conscious attention to errors and mistakes could raise learner awareness of form and function and that this will eventually affect acquisition as well as performance
and competence. So, the conclusion of various linguistic experts likes Elis 1997. Errors and
mistakes are similar but difference in meaning. Errors are mistake that reflect the students and the students could not fix their mistakes. Being according Ancker
2000, mistakes is student error in slip their performance. So, differences in error and mistake were only in knowledge their self. Error centered on student
ignorance and mistake in fixing mistakes, fixing errors based on the previous knowledge.
Krashen himself sees the differences between error and mistake in his research has serious implications for teaching and learning processes. Errors are divided
into two linguistic and applied linguistic. In linguistic, belonging mistake have performance characteristics such as slips of the tongue, lapses of memory, speech
condition, can be self-monitored self corrected. And errors in applied linguistics, belonging error competence has different characteristics from mistake such as the
speaker knowledge of language in question, monitored by other and corrected by others. So, the obvious conclusions both of them are the error based on
competency and performance-based mistakes.
4. The Causes of Errors
There are some opinions relate to the causes of errors. H. Douglas Brown
claims that there are four major causes of errors; they are inter-lingual transfer, intra-lingual transfer, context of learning and communication strategies
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.
a. Interlingual Transfer
Inter-lingual transfer is a significant source of error for all learners. It happened because the native language or mother language interference. In these
29
H. Douglas Brown, Principles of Language Learning and Teaching, New York: Addison Wesley Longman, Inc.,2000, Fourth edition, pp. 223-227
early stages, before the system of the second language is familiar, the native language is only the previous linguistic system upon which the learner can draw.
b. Intralingual Transfer
Intra-lingual transfer the transfer within the target language itself is a major factor in second language learning. Researcher have found that the early
stages of language learning are characterized by a predominance of interference inter-lingual, but once learners have begun to acquire parts of the new system,
more and more intra-lingual transfer-generalization within the target language-is manifested. Negative intra-lingual transfer, or overgeneralization, has already
been illustrated in such utterances as “Does John can sing?” other example like “He good” and “I don’t know what time is it?”
c. Context of Learning
“Context” refers, for example, to the classroom with its teacher and its materials in the case of school or the social situation in the case of untutored
second language learning. In a classroom context the teacher or the textbook can lead the learner to make faulty hypotheses about the language. Students often
make errors because of a misleading from the teacher or word in a textbook, or even because of a pattern that was rote memorized in a drill but improperly
contextualized. d.
Communication strategies It is defined and related to learning style. It is also regarded as elements of
strategic competence in which learners bring to bear all the possible facets of their growing competence in order to deliver clear messages in the second language.
Learners often use production strategies in order to get their message across, but at times these techniques can cause errors.
Error may derive from both two transfer; Interlingual and Intralingual, Context of learning, and also from communication strategies. Afterwards, those
sources will be obviously used in the next chapter as a final step of the procedure of error analysis.
The similar opinion came from Peter Hubbard. He explained the causes
of error. The sources or error are essentially the same as the causes of error. He distinguished the cause of error into three parts
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: a.
Mother Tongue Interference Although the young children appear to able to learn the foreign language
quite easily and to produce the new sound very effectively, older learner experience considerable difficulty. The sound system phonology and the
grammar of the first language impose themselves on the new language and this leads to a ‘foreign’ pronunciation, faulty grammatical pattern and, occasionally,
the wrong choice of vocabulary. b.
Overgeneralization The mentalist theory claims that errors are inevitable because they reflect
various stages in the language development of the learners; it claims that the learner process new language data in his mind and produce rules for its
production, based on the evidence. c.
Teaching Material of Method The teaching Material or Method also can contribute to the students’ error.
According to those who support behaviorism theory, error is evidence of failure, of ineffective teaching or lack of control. If materials well chosen, graded and
presented with meticulous care, there should never be any error.
Jack C. Richards in his book; Error Analysis: Perspective on Second
Language Acquisition also distinguished the causes of errors into four parts, they are
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:
30
Hubbard, Peter, et.al. A Training Course for TEFL, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993, pp. 140-142.
a. Over-generalization
Overgeneralization is the use of the previously learned rule in new situations. Over-generalization includes instances where the learner makes a rule
based on his her experience of other rules in target language. b.
Ignorance of Rule Restriction This cause is the result of the failure to observe the restriction of existing
structures that is the application of rules to context where they do not apply. c.
Incomplete Applicant of the Rules This cause of error arises as the result of the learner’s high motivation to
achieve communicative ability. In achieving it, the learner may produce grammatically incorrect sentence.
d. False Concept Hypothesized
It arises as the result of faulty comprehension of the distinction in the foreign language. Sometimes it is also because of the poor gradation of the
materials of teaching.
5. Kinds of Errors and Mistakes
