Question 11 has two kinds of misformation: the change of subject he into I and verb help into do. Because the student changed he into subject I, he also changed
his into my as the possessive form. This kind of mistake can be categorized as misformation. Next, the change of helped into done causes different interpretation in
meaning although both of the words are verbs. Do might be used based on a same semantic meaning with help that is: to find or solve the answer. The error has the
interpretation as if my sister was the one who did the homework, whether the right interpretation is that the subject I
could do the homework because of the sister’s help.
b. Addition
Addition is the presence of an item which should not appear in the correct form of a sentence Dulay, Burt, Krashen, 1982: 156. The examples of addition
errors are: Question 6 :
Instead of buying a new bicycle, why don’t you have someone fix your old one?
SA : Instead of buying a new bicycle, why don’t you have your
old one is fixed? Question 8 :
Where did you get someone to repair your car? We’re looking for a good mechanic.
SA : Where did you get your car to be repaired?
It is common to see the addition of be and to-be in the passive causative form in Part B. Question 6 indicates that there are two possibilities behind the additional
be is. First, the student is influenced by the rule of regular passive voice: be before the verb. Therefore, is is put in the passive form of simple present tense. Second,
there might be an influence of first language in answering the question. In Indonesian,
passive form is marked by the use of {di-} in the verb Moeliono, 1987: 280. In this case, students acknowledge that be is should be added in passive form to mark the
passive voice, similar with the form {di-} should be added to mark the passive sentence in Indonesian. Due to the transfer of language diperbaiki in Indonesian,
therefore students decided to put is before fixed. Next, question 8 has the additional to be before the verb repaired. The form
of active causative where get is followed by to-infinitive may cause this error. That is why student kept writing to after the object and added be to form the passive voice.
The student seemed not to acknowledge that the passive form of have and get causatives are the same.
c. Omission
The first common error of omission that the student did is the omission of the doer or the causer in the passive form. Here, the causer is marked after by- phrase.
Question 11 : He got his sister to help his homework. SA
: He got his homework helped. The absence of his sister in the answer of question 11 is a significant error in
a such of passive sentence. It is because his sister gives a new information to the hearer Celce-Murcia, Marianne and Larsen Freeman, 1999: 355. However, it is
stated by Marianne, that most analyses show that there are about 15-20 percent of agent absence in passive voice 1999: 354. The fact of agent absence in passive
sentence is also noted by Carter and McCarthy in Marianne who explain get passive sentences have no explicitly stated agent 1999: 349.
The omission of a subject is also common to be found in Part B. Take a look at this example:
Question 6 : Instead of buying a new bicycle, why don’t you have someone
fix your old one? SA
: Instead of buying a new bicycle, why don’t have your old one fixed?
Although the meaning in the passive form is conveyed, the student had been mistaken to omit the causer in passive causative form. It can be observed that the
student might think to put the verb right after don’t because the the student failed to
recognize that don’t is a be for the phrase. The form of an interrogative sentence in
simple present tense has the form: dodoes + subject + verb + noun phrase. Instead, the student may look at the sentence as the negative form in simple present which has
rule: subject+ dodoes + not + verb + noun phrase. The other possibility of the error is the influence of Indonesian. Here, the
student just tried to translate the causative phrase as ‘kenapa tidak sepeda lamamu yang diperbaiki?
’. Due to the translation, the student finally omitted you as the causer.
d. Misordering
Different from misformation, misordering is the incorrect placement of a morpheme or group of morphemes in an utterance Dulay. Burt, Krashen, 1982: 162.
The general error of misordering is the error of get causative. Question 8 :
Where did you get someone to repair your car? We’re looking for a good mechanic.
SA : Where did you get repaired
your car? We’re looking for a good mechanic.
Question 11 : He got his sister to help his homework. SA
: He got helped his homework by his sister. To be looked closely, there is inseparability of get and the verbs in both cases.
It is general knowledge that get passive is used in informal conversation. In the example such as: ‘Barry got invited to the party’ has get as an alternative to be
Celce-Murcia, Marianne and Larsen Freeman, 1999: 345. According to this fact, the student decided to put together be get and the verbs and cause misordering of the
sentence. The objects of your car and his homework should be put between get and the verbs.
Similar thing also happens with have causative. The example is on question 9 as follows:
Question 9 : We need to have someone check out our computer for viruses.
SA : We need to have checked out our computer.
There are two possibilities behind the answer. First, the student noticed ‘to
have someone check out our computer for viruses’ as the non-finite clause of to- infinitive. Although the form is not right for the passive form, the student changed the
verb into past participle form checked in order to add the sense of passive voice. Second, the student noticed the word have as the be for present participle. It caused
student to write down the past participle checked after be have. By this possibility, it is logical if student did not separate be have and checked out. There is also an
omission of for viruses in the sentence. Hence, the answer is incorrect because the sentence of causative should have our computer after have causative.
e. The Combinations of Some Errors
The researcher also found some combination of errors in several answers in Part B. The combinations of errors in Table 4.6 are the combination of misformation
and misordering, misformation and omission, omission and misordering, omission and misformation, addition and misformation, addition and omission, and addition
and misordering. One example is student’s answer in question 8. Question 8
: Where did you get someone to repair your car? We’re looking for a good mechanic.
SA : Where did your car is repaired?
In this example, there are two errors in the student’s answer. First is the
omission of the phrase ‘We’re looking for a good mechanic’. This omission may be caused by the instruction that the students are asked to change the active causative
sentence only. Therefore, heshe only changed the active causative sentence into passive structure. The other missing things in the answer are you and get. You is
omitted because the student transfered the sentence into Indonesian as “Dimana
mobilmu diperbaiki?”. In the other hand, it seemed that the student acknowledged that the verb for the passive sentence should only be one verb, so heshe omitted get
and decided repaired as the verb for the passive sentence. Second, the sentence pattern shows two kinds of be: did and is. Did refers to
the subject your car while is refers to the past participle repaired. The use of is in the answer is an addition error. Furthermore, it may relate to the form of passive sentence
