Error

Analysis
Dr.VMS
Transfer
 Carrying over the old habits get in the way of
learning new habits
 the first language acquisition patters of the
learners influence the way of learning the second
language
Error
 An error according to Corder, takes place when the
deviation arises due to lack of knowledge. An error
cannot be self=corrected.(Ellis,19194)
 Pit Corder-Father of Error Analysis
 -”The Significance of Lerner Errors’(1967)
Corder, 1974
 Hathas come to be known as error analysis has to
do with the investigation of the language of second
language learners.
Norrish(1983)
 Error, ‘A systematic deviation when a learner has
not learnt something and consistently gets it
wrong’
DAVID CRYSTAL (1997
 ERROR is a term used in Psycholinguistics -
referring to mistakes in spontaneous speaking or
writing, -being attributable to a malfunctioning of
the neuro-muscular from the brain. -also called
‘slips of the tongue’ or ‘slip of the brain’.
 B. Richards, Jack (1999) • E A is an activity to
reveal errors found in writing and speaking. EA is
considered as an aid in teaching or in the
preparation of teaching materials
BROWN (2005)
 Error analysis is the process to • (1) observe, • (2)
analyze, • (3) classify the deviations of the rules of
the SL/FL/TL and to • (4) reveal the systems
operated by the learner
 Errors and Mistakes
 Errors are systematic, governed by rules, and appear because
of learner’s knowledge of the rules of the target language is
incomplete • Indicative of the learner’s linguistic system at a
given stage of language learning ,i.e., his/her transitional
competence or interlanguage development • Occur repeatedly and
not recognized by the learner, in the sense that only teachers and
researchers can locate them
 In contrast, mistakes are: • random deviations, unrelated to any
system, and instead representing the same types of performance
mistakes that might occur in the speech or writing of native
speakers, such as • 1- slips of the tongue or Freudian slips ,as in
“You have hissed all my mystery lectures” instead of “You have
missed all my history lectures”. • 2- slips of the ear ,as in “great
ape” instead of “gray tape” • 3- false starts, lack of subject-verb
agreement in a long complicated sentences ,
 Errors and Mistakes
 The distinction between learner’s errors and mi
stakes has
always been problematic for both teachers and
researchers , but to Ellis (1994) frequency of
occurrence is regarded the distinctive point; •
errors which have a rather low frequency are
considered mistakes or performance errors • and
those with high frequency as systematic errors
 Error is overt or covert • Overt error is easy to
identify e.g I runned all the way. • A covert error
occurs in utterances that are superficially well
formed • It was stopped (from Corder 1971 a) •
Until we come to know that it refers to wind.
 Description of Errors
 Involves the learner’s idiosyncratic utterances with
a reconstruction of those utterances in the target
language . • Dulay, Burt and Krashan (1982)
argues the need for descriptive taxonomies of
errors that focus only on observable , surface
features of errors, as a basis of subsequent
explanation. • The simple type of classification is
linguistic involves(clause structure, the auxiliary
system, passive sentences, …
Corder (1974) Framework for the
description of errors
 Three types of errors according their systematicity
 Pre systematic : when a learner is unaware of the
particular rules in the language.
• Systematic : when the learner discover the rules but
it is a wrong one
• Post systematic: When the learner knows the correct
target language rule but uses it inconsistently
Transfer
 Carrying over the old habits get in the way of
learning new habits
 the first language acquisition patters of the
learners influence the way of learning the second
language
 SOURCES OF ERRORS
 They can be categorized in two domains:
 1. Interlingual transfer , 2.Intralingual transfer
 Interlingual Transfer is a significant source for language
learners. Dictionary of language Teaching and applied
Linguistics (1992) defines: Interlingual errors are the
result of language transfer which is caused by the
learners’ first language. It occurs at different levels such
as transfer of phonological, morphological, grammatical,
and lexica-semantic elements of the native language (L1)
into the Target Language.
 Intralingual error
 Intralingual error is one which results from faulty or
partial learning of the target language, rather than from
language transfer. The sentence “She must goes” is
wrong. The error might be made as a result of blending
structures learned early in the learning process.
 Intralingual errors that result from L2 itself James (1980:
185-187) goes into more details. He refers to intralingual
errors as learning-strategy based errors and lists 7 types
of them: False analogy, misanalysis, incomplete rule
application, exploiting redundancy, over-laboration,
hypercorrection and overgeneralization.
Richard (1971
three types of competence errors
• Interference errors
• Intralingual errors
•Developmental errors(due to limited knowledge)
Mistakes
 A mistake refers to a performance error that is
either a random guess or a slip of tongue.
 It is actually a failure to utilize a known system
correctly.
 Native speakers make mistakes but when attention
is called to them, they can be self=corrected
EA
 Error analysis helps students, teachers and
researchers in a way of helping the learners to
improve mostly the use and usage of second
language
EA and its need
 The errors give valuable feedback to both teachers
and learners regarding learner strategies and
progress.
 The errors also provide researchers with insights
into the nature of SLA process
 EA is not restricted to errors caused by negative
transfer fro the L1, it covers all types of errors
Interlanguage

 It was coined by Selinker in the belief that the

language learner's language was a sort of hybrid
between his LI and the target language. The evidence
for this was the large number of errors which could
be ascribed to the process of transfer. But when
second language acquisition researchers began to
collect data from learners not receiving formal
instruction, particularly children, the pro- portion of
transfer errors was found generally to be quite small.
Error Analysis and Inter language

 our teaching techniques. The philosophy of the

second school is that we live in an imperfect world
and consequently errors will always occur in spite of
our best efforts. Our ingenuity should be concentrated
on techniques for dealing with errors after they have
occurred. Both these points of view are compatible
with the same theoretical standpoint about language
and language learning, psychologically behaviorist
and linguistically taxonomic.'
 Acquistion vs learning
 The usefulness of the distinction between acquisition and learning has been
emphasized by Lambert (1966) and the possibility that the latter may benefit
from a study of the former has been suggested by Carroll(i966).The
differences between the two are obvious but not for that reason easy to
explain: that the learning of the mother tongue is inevitable, whereas, alas, we
all know that there is no such inevitability about the learning of a second
language; that the learning of the mother tongue is part of the whole
maturational process of the child, while learning a second language normally
begins only after the maturational process is largely complete; that the infant
starts with no overt language behaviour, while in the case of the second
language learner such behaviour, of course, exists; that the motivation (if we
can properly use the term in the context) for learning a first language is quite
different from that for learning a second language. On examination it becomes
clear that these obvious difference simply nothing about the processes that
take place in the learning of the first and the second language. Indeed the most
widespread hypothesis about how languages are learnt, which I have called
behaviourist, is assumed to apply in both circumstances.
EA Classification
 Phonological
 Lexical
 Syntactic,
 etc
EA categories
 Over-generalization
 Learners of second language sometimes apply
previous learned rules on the target language
without appropriate knowledge of their
application. Thus, they commit error. Ex,. It can
eats.
Ignorance of rules
 Every language has its unique rule system ignoring
the rule lead to errors
Error Analysis VS Contrastive
Analysis
 In the 1960s EA was acknowledged as an
alternative to the behaviourist CA • The
Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis (CAH) was
widely accepted in the 1950s and 1960s USA and
its original purpose was purely pedagogical. The
teaching method which used the CAH as its theory
of learning was the audiolingual method.
 contrastive analysis
 The main idea of contrastive analysis, as propounded
by Robert Lado in his book Linguistics Across
Cultures (1957), was that • It is possible to identify
the areas of difficulty a particular foreign language
will present for native speakers of another language
by systematically comparing the two languages and
cultures. Where the two languages and cultures are
similar, learning difficulties will not be expected,
where they are different, then learning difficulties are
to be expected, and the greater the difference, the
greater the degree of expected difficulty. (Lado 1957)
Thank you