18 mistake and correct it if necessary. Corder 1967 as cited by Dulay et al 1982
stated that performance errors are apparently mistakes.
c. Lapse
Norrish 1983 also presents lapse. Lapse happens because of the lack of concentration, shortness of memory, fatigue and other factors. Lapse happens
when the students do not obtain a good atmosphere and situation of learning for example due to the weather, or other particular situations. Lapse is neither an error
nor a mistake and lapse can happen to anyone at any time.
d. Careless Slip
Norrish 1983 also stated careless slip. Careless slip is caused by learner‟s
inattentiveness in class. Learner‟s inattentiveness could be triggered by many
factors. The factors are class‟ situation, learners‟ concerns and any other else.
Careless slip is considered as a minor type of „errors‟.
3. Sources of Error
In this research, the researcher also presents the theories about sources of error. The theories are presented in order to give clear explanation for the
students‟ error in descriptive texts. Sources of errors are needed in the step of error analysis. The step is explanation of errors by Ellis 1994.
Brown 1980 as cited by Hasyim2002 presents the sources or errors.
Brown 1980 classifies the sources of errors into four. They are: 1 Interlingual Transfer.
This is negative influence of students‟ mother tongue. 2 Intralingual Transfer
. This is negative transfer of items in the target language. In other word,
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this is the incorrect use of rules in the target language. 3 Context of Learning.
This is the overlapping of the interlanguage transfer and intralingual transfer. The role of teacher and textbook is very important, because teachers and textbooks
might make wrong generalization about the language.4 Communication Strategies.
Communication strategies are used as a conscious verbal mechanism for communicating when linguistics forms are not available to the students for
some reasons. Richards 1971b as cited by Ellis 1994: 58 also presents three sources of
errors. They are 1interference errors.
„Interference errors occur as a result of the use of elements from one language while s
peaking another‟. 2 Intralingual errors
. „intralingualerrors reflect the general characteristics of rule learning such as faulty generalization, incomplete application of rules and failure to learn
conditions under which rules apply‟. 3 Developmental errors.„Developmental
errors occur when the learner attempts to build up hypotheses about the target language on the basis of limited experience‟.
4. Causes of Errors
Norrish 1983 presents the causes of error. That is essential because those causes could explain the error made by seventh grade students of SMP
PangudiLuhur Yogyakarta.Those causes are presented as follows.
a. Carelessness
Norrish 1983stated that carelessness is often done due to lack of motivation. Another reason is that the teachers‟ materials do not suit the students‟
20 capabilities. One aid to overcome those “carelessness” problems is to get the
students to check each other‟s work. This activity requires the students‟ capabilities in English and English can be used as a class language in this activity.
b. First Language Interference
Norrish 1983stated that learning language whether it is a mother tongue or a foreign language is a matter of habit formation. The learners‟ utterances were
elaborated to be gradually shaped towards the language they were learning. Skinner 1957 as cited by Norrish 1983 stated a definitive statement of
behaviorist theory of language learning. It says that a language is essentially a set of habits, and then when the learners try to learn the new habits, the former habits
will interfere with the new habits. That is called mother tongue interference. The most appropriate way for teachers to overcome the first language interference is to
re-teach a given structure, or a piece of vocabulary, in a way which allows the students to see the language item from as many points of view as possible. In
addition to that way, the student must have chance to use the items in an appropriate situation.
c. Translation
Norrish 1983 also says that another popular idea why students make errors is due to translation. The students often do word-by-word translation in
translating idiomatic expression. Errors due to translation may occur during the discussion. It is where students have reached the stage of concentrating more on
the message things they want to deliver than the code they are using to express it the language itself. The use of conscious or unconscious translation can be
21 considered as a communication strategy. That means a learner can express himself
in the language he is learning using „interlanguage‟ as bridge between his own language and the target language.
d. Overgeneralization
George 1972 as cited by Norrish 1983 explains an approach in study learner‟s errors. They are Overgeneralization by Richards 1974 and Redundancy
Reduction by George 1972. The example of overgeneralization is that the students construct a deviant structure. Norrish 1983: 31 also stated that this error
occur as “a blend of two structures in the „standard version‟ of the language” and also as “a result of blending structures learnt in the learning sequence”. Richards
1971b as cited by Ellis 1994:59 says that “overgeneralization errors arise when the learner creates a deviant structure on the basis of other structures in the target
language. Overgeneralization error generally involves the creation of one deviant structure in place of two target language structures”. The examples of
overgeneralization are presented as follows. e.g.:
a. We are visit the zoo. b. She must goes.
c.Yesterday I walk to the shop and I buy.
e. Incomplete Application of Rules
Richards 1974 as cited by Norrish 1983 adds another kind of errors and that is incomplete application of rules. In this kind of error, Richards 1974 as
cited by Norrish 1983: 32 suggests two possible causes of this error. They are 1 “the use of questions in the classroom and 2 the fact that the learner may
22 discover that the learner can communicate perfectly adequately using deviant
forms”. In this error, the students tend to use deviant forms of language. Richards 1971b as cited by Ellis
1994: 59 also explains that “incomplete application of rules involves a failure to fully develop a structure
.” Richards 1971b as cited by Ellis 1994 also says that incomplete application of rules is included in
intralingual errors. The examples of incomplete application of rules are presented below.
e.g.: Teacher: Ask her where she lives. Students: Where you she lives?
f. Material Induced Errors
Norrish 1983 also stated there are two reasons regarded material induced errors. The first is a
“false concept” and the second is “ignorance of rule restrictions
”.False concept occurs when the material do not use appropriate context to explain the learners. The example of false concept is the use of present
progressive tense in descriptive texts. Richards 1971b as cited by Ellis 1994: 59 explains that “false concepts hypothesized arise when the learner does not
fully comprehend a distinction in the target language”. Richards 1971b as cited
by Ellis 1994: 59 also explains that “ignorance of rule restrictions involves the
application of rules to the contexts where they do not apply”.It is probably more difficult to avoid errors from ignorance of rule restriction than it is to avoid false
conceptualization.
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g. Error as a part of language creativity
Norrish 1983 stated that the learners who have limited capability in English would form a hypothetical rules related to English on insufficient
evidence. The learners need to create new utterances, but with limited capability, they may make mistakes or even errors. Language creativity is divided into two
major factors. The first factor is that the students‟ incapability to follow the target language rules. The second factor is creative arts. It deals with some works on
literature such poems, novels or prose.
The causes of errors by Norrish 1983 have been presented by the researcher. Those causes are essential because the origin of students can be found
out by searching through those causes. In this research, the researcher also implements as Norrish 1983 suggested. It is to use correcting codes. The
purpose of using correcting codes is that because correcting codes can lead the learners to work out for themselves what is wrong and to figure out some way
towards correcting it. Norrish 1983 suggested some codes to correct students‟
writing. They are T tense, WF word form, WO word order, S syntax, A agreement, V vocabulary, Sp spelling, P punctuation, Art article, R
reference unclear, St style and many more. The researcher made correcting
codes which were adopted from Linguistic Category Taxonomy by Politzer and Ramirez cited by Dulay et al 1982. Those codes could facilitate the teacher to
give comments in a more student-friendly way instead putting a bunch of red ink on students‟ writing.
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5. Types of Errors
Dulay et al 1982 explain the types of errors. These theories of error type underline this error analysis. They are presented as follows.
a. Omission
Dulay et al 1982 stated that omission happens because of the absence of an item that must appear in well-formed utterance. Some morphemes are potential
to be omitted in writing. They are two kinds of morpheme, content morpheme and grammatical morpheme. The phenomenon that is often seen is the omission of the
grammatical morphemes. The grammatical morphemes are noun and verb inflections the s- in birds, articles a, an, the, verb auxiliaries is, will, can, is,
was, am, etc , and prepositions in, on, under,etc.
b. Additions
Dulay et al 1982 stated that addition errors are the opposite of omissions. In this type or errors, the errors are characterized by the presence of an item which
must not appear in a well-formed utterance. This error happens because of the result of the too faithful use of certain rules. Additions are also divided into three
different parts. They are double markings, regularizations, and simple additions.
1 Double Markings
In some cases, the students who have acquired the tensed form for auxiliary and verb often place the marker on both. Dulay et al 1982: 156 stated
that “many addition errors are more accurately described as the failure to delete
25 certain items which are required in some linguistic constructions, but not in
others”. The examples are he doesn’t knows my name or we didn’t knew about it.The error above is called double markings, because two items rather than one
are marked for the same feature.
2 Regularization additions
Dulay et al 1982 say that a rule typically applies to all linguistic items, however, some members of a class are exception to the rule. Regularization errors
that are included in the addition category are those in which a marker that is typically added to a linguistic item is erroneously added to exceptional items of
the given class that do not take a marker. The examples of regularization errors are eat- eated instead of ate, beat- beatedinstead of beat, sheep-sheepsinstead of
sheep, put-putted instead of put and etc.
3 Simple Addition
Simple addition is the last category of additions. If an addition error is neither a double marking nor a regularization error, it is called simple addition.
This error is still based on adding unnecessary morphemes to sentences, and words. The examples of simple addition error are the train is gonnabroke it past
tense, a this article a, and etc.
c. Misformation
Dulay et al 1982 stated that misformation errors are characterized by the use of wrong form of the morpheme or structure. The example of misformation
errors is the dog eated the chicken. In that error, a past tense marker was added
26 while it is not necessary. Misformation is also divided in three parts. They are
regularizations, archi-forms, and alternating forms .
1 Regularization Errors misformation
This error is caused by a regular marker used in a place if an irregular one. The examples are run- runnedinstead of run, goose- gooses instead of geese.
Regularization errors occurred most in the verbal output of both first and second language learners. Dulay et al 1982: 160 also stated
that “the overextension of linguistic rules to exceptional items occurs even after some facility with the
language has been acquired”.
2 Archi forms
The selection of one member of a class of forms to represent others in the class is a common characteristic of all stages of second language acquisition. The
students‟ selected forms are called archi forms. For example, the students choose one demonstrative adjective that, these, those, this to add with some words,
thatcar- that cars .Dulay et al 1982 stated
that “for the learner, that is the archi- demonstrative adjective representing the entire class of demonstrative adje
ctives”.
3 Alternating forms.
These forms are still students‟ selected forms. This error happens because of the influence of the students‟ grammar-vocabulary grow. In this error, the
students may alternate between the forms. The examples are those dog, this cats, he would have saw them, I seen her yesterday.
27
d. Misordering
Dulay et al 1982 state that misordering error is characterized by the incorrect placement of a morpheme or group of morphemes in an
utterance.Misordering occurs systemically both in L1or L2 learners. For example, they produce wrong type of questions such what daddy is doing? The correct form
is what is daddy doing?
e. Interlingual errors
Dulay et al 1982 stated that interlingual errors happen because the influence of students‟ native language. The sentences or words that are made are
semantically similar or equivalent with the students‟ native language structure. For example, Spanish students may produce the man skinny, because they are
influenced by their native language structure. That error is caused by the Spanish adjectival phrase el hombre flaco.
f. Ambiguous Errors
Dulay et al 1982 stated that ambiguous errors are classified both as developmental error and interlingual
error. This error reflects the students‟ native language structure and children acquiring first language. The example for this
error is I no have car . In that example, it is shown that “no” shows two alternate
error origin, the students‟ native language structure and also children acquiring first language.
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6. Error Taxonomy Linguistic Category Taxonomy
This research is considered as an error analysis. Due to that fact, the researcher used Linguistic Category Taxonomy by Politzer and Ramirez 1973
asDulay et al suggest 1982. Dulay et al 1982 as cited by Ellis 1994: 54 argue “the need for descriptive taxonomies of errors that focus only on observable,
surface features of errors, as a basis for subsequent explanation”. Ellis 1994 also stated that the simplest type of descriptive taxonomy is based on linguistic
category. Politzer and Ramirez 1973 as cited by Ellis 1994 begin their taxonomy
with more general categories: morphology, syntax and vocabulary and they say that Linguistic Category Taxonomy allows for both a detailed description of
specific errors and also for a quantification of a corpus of errors.The researcher used Linguistic Category Taxonomytoclassify
the students‟ errors and using this taxonomy, the classification was faster and easier. The researcher used Linguistic
Category Taxonomy to project the errors from general categories: syntax, morphology and other findings. Other findings consist of two kinds of errors:
orthographic and lexico-semantic Keshavarz, 2012as cited by Abed, 2012. After classified into generalcategories, the errors were, then, classified into some more
specific categories such as omission, addition and etc, and it can enable the researcher to investigate deeper on the students‟ errors. The researcher also
combined Linguistic Category Taxonomyby Politzer and Ramirez 1973 as cited by Dulay et al 1982 with types or errors by Dulay et al 1982 in order to
classify the errors in students‟ descriptive texts.
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7. Descriptive Texts
