103 total errors found relating to subject-verb agreement of the present verb to be: is (82

errors), are (17), and am (4). Secondly, the study reveals that a lack of knowledge of English

grammar is the main source of students’ errors, accounting for 63.2% of the total errors found.

Thus, it was concluded that students are still facing problems in applying SVA rules in their

writing and their lack of knowledge of the rules of the target language is the main factor causing

the written production errors.

Keywords: Error Analysis, Corpus, Subject-verb Agreement.


الملخص

يهدف هذا البحث إلى إيجاد األخطاء التي يرتكبها طالبات المستوى الرابع في كلية اللغات والترجمة في جامعة األمير نورة بنت

عبدالرحمن. استخدم الباحث نظرية تحليل األخطاء والتي تهدف إلى استكشاف أخطاء الطالب ومعرفة نوعها وإيجاد أسبابها.

طالبة، كل طالبة لديها ملف خاص 02عبارة عن مجموعة من المقاالت المكتوبة بواسطة المادة المستخدمة في البحث هي

مقاالت تتمحور حوَل عدة مواضيع مختارة بواسطة المعلمة. معلمات الطالبات يتبعَن منهج "عملية الكتابة" 7-6يحتوي على

ى معرفة إذا ما كانت الطالبات يعانين من مشكلة وذلك خالل تدريس مهارات اللغة اإلنجليزية للطالبة. تهدف هذه الدراسة إل

تطبيق قاعدة موافقة الفعل المساعد للفاعل في الجملة اإلنجليزية وإيجاد أسباب هذِه المشكلة، وقد أثبتت الدراسة أّن الطالبات

للفعل المساعد 37و ”is“للفعل المساعد 20خطأ مقسمة على 321يعانين بالفعل من تطبيق هذِه القاعدة حيُث تّم اكتشاف

“are” للفعل المساعد 4و“am” باإلضافة إلى ذلك، أثبتت الدراسة ان المسبب الرئيسي لهذِه المشكلة لدى الطالبات هَو عدم .

معرفة القاعدة بالشكل الكامل والصحيح والذي أدى إلى ظهورها في كتاباتهّن.

كلمات البحث :

مساعد للفاعل في الجملة.نظرية تحليل األخطاء، موافقة الفعل ال


Acknowledgments

First and foremost I would like to express my gratitude to Allah, who has helped me in

this long journey and enabled me to finally finish my thesis despite all the challenges I

experienced.

I am extremely appreciative of the assistance, total commitment, kindness, and support I

received from my supervisor, Dr. Abdulhameed Eliwa.

I also wish to extend my full gratitude to my husband, who has been the rock in my life.

Thanks for providing the support and help that I needed.

Thanks are also due to my mother, who has constantly been behind me, never hesitating

to offer all that she can to facilitate my journey. My deepest thanks also go to my dad, my

brothers, and the rest of my family.

Finally, I am sincerely grateful to all the people who have helped and supported me

throughout my project.


Table of Contents

Introduction ................................................................................................................................................. 2

I.1 Statement of the Problem......................................................................................................................... 9

I.2 Purpose and Questions of the Study ........................................................................................................ 9

I.3 Significance of the Study ......................................................................................................................... 9

I.4 Definition of Terms ............................................................................................................................... 10

II. Literature Review ................................................................................................................................... 11

II.1 Error Analysis ...................................................................................................................................... 11

II.1.1 Background ....................................................................................................................................... 11

II.1.2 Classification and Types of Errors .................................................................................................... 13

II.1.3 Error Sources ..................................................................................................................................... 14

II.1.4 Stages of Error Analysis .................................................................................................................... 15

II.1.5 Corpus Linguistics and Language Teaching ..................................................................................... 15

II.2 The Standard View of Subject-Verb Agreement and Some Problems ................................................. 16

II.3 Practical Studies ................................................................................................................................... 19

III. Methods and Procedures ....................................................................................................................... 25

III.1 Corpus Description ............................................................................................................................. 25

III.2 Data Collection ................................................................................................................................... 25

III.3 Instruments of the Study ..................................................................................................................... 25

III.4 Study Design ....................................................................................................................................... 26

III.5 Procedures of the Study ...................................................................................................................... 26

III.5.1 General Procedures .......................................................................................................................... 26

Results of the Study .................................................................................................................................... 28

First Step: Frequencies ................................................................................................................................ 28


Second Step: Concordances ........................................................................................................................ 29

The occurrence of the present tense of the verb to be in the corpus ........................................................... 29

Discussion and Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 50

Application for English Teaching ............................................................................................................... 54

Conclusions ................................................................................................................................................. 55

Recommendations ....................................................................................................................................... 56

References ................................................................................................................................................... 57

Appendix ..................................................................................................................................................... 61


Introduction

“Corpus linguistics is the study of language as expressed in real-world text. In some areas

it is related to computational linguistics, then at last it moves towards language processing

applications” (Yousif, 2009, p. 104). In corpus linguistics, people deal with real text produced by

native speakers, whether it is written or spoken. Therefore, it is a very useful process for

identifying the most important features and principles of any language. In addition, corpus

linguistics analysis is very helpful in the teaching field, allowing both teachers and students to

benefit from it. By this kind of analysis, teachers can become aware of their students’

weaknesses by identifying their errors. The collection of their results can produce better teaching

methods. One of the most common mistakes in standard written English is subject-verb

agreement. Marzuki and Zainal (2004) analyzed the errors of writing reports in an examination

situation and found that the most frequent error was subject-verb agreement with 95.5%

occurrence. Moreover, Adira et al. (2010) found, based on the 66 paragraphs they analyzed, that

subject-verb agreement was one of the errors which was recorded with 85 errors (7.07%).

Clearly, although making subjects and verbs agree seems easy, there are certain errors that many

students commit. The basic rule of subject-verb agreement is that a verb must agree in number

and person with its subject. Singular subjects need singular verbs; plural subjects need plural

verbs (Hudson, 1998). However, there are different versions of subject-verb agreement, and one

variable involves verb tenses. This paper explores whether EFL Saudi female students at Prince

Noura University (PNU) have problems with subject-verb agreement, particularly with the

present tense of the verb to be.


I.1 Statement of the Problem

One of the major common errors in written English is making subjects and verbs agree.

Although this rule seems easy, many students seem to have difficulty applying it. This could be

due to their lack of knowledge of the rule itself or interference from the student’s mother tongue.

Therefore, the present study intends to find out whether students have difficulty applying the

subject-verb agreement rule and establish the causes of SVA errors.

I.2 Purpose and Questions of the Study

The purpose of this study is to explore the frequency and types of SVA errors in the

present tense of the verb to be produced by EFL Saudi female students at PNU in their writings.

The study aims to examine the following research questions:

1- Do EFL Saudi female students at PNU face problems with subject-verb agreement when

using the present tense of the verb to be in their writings?

2- What are the main sources of EFL Saudi female students’ errors of subject-verb

agreement when using the present tense of the verb to be in their writings?

I.3 Significance of the Study

A number of studies have been conducted on error analysis of subject-verb agreement.

However, hardly any studies have examined subject-verb agreement in the present tense of the

verb to be using the corpus-linguistics-based error analysis approach in Saudi Arabia. Therefore,

this study provides insight into the types of SVA errors relating to the present tense of the verb to

be in the writing of EFL Saudi female students at PNU. In addition, the stated value of errors and

error analysis used in this study is to offer solutions, recommendations, and suggestions for PNU

teachers and instructors to avoid these errors in future.


I.4 Definition of Terms

Error analysis: a branch of applied linguistics that studies and analyzes errors made by second-

language learners.

Corpus-based study: a study that depends on collecting written or spoken linguistic data to

explore different topics.


II. Literature Review

This chapter presents the literature review, which includes error analysis background,

corpus-based background, and the standard view of subject-verb agreement and some of its

problems. The first part focuses on the theoretical studies and theories written about these

approaches. The second part deals with the practical studies conducted on error analysis of

subject-verb agreement and corpus-based studies. The final part discusses the gap in those

studies, which helps in conducting this research.

II.1 Error Analysis

II.1.1 Background

Because this study uses error analysis techniques in students’ writing, it is essential to

discuss the theory of error analysis (EA). Evidence in the literature (T. Maicusi, P. Maicusi,

& Lopez, 2000; Sanal, 2008; AbiSamra, 2003; Khodabandeh, 2007) indicates that EA

was a development of contrastive analysis (CA). Contrastive analysis stems from the behaviorist

view that language learning is based on habit formation. In addition, it viewed the mother tongue

as the hindrance to learning new languages. The CA hypothesis reinforced this view of

“interference”: the learners’ existing habits prevents correct utterance, which results in errors that

are signs of the learner’s failure (Chanier, Pengelly, Twidale, Self, 1992). Ehsan (1995)

explained the behaviorist view that perceives the similarities between two languages’ structures

as easy to learn, referring to it as “positive transfer.” However, if major differences exist between

the two languages, the learning becomes more difficult. Thus, negative transfer occurs when

learners inappropriately transfer L1 rules to the structure of L2. Contrastive linguistics

essentially studies inter-lingual errors (errors caused by things other than the target language)

and takes into account the aspect of transfer of learning (Khan, 2011, p. 107)


However, CA proved to have some weaknesses. For example, it lacks 100% predictive

ability (Ehsan, 1995). This happens when teachers are familiar with learners’ errors, but linguists

cannot predict those errors. In addition, mother-tongue interference is not the only cause of errors

produced by SL learners. In fact, some errors are attributed to the complexity of L2 structure,

and CA is more appropriate to explain observable difficulties than to predict them (Ehsan, 1995).

Therefore, error analysis was produced to overcome the weaknesses in CA, and it is the most

effective tool for describing errors made by speakers of other languages (Johnson, 1951).

In fact, EA became an essential part of applied linguistics as a result of Corder’s (1967)

work. He explained that errors produced in the L2 learning process are similar to those

committed by a child learning his mother tongue. This concept is based on the Chomsky idea

that “a child generates language through innate universal structures” (T. Maicusi & P. Maicusi,

2000, p. 169). With regard to errors in the learning process, Corder (1967) emphasized the

different system of language in the learners’ learning process and the idea that learners’ errors

are an indication of their learning stages. In fact, according to him, learners’ errors are significant

in three different ways. First, they are significant for teachers because the learners’ errors could

determine the goals that must be achieved. Second, they are significant for the learners because

they can view them as a tool to use in learning. Third, they are significant for researchers

because they show the process of language acquisition. In addition, Sanal (2008) examined error

analysis based on second-language teaching strategies and found that errors are no longer seen as

“unwanted forms”; instead, they indicate the student’s learning-process level. In contrast,

Chanier et al. (1992) pointed to errors as a guide to the learner’s internal process.

These theories led to the study of EA in Applied Linguistics, which focuses on the

comparison between the errors made in the target language (TL) and that TL itself


(Khodabandeh, 2007, p. 3). Therefore, researchers are interested in identifying those errors and

analyzing them. Lennon (1991) defines errors as a linguistic form or combination of forms that

would not be produced under similar conditions and contexts by a native speaker. Brown (1987)

defines errors as those that are made by learners that can be observed, analyzed, and classified to

reveal their learning systems. Catalan explains error as “an infringement or deviation of the code

of the formal system of communication through which message is conveyed” (n.d., p. 66, as

cited in Gutilo & Mango, 2012, p. 3). It is important to note that researches and theories cannot

all have the same definition of errors.

II.1.2 Classification and Types of Errors

Before examining the various types of errors, it is important to differentiate between two

important terms: errors and mistakes. Corder (1967) defines “errors” as systematic errors that are

errors of competence. On the other hand, he defines “mistakes” as unsystematic errors that are

“lapses” or slips of the tongue (errors of performance). In the applied linguistic field, the term

“error” means the idiosyncratic or “un-native-like” language produced systematically by a

foreign language learner. However, “mistakes” are the lapses or slips of the tongue that are not

systematic and that the learner can correct (Chanier et al., 1992). They are simply a result of

imperfection in the process of producing speech (Brown, 1987). In addition to the previous

classification, Corder (1981) himself specified another classification of errors: “covert” and

“overt.” According to him, “overt idiosyncratic” errors are ungrammatical at sentence level,

while “covert idiosyncratic” errors are completely grammatical at sentence level but not

interpretable within the context.

Therefore, errors, not mistakes, are what researchers are focusing on, and many

researchers are interested in categorizing errors and the literature containing various types of


errors. For example, Gustilo and Mango (2012) classified errors as omission errors, addition

errors, misformation errors, wrong order, spelling errors, system errors, and the like. This

classification is similar to those found in Dulay, Burt, and Krashen (1982), who categorize errors

into four types. They are omission (i.e., excluding a linguistic item that is obligatory in a

grammatically correct utterance), addition (including a linguistic item that is not required in a

grammatically accurate sentence), misformation (mixing up the use of linguistic items), and

misordering (placing linguistic items in an inappropriate order). Sun (2010) examined other

kinds of errors: misuse of words, grammatical errors, syntactic errors, and errors of discourse

construction and content.

II.1.3 Error Sources

Identifying errors and their types are not the only concerns of EA research. In general,

researchers are interested in investigating the sources of these errors. Corder (1971) classified

error sources into two types. The first is interlingual/transfer errors, which refer to the native

language. These errors occur when the learner’s L1 prevents him from acquiring the rules of L2.

Sanal (2008) describes interlanguage errors as the mistakes committed by learners in the TL

because of the influence of their mother tongues. The second is intralingual/developmental

errors, which refer to the TL that is being learned. Sanal (2008) describes intralanguage errors as

the mistakes committed by learners in the TL due to a lack of knowledge of that TL’s rules.

Richard (1970) agrees with Sanal and elaborates by stating that intralingual errors are items

produced by learners that represent the structure of neither the mother tongue nor the TL. He

mentions the overgeneralization view and explains that because learners tend to follow the new

rules they have learned, they may develop a hypothesis that does not correspond to L1 or TL. In

addition, Zawahreh (2012) states that the error source could be attributed to mother-tongue


interference, intralingual interference, teachers, false analogy, and the familiarity of the

appropriate collections.

II.1.4 Stages of Error Analysis

In order to conduct error analysis studies, certain stages in the literature must be

followed. Corder (1967 and 1974, as cited in Sun, 2010, p. 86) suggested three models in EA

research, which includes three stages: 1) data collection; 2) description; 3) explanation. In

addition, Gass and Selinker (1994, p. 67) elaborate on this model and give six steps that include

data selection, error identification, error classification, error explanation, error evaluation, and

error correction.

II.1.5 Corpus Linguistics and Language Teaching

Technology and computers play an important role in our lives, and teaching is one of the

areas that uses them to facilitate students’ and teachers’ learning process and provide researchers

with answers. Therefore, corpus linguistics is considered a tool that could be very useful for

pedagogical purposes, an idea that will be applied in the present study.

In general, corpora can be describes as “a large body of linguistic evidence typically

composed of attested language use” (Mitkov, 2003, p. 449). Also, we can say that a collection of

more than one text that is put together on a computer-readable system and used for different

purposes is a corpus (Yusuf, p. 2009). It is important for these electronic forms to be easy to

access by end users to enable both common users and researchers to use these data. Therefore,

these collections can be used in corpus linguistics, which is the study of language collected from

real-world texts and ordered according to explicit criteria. These texts must be a true replica of

physical text, gathered from a genuine normal spoken or written source (Dash, 2008). Corpus

linguistic deals with real input, and it is based on the linguist’s intuition. Thus, a corpus collector


must not include any text taken from experimental conditions and/or artificial circumstances

(Dash, 2008).

For pedagogical purposes, there is a relationship between corpora and language teaching.

Figure 1 is taken from Lüdeling and Kytö (2009) to illustrate the relationship between corpus

linguistics (CL) and language teaching (LT).

Figure 1. The relationship between corpus linguistics (CL) and language teaching (LT).

As seen in the above figure, corpora and teaching are closely related to each other,

meaning that corpora can be used as a tool applied in the language teaching process. In order to

use it, some common steps must be followed. First, real data must be collected from native

speakers. Then, these data are entered into a software program for corpus access. Finally, certain

methods must be used to achieve the desired purposes, such as using the analytic technique with

students’ writing.

II.2 The Standard View of Subject-Verb Agreement and Some Problems

The grammar of any language is not just a simple matter of rules; in order to achieve

correct formal writing, the students must follow some basic principles, such as subject-verb

agreement. In English, there are three verbs used both as a main verb and as a helping verb, such


as to be. Their distribution in regard to present tense is represented in Table 1 (Werner, Church,

& Baker, 1996 a, p. 3).

to be, to have and to do: Present Tense

Singular Subject and Verb Plural Subject and Verb

First Person I am We are

Second Person You are You are

Third Person

He

She

It

They are

Table 1. The distribution of to be in the present tense.

As illustrated in Table 1, verbs in the present tense for the third person take singular

subjects: she, it, and he. Moreover, verbs in the first and second person are almost the same

except for the verb to be; the first person takes am and the second person takes are.

On the other hand, it is not always easy to trace the subject in the sentence. Sometimes,

subjects are separated from their verbs by a prepositional phrase (Werner, Church, & Baker,

1996 b, p. 5). The prepositional phrase includes the preposition and its object, which will never

be the subject of a sentence. This emphasizes the fact that this phrase cannot agree with the verb.

The most common prepositions in English are at, from, in, of, on, and with.

In addition, there are other cases of subject-verb agreement of indefinite pronouns

(Werner et al., 1996 b, p. 139-216). They do not refer to specific nouns; some of them are

considered singular, and some are plural. Indefinite pronouns, such as anyone, everyone,

someone, anything, nobody, anybody, no one, nothing, one, somebody no one, someone,

is


something, none, and much, are always singular and require singular verbs. However, indefinite

pronouns, such as all and some, are singular or plural depending on what they refer to.

Furthermore, some phrases in English give the sense of the meaning. For example,

together with, as well as, and along with are not the same as and. Thus, the use of one of these

phrases does not compound the subject, so a singular verb is required. The same is true for the

phrases neither and either (Werner et al., 1996 a, p. 39). Even though they seem to be referring

to two things, they are singular, and they require singular verbs. They join as parts of a subject,

and the verb must agree with the part nearest to it.

Another principle in subject-verb agreement involves collective nouns (Werner et al.,

1996 a, p. 187). They are a collection of different types of names. The agreement between them

and a verb depends on the context of the sentence. The most common collective nouns include

audience, team, band, class, cast, family, unit, troop, crowd, and jury.

In some situations in English, subjects come after verbs. In these cases, the verb must be

identified and any prepositional phrases must be removed in order to complete the action of the

verb. Usually, there are some indicators to the verb preceding its subject, such as there and here

(Benner, 2000).

Finally, verbs must agree with relative pronouns. These pronouns include who, which,

whom, and that. The agreement is simply identified by the relationship between the relative

pronoun, its antecedent, and its verb. Thus, if the relative pronoun refers to a singular antecedent,

then it requires a singular verb. However, if the relative pronoun refers to a plural antecedent,

then it requires a plural verb (Werner et al., 1996 b, p. 324).


II.3 Practical Studies

So far, this paper has presented some theoretical background of error analysis corpus

linguistics and rules related to subject-verb agreement of the present tense of the verb to be.

The latter part reviews previous studies made on EA and EA of subject-verb agreement and the

present tense of the verb to be. They have been ordered in relation to the main topic.

Zawaherh (2012) investigated the written English errors of tenth-grade students in female

and male schools in Ajloun, Jordan. The sample for the study consisted of 350 students selected

randomly from a group of schools in Ajloun. They were asked to write an essay about “a journey

to the ancient city of Jerash in Jordan” in an ordinary English-language exercise in the class. The

essays were then analyzed for errors. Zawaherh found that the most dominant error among tenth-

grade students in Ajloun schools was lack of agreement between the subject and the main verb.

The number of errors due to lack of agreement between subject and verb was 104, and the cause

of these errors was Arabic interference. In addition, the study found that omission of the verb to

be occurred 3 times, and again the cause was Arabic interference.

Wahyudi (2012) attempted to analyze the errors made by a first-semester student of the

English Department, Faculty of Humanities and Culture, Maulana Malik Ibrahim State Islamic

University, Jawa Timur, Indonesia. The student was a 19-year-old male majoring in English at

the university, and he was in his first semester. He was asked to do three separate tasks, each of

which included writing essays of 250 words. The research examined the errors in subject-verb

agreement of the student’s writing, and its taxonomy was based on Duley, Burt, and Krashen

(1982), who categorize errors as those of omission, addition, misinformation, and misordering.

The learner made a significant number of errors in each task with an accuracy of 46, 42%

incorrect use of verb to be agreement (omission error = 3 times and misinformation = 12 times)


in the first composition, 31, 58% (omission = 5 times and misinformation = 21 times) in the

second composition, and 40, 62% (omission = 3 and misinformation = 16 times) in the third

composition.

Salebi (2004) investigated Saudi college students’ perception of their errors in written

English. His aim was to find what kinds of errors Saudi female college students of EFL usually

make. The subjects of the study were 32 Saudi females aged 22–24 years old who were in the

fourth level at the Department of Foreign Languages at King Faisal University. They had

attended an error analysis course where they were taught how to identify, classify, and describe

errors in English committed by second-language learners. The research used two instruments: a

test and students’ comments on their errors. The study found that the percentage of subject-verb

agreement was 44.03%. In addition, it found that the percentage of errors caused during

translation from Arabic was 18.75%. Further, it showed that the main reason for errors was the

difficulty of the target language, which resulted in generalization of rules.

Stapa and Izahar (2010) investigated errors in subject-verb agreement among Malaysian

ESL learners. The study used error analysis to explore these errors. The subjects of the study

were 20 trainee teachers from a postgraduate teaching course who were majoring in English

language studies. They had at least 16 years of experience in learning the English language. The

study examined errors in five types of subject-verb agreements: person, number, coordinated

subject, indefinite expression of amount, and notional agreement and proximity. Two types of

written compositions (argumentative and factual) were analyzed to identify the students’

problems in writing grammatically correct statements with subject-verb agreement. The study

found that ESL learners still have problems at all levels of proficiency and face difficulties in

applying the subject-verb agreement rule.


Sun (2010) applied a corpus-based study of errors in Chinese English majors’ English

writing. It focuses on the general features of errors in these students’ English writing, the reasons

for those errors, the developmental features of errors in different grades, and the reasons for

those developmental features. The research design was based on a study by Corder (1974) that

suggested the following four steps in EA research: collection of data, description of errors,

explanation of errors, and evaluation of errors. The corpus of the study consisted of compositions

by English majors in Ludong University of Grade 2008, 2007, and 2006 in the first semester of

the school year 2008–2009. The study found that “grammatical errors” ranked the highest and

agreement errors were estimated at 11.48%. The reasons for these errors were vocabulary and the

influence of negative transfer of the mother tongue.

Gustilo and Mango (2012) investigated learners’ errors and their evaluation of Filipino

ESL writers. The aim of the study was to examine sentence-level errors. The data of the study

was collected from previous studies, and it consisted of 150 essays written by freshmen college

students during their first week of classes at Metro Manila. The essays were processed and

subjected to ratings and codings for errors. The raters were asked to fill out open-ended questions

to focus on their perspective on the different aspects of writing that impacted the essay scores.

To answer the research questions, the study used frequency counts, standard deviations,

MANOVA and NOVA results, and the data from regression analyses. The study found that there

were errors in subject-verb agreement in the verb category in the students’ writing.

Ericsson (2008) investigated the subject-verb concordance errors in writing produced by

eighth-grade students at a Swedish compulsory school. The study involved a written essay and

fill-in-the-gap test taken by twenty-four 14-year-old pupils (12 girls and 12 boys). The research

hypothesis stated that pupils would commit more errors in the essays than in the test. The


research used quantitative methods, which involve the collection and analysis of numerical data

and statistics. The study found that in the essay task 50% of the pupils used the verb form be

(are) incorrectly due to the similarity between the Swedish single present-tense verb forms and

the English forms (the English are and the Swedish ar). In addition, the students faced some

difficulties with unmarked plurals such as “people.”

Wulandari & Erni (2005) explored the analysis and classification of subject-verb

agreement errors in order to determine the frequency of concurrence of each. The sample in the

study was 48 fourth-semester students out of 245 students of the English Department at

Muhammadiyah University of Malang. The data for this study were gained from the results of a

writing test. The study found that there were 107 errors and the highest frequency of occurrence

was due to omission, followed by addition and misformation. The study also found that students

still had difficulties with the differences between singular and plural verbs or singular and plural

subjects, and the highest frequency of errors was for basic subject-verb agreement error

(82.21%).

Shamsudin and Mahady (2010) applied a corpus-based study to examine the writing

errors of first-year students at University Teknologi in Malaysia. The study used 66

questionnaires, and they were distributed to first-year UTM students from the Faculty of

Mechanical Engineering and the Faculty of Civil Engineering. Further, students’ paragraph

samples of were also used to collect data. It was found that the first-year students in the

university were still producing grammatical and lexical errors in their writing. Students writing

in a second language are faced with social and cognitive challenges related to second-language

acquisition, where CAH and EAH can be used to explain the causes of these errors. In addition,


from the 66 paragraphs analyzed, a total of 1,202 errors were found, and 85 of them were

correlated to subject-verb agreement (7.07%).

Misra (1985) made a detailed linguistic analysis of errors in different areas of English by

the undergraduate students of Madhya Pradesh. The sample of the study consisted of 225

randomly selected undergraduate students studying in different disciplines. The students were

asked to write an essay in English on any one of six topics provided. The first 200 words of these

essay compositions were taken for the purpose of analysis. Errors in this study were first

assigned to the levels of language description. They were further classified within each level in

terms of systems. The hierarchy of errors based on frequency of recurrence was as follows: verb

phrases, spelling, lexis, prepositions, articles, number, subject-verb agreement, pronouns, syntax,

miscellaneous errors, omission of major constituents, adjectives and verbs, connectives, and

generative suffixes.

Cronnell (1985) analyzed the Spanish- or Chicano-English-influenced errors made by

third- and sixth-grade Mexican American children. The study identified seven error categories:

Spanish spellings, pronunciation, consonants, pronunciation-vowels, verbs, nouns, syntax

(excluding verbs and nouns), and vocabulary. It was found that errors such as subject-verb

agreement, subject pronoun omission, article usage and word order, and the use of

prepositions—especially in and on—were the most frequent errors for Spanish-speaking

Mexican American students.

At The University of Texas, Austin, Holling (2004) studied a random sample of 100

eighth-grade writing samples drawn from the 2002 TAAS exam administration. He found that, in

general, mechanical errors such as capitalization, punctuation, and spelling were most frequent.


On the other hand, verbal errors, such as subject-verb agreement and verb tense errors, were

rarer.

Marzuki and Zainal (2004) investigated errors produced by students when writing

reports. The participants of the study were Malaysian students studying at University Teknologi

Malaysia (UTM, Johor Bahru). The researcher analyzed 59 examination scripts produced by

students from the Faculty of Science. The task given to them was to write a report of three to

four pages using information given in the examination question. The study found that students

tended to produce grammatical errors, including SVA errors. Subject-verb agreement errors

showed a high percentage of occurrences, registering a total of 95.5%.

The researcher believes that this study gained its distinct importance because many of the

previous studies shed light on one area of errors related to subject-verb agreement in general.

However, few studies have been conducted on SVA in the present tense, and none were found on

SVA for the present tense of the verb to be, especially in Saudi Arabian students. For this reason,

this study is an attempt to focus on SVA errors of the present verb to be made by female students

at Prince Noura University (PNU).


III. Methods and Procedures

This section discusses the methods and procedures of the study, including participants,

data collection, instruments, study design, and procedures.

III.1 Corpus Description

The corpus of the present study is based on the data collected from 20 students of level-

four at Prince Noura University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Each student has her own folio consisting

of six to seven essays divided into different types designed by the teacher. These essays contain

short paragraphs and short stories, a compare-and-contrast essay, a cause and opinion essay of

the student’s own choice of topic, a narrative essay about a personal experience, and a

descriptive essay about the student’s favorite dish. The students’ teachers are using the Writing-

Process Approach when teaching writing skills. Writing lessons are taken in writing labs

designed in a way that allows each student to work at a PC individually. Many functions are

available on these computers, such as Microsoft Office, internet access, and databases.

III.2 Data Collection

The study aimed at analyzing the SVA errors of the present tense of the verb to be that

occur in the English essays written by EFL Saudi female students at Prince Noura University,

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The corpus used in this study is collected from the writing courses of 20

students of level-four, and each student has her own folio that consists of six to seven essays

divided into different types designed by the teacher.

III.3 Instruments of the Study

The instrument used for corpus-based error analysis approach is the MonoConc program.

This program is specialized for fast concordance (text searching), which helps the researcher


with the analysis of research. Also, it can be used in corpus linguistics courses for different

purposes, such as vocabulary learning, exploring the most common grammar mistakes,

collocations, and language learning in general. In addition, the researcher used the Notepad

program to write their essays in an electronic form.

III.4 Study Design

The method used in this study is mainly qualitative with some quantitative parts. This is

because it focuses on the collection and analysis of numerical data and statistics, then describes

the types of errors and finds their causes.

III.5 Procedures of the Study

III.5.1 General Procedures

1- The first step was to get permission from PNU to conduct the research.

2- Then the researcher collected data from the students to create the corpus.

III.5.2 Data analysis

1- This study followed Corder’s (1967 and 1974, as cited in Sun, 2010, p. 86) three stages of

error analysis, which consist of 1) data collection; 2) description; 3) explanation.

2- Data were written in a computer form using the Notepad program. The input was added into

the computer manually and saved as documents (.txt).

3- The data were analyzed by using the MonoConc program to find the frequency of errors and

concordances of the present tense of the verb to be (am, is, and are). Each error of the verb to

be was analyzed according to its frequency in the corpus.

a. The errors were classified according to Dualy, Burt, and Karshen (1982) into four types:

omission (excluding a linguistic item that is obligatory in a grammatically correct

utterance), addition (including a linguistic item that is not required in a grammatically


accurate sentence), misinformation (mixing up the use of linguistic items), and

misordering (placing linguistic items in an inappropriate order).

b. A source analysis was done for each error based on two sources: inadequate knowledge

of second language or Arabic interference. In addition to the literature and researcher’s

judgment, a number of English teachers and instructors were asked to advise on the

sources of error.

c. A taxonomy was built using Microsoft Word based on the literature (Abisamra, 2003;

Khodabandeh, 2007; Stapa & Izahar, 2010; Sun, 2010; Zawahreh, 2012), which is

included in Table 2: numbered, verb to be type (am, is, are), the line number of the

error’s occurrence in the corpus, number of errors, error occurrence in the text, error

classification (omission, addition, misinformation, and misordering), and the source

(over-generalization or Arabic interference).

Numbered Verb to

be type

(am, is,

are)

The line #

of its

occurrenc

e in the

corpus

Number

of errors

Error

occurrence

Error

classification

(omission,

addition,

misinformation,

and disordering)

The source

(over-

generalization

or Arabic

interference)

Table 2. Taxonomy of errors analysis based on the literature.

4- The results were discussed based on the literature.

5- A number of recommendations and suggestions were stated for teachers in order to enhance

their students’ performance.


Results of the Study

First Step: Frequencies

The first step was to analyze the corpus as a whole to identify the words that were used

most frequently. It was found that the total number of words was 32,263. In addition, Figure 2

and Figure 3 show a screen capture of the frequency count of the corpus.

Figure 2. Most frequently used words Figure 3. Least frequently used words


As Figure 2 and Figure 3 highlight, the most frequently used words are articles (definite

and indefinite), prepositions and conjunctions, personal pronouns (mainly first- and second-

person pronouns, I and you, because the essays were about the students’ general lives), indefinite

pronouns, and the verb to be. The most frequently used noun is people, and the next most frequent

nouns are time, life, and family, because most of the essays focused on topics involving the

students’ present and past experiences. On the other hand, the least frequently used words are not

from the same category; they are worldwide, woman’s, and wife.

Second Step: Concordances

In this step, the researcher focused on two things: the occurrence of the present tense of

the verb to be and the errors that occurred in the corpus with their classifications. The following

is detailed description of each of them.

The occurrence of the present tense of the verb to be in the corpus

The researcher calculated the occurrence of the present tense of the verb to be in the

corpus and all the forms in which it can be written. For example, the search included is, it is, it’s,

he is, he’s, she is, she’s, they are, they’re, we are, we’re, I am, and I’m. In addition, because the

students were expected to make some spelling mistakes, the researcher looked for other mistaken

forms, such as r, iam, shes, hes, theyr, wer, and its (without the apostrophe). Moreover, to make

sure nothing was missed, the researcher checked the forms your and It’s. The researcher found

that is was used a total of 576 times. It occurred in the corpus with different forms: is was used

500 times, she’s seven times, its four times, it’s 51 times, that’s 12 times, there’s one time, once

as a spelling mistake of if, and again as a misspelling of his. However, are appears in the corpus

308 times with different forms: are was used 306 times, you’re one time, and we’re one time. On


the other hand, “am” occurs in the corpus 79 times. Its forms are the following: am 35 times, I’m

44 times, and Im as a spelling mistake of “in.”

For the purpose of validity and reliability in this study, some sentences have been

excluded because they were ambiguous sentences or they did not have a subject. This procedure

was important for the researcher to make a clear judgment about each sentence. Eight sentences

in total were found with no subject, accounting for 7.65% of the total number of examined

sentences. In addition, there were 15 ambiguous sentences, accounting for 14.56% of the total

number of studied sentences.

The researcher calculated the occurrence percentage of the verb be in the corpus. First,

the researcher calculated the total number of words in the corpus and then multiplied the total

number of instances of be by 100. After that, the result was divided by the total number of

words, which was 32,275 words. The following is an example of the occurrence of is:

Is:

The results were 2.71% for is, 0.95% for are, and 0.24% for am. Figure 4 demonstrates

these percentages in the corpus.

576× 100

32,275 1.78% =


Figure 4. The percentage of verb to be occurrence in the corpus.

The present tense of the verb to be carries many functions in a sentence because it is

considered a helping verb. Therefore, its occurrence in the corpus can say a great deal about the

overall understanding of English grammar. In addition, aside from its occurrence, it is important

to determine the misusage and identify the error types. This technique is known as ER. The heart

of ER also includes identification of the errors’ source. To insure the validity and reliability of

data, the researcher consulted seven English teachers who majored in English and have been

teaching grammar for at least three years. Then, the researcher calculated the percentage of their

answers compared to her source analysis. Table 3 below demonstrates the occurrence of is, are,

and am and their different forms in the corpus. It contains seven columns: numbered, the error’s

occurrence line in the corpus, the error’s occurrence in the context, the correct form, the error’s

type, and the error’s source based on the researcher’s analysis (“A” is for Arabic interference and

“E” is for inadequate knowledge of the second language), followed by the percentage of the

teachers’ answers.

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

is are am

The percentage of verb to be occurrence in the corpus

The percentage of verb tobe occurrence in thecorpus


# # in the

Corpus

Occurrence Correct

Form

Error Type Source Teachers’

Percentage

Is

1 21 … Macrons is a main

meals in saudi home ...

are Misinformation A 28.5%

2 22 ... newspapers and

novels is a freat way to

...


3 23 … but PNU is a new

building one …

has Misinformation E 85%

4 33 ... there is a lot of

recipes ...

are Misinformation E 85%

5 34 ... She - the only one I

tell her every thing …

is Deletion E 42.8%

6 34 ... She - a wise women

...

is Deletion E 42.8%

7 38 ... And Brazil - located

in south America ...

is Deletion E 42.8%

8 38 ... Rome – famous for

Colosseum ...

is Deletion E 42.8%

9 39 ... because she - shy ... is Deletion E 42.8%

10 40 ... In Riyadh there is are Misinformation A 85%


about 3 universities for

girls ...

11 49 ... He is always adjusts

the time in the ...

Addition E 57%

12 54 ... In addtion KAU is

an old building

university ...

has Misinformation E 100%

13 58 ... In addition, the

Passport must be ready

if your trip's places-

outside of your country

...

are Deletion E 57%

14 64 ... and there's alot more

to represent her nice

personality ...


15 68 ... Dubai - full of life

and joy ...

is Deletion E 42.8%

16 72 ... you will know that it

- worth ...

is Deletion E 42.8%

17 74 ... Stydying at RNS was

difficult, but it is better

than AS …

was Misinformation E 100%


18 82 ... Also it is built before

many years …

was Misinformation E 85.5%

19 83 … Dubai is buldings

are more modern …

Addition E 42.8%

20 91 ... My graduation from

high school is change

my personality …

has changed Misinformation E 100%

21 93 ... The components of

the pasta

is:chicken,vegitsbles,oi

l,onion,Garlic,milk and

cream ...

are Misinformation A 28%

22 97 ... you should obey

them even if it is

conflicting your

desiring. ...


23 99 .. My family is contain

mother and father and

three girls and three

boys ...

contains Addition E 85.5%

24 100 ... it is contains for 7

people, each one of

them has a …

contains Addition E 100%


25 101 ... he is contribute and

participate in the new

ideas in the work …

Addition E 71%

26 108 ... Macrons is a main

meals in saudi home.

And is delicious but

sometimes healthy

macaronis ...


27 112 … my old and new

house is different …


28 123 ... to have a social

personality is

emotional and

physiacal ability ...


29 127 ... Being active, proud

and serious is example

of having perfect

ethics. ...


30 132 ... the doctor who is

follow-up the

pregnancy is one of ...

Addition E 57%

31 133 ... Studying tricks is

being able to know

Addition E 71%


what the best way for

you to study by is ...

32 137 ... but they have some

different. My new and

old house is generally

the same ...


33 142 … , I did not know wht

is going on!! …


34 148 ... The death of my

grandfather is greatest

change in my life …


35 154 … After the plane

started to fly,we

listened to the

instuctions,the old man

was scared and

screaming,and,showed

signs strange on his

face.We think he has a

phobia of fly,but the

truth was different.The

truth is:he was dying.

…



36 177 … You will not like it

is it gets cold. …

when it gets

cold

Addition A 28%

37 198 ... In london, there is

lots of celebrities ...


38 204 ... The best layer which

containing beef with

sauce - it is make this

layer salty and juicy ...

Deletion of is A 57%

39 204 ... it is make this layer

salty and juicy …

it makes Addition E 85.7%

40 207 ... so, there is many bad

effect in life for

example …


41 209 ... but in Chukit ther is

Miscellaneous

Industries …


42 219 ... In short, these are

some of the differences

and there is more, but

differences make them

special and distinctive

...



43 227 ... however,mthere is

one person in my

family who has done

more for me than

anyone else is is my

mothere ...

Addition A 57%

44 249 ... There is no children

palying or people

walking ...


45 259 ... Another thing is the

rules and regulations.

In RNS, it is not easy to

beak them ...


46 263 ... In contrast Riyadh is

not have ...

does not

have

Misinformation E 57%

47 265 ... is the only country

that is not allowing

woman's driving ...

does Misinformation E 100%

48 266 … Another reason to

make him a popular

among the people -, be

a person who is not

complicated personal

Deletion of is E 14.2%


and does not jealous of

others ...

49 282 ... In fact, the doctor

who is follow-up the

pregnancy is one of

themain things that

could prepare the new

mother and …

Addition E 57%

50 299 ... Also, rivers, forests

and lakes is places that

encourage …


51 327 My new and old house

is similar


52 331 ... I like to have the

pasta within chicken in

side ,that is small cut

…

with small

pieces of

chicken

inside

Addition A 42.8%

53 333 ... Malysia and Egypt is

so beautiful …


54 336 ... It Is so delicious, I

will ask restaurant

waiter for way of the

sauce …



55 345 ... The person who

confident of himself

usually is social person

...

The

confident

person is

usually a

social one

Ordering A 85%

56 346 ... Also, there is some

cheap version …


57 350 ... For example, you

can add more tomato if

it spaghetti is …

if it is

spaghetti

Ordering A 85%

58 361 ... It was good and I

enjoyed it like I always

do. When she asked me

about my opinion , I

told her the truth, it is

tasty but zi think my

mother's is the best …


59 363 ... And the most thing

that I was excited about

is that when I graduate

I'll have 2 certificates ...

was Misinformation A 28%

60 ... The last change

happened is that I



moved in to a new

house …

61 446 … language and

translation is the most

interesting studt to me

…


62 428 ... There are two places

is the most wonderful

in the world ...

– that are Misinformation A 14.2%

63 450 ... I think that the most

important causes for

survival of friendship is

their interest to each

other …


64 460 … The Factors that

determine if there is

someone who can be

successful in his job is

to consider the work

tasks and relationships

…


65 479 ... On one hand, my old

neighborhood is very

was Misinformation E 14.2%


life …

66 481 ... Some of the Italian

restaurants is very tasty

…


67 490 ... I was studying

abroad and it wasn't

easy.in the first page of

my journey in learning

this is what happened ,

in airport of

Washingtin DC. …


68 490 ... he is wish to have his

name occupies a high

position …

wishes Misinformation E 85%

69 494 ... , she is worry about

me …

worries Misinformation E 100%

Its

70 21 ... its smell strong and

spicy. ...

it smells Misinformation E 85%

71 25 ... so when I study hard

and get good excellent

grade its automatically

it’s

automatic

Addition A 57%


I will get a well paying

job …

72 31 ... First of all, what I

love the most about hot

chocolate - its

bittersweet taste …

Deletion of is E 100%

It’s

73 9 ... and it's contains

caffeine …

contains Misinformation E 100%

74 10 ... but it's different in

their size …

are Misinformation E 85.7%

75 25 … the wall was red

with whit and it's my

favorait colour, …


78 37 ... These causes I think

it's the main points for

the survival of

friendship …


79 42 ... Actually, I like these

similarity because it's

the basic thing to me, I

would like to not

they are Misinformation A 28.5%


change them …

80 45 ... These causes I think

it's the main points for

the survival of

friendship …


81 47 ... It's two completely

different …


That’s

82 10 ... was happy and

excited and we ask our

brother how did he

manage to carry her

since we knew our

mom was heavier than

everybody else that's

when my brother told

us everything in the

water …

was Misinformation

E 71%

Are

1 24 ... The last thing is the

are of the academic

campus ...

Addition E 100%


2 54 ... the differences are in

the size of the yard. ..

is Misinformation A 28.5

3 73 ... Bit in Brazil they are

speak Portuguese

language …

they speak Addition A 28.5%

4 77 ... In other countries

are allowed to women

to travel alone …

women are

allowed to

Ordering A 100%

5 120 ... Also, the countries

economics are based in

two different things ...

economy is Misinformation E 100%

6 154 ... Do you want know

wht it's put in this

pasta! …

what to put Addition A 100%

7 156 … Am surrprised what

are they wanted of me!

…

what did

they want

from me

Misinformation E 42.8%

8 163 ... In my opinion, both

they are I love it ...

In my

opinion, I

love them

both

Addition A 71%

9 167 ... Now, you are know you know Addition E 71%


the practice and

creativity …

10 170 … now there are a

professional chef ..

is Misinformation E 100%

11 173 ..They are afraid of the

reaction me …

were Misinformation E 100%

12 256 ... almost the same

entertaining activities

which are large

shopping malls. These

shopping malls have ...

is Misinformation E 85%

13 266 ... Honest eyes, eyes

are smiling from the

heart …

are eyes .. Ordering A 71%

14 268 ... The smell of vanilla

flavor and chocolate

are like drug to me …

The smell of

vanilla

flavor and

chocolate is

like a drug

to me.


15 288 ... both cities are speak

Arabic …

speak Misinformation E 57%


16 293 ... sucessful students

strive to achieve

maximum benefit that

school in which they

are in offers, by

investing time and

energy in their studies

...

in their

schools

Addition E 42.8%

17 297 ... In fact, the hidden

benefit is that that you

are mastering the art of

achievement ...

mastering

the art of

achievement

Addition E 28.5%

Am

1 34 ... I had deepest fear in

not that i am

inadequate ...

.. Addition A 42.8%

I’m

2 19 … I Know that I’m not

accepted in the major I

wanted ...

.. I knew

that I was

not accepted

..


3 29 ... and I'm tried to

Screaming loudly …

Addition E 71%


4 30 ... And I'm care about

it in many ways …

Addition A 42.8%

Table 3. Error analysis of verb to be error occurrences in the corpus, with their types and sources.

From Table 3, it can be seen that the most frequent errors of the verb to be occurred with

is, which had 82 errors, followed by are with 17 errors and am with four errors. Thus, from the

data above, it can be seen that the learners made a significant number of errors with is. In

addition, the error type showing the highest number of occurrences was misinformation at 62

times: errors occurred 53 times with is, eight times with are, and once with am. Next is the

addition error type with 23 occurrences: 14 with is, seven with are, and none with am. The

deletion type is next, appearing only 11 times with is. Finally, the ordering type occurred twice

each with both is and are. Figure 5 and Figure 6 represent these data.

Figure 5. The percentage of errors of each type in the corpus.

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

The percentage of errors of each type in the corpus

The percentage of errorstype in the corpus


Figure 6. The percentage of verb to be errors that occurred in the corpus.

The data show some differences between the researcher’s analysis of error sources and

the teachers’ percentages. The researcher calculated the percentage of these differences and

found that the teachers’ results match the researcher’s analysis results by 36.8%, proving the

credibility of the students’ error sources in this study. Further, the data reveal that Arabic

interference accounts for only 36.8% of the total error sources, whereas the biggest percentage is

due to a lack of knowledge of English grammar with 63.2%.

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

misinformation Addition Deletion ordering

is

are

am


Discussion and Conclusion

The results of this study show that female students in the English Department of

Languages and Translation College at PNU are facing difficulties in applying the SVA rule in

their writings. The findings of this study are in line with those provided in the literature that have

been conducted on ESL/EFL learners (Zawahreh, 2012; Wahyudi, 2012; Salebi, 2004; Stapa &

Izahar, 2010; Sun, 2010; Gustilo & Mango, 2012; Ericsson, 2008; Shamsudin & Mahady, 2010;

Wulandari & Erni, 2005; Mirsa, 1985; Cronnell, 1985; Holling, 2004; Marzuki & Zainal, 2004).

In addition, this study shows that the highest percentage of errors occurred with is, followed by

are and then am. These findings contrast with those shown by Ericsson (2008), which found that

50% of the pupils used the verb form be (are) incorrectly.

Furthermore, the analysis of data shows that the highest number of errors of the present

tense of the verb to be was found in the error type misinformation. This is similar to Wahyudi’s

(2012) findings that indicated misinformation as the highest error type followed by omission.

However, the present result shows the opposite to the finding of Wahyudi and Erni (2005),

which ranks omission of errors as the highest type and revealed misinformation as the least

frequently committed error type. The following error type in the present study is addition,

agreeing with the results found by Wulandari and Erni (2005) that revealed addition as the

second type. Therefore, this study reveals that with subject-verb agreement, students have a

tendency to use the wrong form of the morpheme or structure and to omit the verb to be in many

cases.

Although application of subject-verb agreement is different between English and

Standard Arabic, this study revealed that Arabic interference is not the main cause of SVA errors

committed by EFL students, because they account for only 36% of the total errors. Instead, the


study showed that inadequate knowledge of the second language has the highest percentage as

the main cause of errors. This result is the opposite of that found by Zawahreh (2012), where

most agreement errors were caused by Arabic interference. In addition, this study’s findings

contrast with Sun (2010), who studied errors committed by Chinese students and found that the

highest percentage of errors was due to agreement errors, with 11.4% caused by vocabulary and

influence of negative transfer of the mother tongue.

This result may indicate that the participants might not have been able to understand the

SVA rule in English. Therefore, in the latter part of this study, the researcher provides English

teachers with some implications collected from the literature to help them in developing their

students’ proficiency level.

An interesting point that needs further exploration is the fact that the students’ writing

contained a great deal of ambiguous sentences and sentences without a subject, which prevented

the researcher from analyzing the errors and their types and causes. Because these students are at

level four at Languages and Translation College, they were expected to demonstrate a better

understanding of writing and grammar. Therefore, these amounts of problems were not expected.

These kinds of mistakes are due to their inadequate knowledge of English grammar. Table 4

below shows the occurrence of ambiguous sentences and sentences without a subject in the

corpus.

Line number in

the corpus

Occurrence Ambiguous sentence or

sentence without a subject

Is

13 ... Most of its territory in Avriqiaghir that part

of its territory, the Sinai Peninsula, is located in

Ambiguous


the cotinent of Asia, it is a country

transcontinental …

36 … also in a touch is a soft, thin, gooey, mushy,

and fluffy …

Ambiguous

37 ... While traveling is a must to have a camera

with you …


45 ... brasilia is the capital city of Brazil is also

modern city …

Ambiguous

76 ... both they are I love it, but I think the best is

al-faisaliah mall bigger and modern …


79 ... Is bordered by Syria to the north and east … sentence without a subject

121 ... In Downtown clothing is Egyptian industry

but in Chukit ther is Miscellaneous Industries ...


136 … out of this communication is gaining culture

…

Ambiguous

177 … You will not do it, is old. … sentence without a subject

192 ... Most of its territory in Avriqiaghir that part

of its territory, the Sinai Peninsula, is located in

the cotinent of Asia, it is a country

transcontinental …

Ambiguous

208 … In order to become a successful employss, Ambiguous


you have to do tasks work. Is mean the

employee must be always on time. …

218 ... The most important different between school

and university is that is more flexible …

Ambiguous

262 ... these reasons are not convincing men if they

wantednto harassment Every place is not

restricted to driving a car …


266 ... Another reason to make him a popular

among the people, be a person who is not

complicated personal and does not jealous of

others, if the person has a complicated character

, will be dominated by self-love, and limit their

contact with others people …

Ambiguous

355 ... when I smell this pasta I become hungry even

if I don't, is sweet and faint …

Ambiguous

It’s

31 … Do you want know wht it's put in this pasta!

..


50 … Connection with other people it's very

important to change our life …

Ambiguous

Are

255 … They are very dry … sentence without a subject


257 … Madinah and Riyadh's differences are that

their similarities …

Ambiguous

That’s

8 ... That's close for tow Asian countries despite

other distances! …

Ambiguous

Am

24 … am surprised what are they wanted of me … Ambiguous

30 … am sure that even in the future … Ambiguous

I’m

20 ... In concoljn Raghd is one of a kind. And I'm

apret to be the best friends …

Ambiguous

Table 4. The occurrence of ambiguous sentences and sentences without a subject in the corpus.

Application for English Teaching

The key component of learning is making errors, correcting them, and promoting the

acquisition level. Languages teachers should pay more attention to students’ errors and classify

them in order to determine remediation strategies for learning. Thus, ER helps SLA researchers,

students, and teachers to learn more about the nature of their errors. Consequently, a number of

researchers have recommended appropriate application of these methods for English teaching.

Sun (2010, p. 91) mentions three implications: strengthening language teaching for basic

knowledge; utilizing positive transfer of the mother tongue that includes translation, back

translation, and bilingual extensive reading; and countermeasures against native transfer, which

consists of encouraging learners to think in English and use proper dictionaries. Further, Salbi

(2004) stresses the importance of grammatical drills and exercises used in EFL classrooms.


Likewise, Zawahreh (2012, p. 296) discusses five important implications for teachers based on

his study results. Firstly, teachers should focus more on the errors and include more exercises

about these errors. Secondly, he stresses the value of an English teacher and how they should

adopt approaches to writing and related activities. Thirdly, Zawahreh says that, during grammar

teaching, teachers should provide their students with rules and limitations on how to use the

information in different meaningful contexts. Furthermore, he says that teachers should deal with

errors as a natural process, not as if they are only the result of mother-tongue interference. He

also suggests that mother-tongue interference and intralingual interference are the main sources

behind errors. Similarly, Salbi (2004) points to the importance of the learner’s awareness to the

differences between their native and second languages. In addition, Chanier et al. (2012) provide

insight into the process of language acquisition and deemphasize the idea of errors as failure.

Conclusions

This study attempted to investigate the errors of applying subject-verb agreement in the

written English of 20 students in level four at Language and Translation College of Prince Noura

University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The study aim was to apply a corpus-based study using an

Error Analysis technique in order to investigate two main questions. The first is whether these

students are facing problems in applying this rule in their writings. The second is to explore the

main source of these problems. As a conclusion, what seems to be important is the fact that this

study provides evidence that students are still facing problems in applying SVA rules in their

writing. In addition, it shows that their lack of knowledge of rules of the target language seems to

be the main factor in causing the written production of the errors. This lack of knowledge causes

them to use incorrect forms of the morpheme or structure, which leads to the misinformation

error type. Furthermore, this rule ignorance leads students to omit the verb to be entirely in many


sentences. Similarly, this inadequate knowledge has caused other problems, such as writing

ambiguous sentences or sentences without a subject. Clearly, it is very important for students or

learners of a foreign language to have a strong foundation in the rules of the target language.

Therefore, the researcher presents a number of applications for English teachers to use in their

classrooms to help their students avoid these errors.

Recommendations

In the light of the results of this study, which showed that deleting the subject accounted

for 7.65% of the total errors found during SVA analysis, the recommendation given in this study

is to explore the error analysis of deleting the subject in the sentence and its sources. In addition,

it is recommended to find the relation between the verb to be and the deletion of the subject in a

sentence.


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Appendix

Table 1. The distribution of to be, with present tense

Table 2. Taxonomy of Errors Analysis based on the literature

Table 3. Errors Analysis of verb to be error occurrences in the corpus (types and sources)

Table 4. The occurrence of ambiguous sentences and sentences without a subject in the corpus

Figure 1. The relationship between corpus linguistics (CL) and language teaching (LT)

Figure 2. Most frequently used words

Figure 3. The least frequently used words

Figure 4. The percentage of verb to be occurrence in the corpus

Figure 5. The percentage of errors of each type in the corpus

Figure 6. The percentage of verb to be errors that occurred in the corpus.

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