problems of Tense Errors in English Essays: A study of the situation among SS3 Students

problems of Tense Errors in English Essays: A study of the situation among SS3 Students

ABSTRACT

This study examined tense errors in English essays of secondary school students in Eastern Obolo Local Government Area. Three research question were raised in line with the specific objectives of the study. The study adopted the quasi-experimental research design. The population of the study comprised all senior secondary school students in the study area. A sample size of 120 ss2 students was used for the study. The major instrument for data collection was “ English Language Essay Test [ELET]. The data collected were analyzed using frequency counts and simple percentages.

The result showed that students made errors in the use of tenses of verb in their sentences. Errors were observed in the use of present tense, past tense and future tense. An average of 3.8 cases of tense errors were recorded prescript. it was concluded that the students examined were still in competent in the use of English tense. It was recommended among others that students should be encouraged to speak English Language quite often in and outside the classroom to improve their ability to achieve communication in the Language.

 

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background to the Study

The importance of English Language acquisition as a stepping – stone for proficiency in other school subjects cannot be over-emphasized. The knowledge is important both for educational, economical and national development of a country. The importance of English Language as a school subject derives mainly from its utilitarian value to the larger Nigerian society. English is the official Language of administration and commerce. In recognition of the importance of English Language for enhancing educational attainment as well as for improving communication ability of citizens, the government had made the subject a core subject (FGN, 2004).

It is also compulsory for students to have credit in English Language before entering the university. This also explains why many parents go off their way to see that their children passed at credit level or above in English Language. Nigerian, like most sub- Saharan countries, is blessed with many indigenous Languages but the English Language continues to play a pivotal role in day-to- day transaction of Nigerians. As a result of this rather unfortunate case of linguistic imperialism, the ministry of Education has made it a policy for the English Language to be taught from kindergarten to the university level. In addition, it is also medium of instruction in almost all subjects.

Afful  (2007) observed that apart from English Language being used as an official Language or Lingua Franca in Nigeria, it is an important means of inter- ethnic communication internally and a source of communication internally and a source of communication with the international community – politics, trade, and science. Afful’s assertion, with regard to the importance of the English Language in Nigeria has been buttressed by Quagie (2010), who, in extolling the role of English positoes that he is yet to read or see any written manifestoes of political parties in other Nigerian Language. This is very unfortunate as the majority of the population is not very literate in English.

However, it is important to mention that not withstand the status of the English Language in Nigeria, not much has been done to improve upon how the Language is taught and learned, let alone spoken as one would have expected. In this regard, mention can be made of how issues surrounding the teaching and learning of the Language in Nigeria continue to pose challenges to teachers and other academics. Indeed, one of such problems is the wrong use of tenses in written and spoken communication which might not be unconnected with the influence of mother- tongue.

It should be borne in mind that errors in the use of tenses are not peculiar to students only but the teachers of the language who are not well vested with the knowledge of the Language do make similar errors. This development however, must have accounted for the poor performance of students in the subject in public examinations which is fast becoming a recurring decimal if left unchecked.

Statement of the Problem.

The recurrent poor performance of students is English Language is causing some concern among English Language teachers, school administrators, parents and the general public. Teachers have put up noble and spirited efforts aimed at identifying the major problem associated with learning of English Language in schools. Despite all these efforts, the problem of poor achievement in English Language has continued to rear its head in the nations public examinations. Many scholars have attributed the incidence of students’ failure in the subject to ineffective method of teaching the subject and poor reading culture among students which as culminated in the poor knowledge of the subject by the students. Accordingly, it has been observed that students being second Language Learners find it complicated to speak or write good English owing to the influence of mother tongue.

Most students have problems in differentiating between past, present and future tenses in their daily communication and essays. They end up mixing up tenses in their essays which account for their poor performance in public examinations. It is against this background therefore, that this study “ Tense Errors in the English Essays of secondary school students in Eastern Obolo Local Government Area ’’ became imperative.

problems of Tense Errors in English Essays: A study of the situation among SS3 Students

1.2 Objective of the Study.

 The main objective of this study is to examine tense errors in English essays of secondary school students in Eastern Obolo Local Government Area. The specific objectives include:

1. To identify the tenses in the essays of students in Eastern Obolo Local Government Area.
2. To classify the tense errors identified into types.
3. To find out the possible causes of the tense errors identified.

Research Questions.

The following research questions were raised inline with the specific objectives of the study.

1. What are the tense errors students make in their English essays?
2. What are the types of errors made?
3. What are the causes of the errors?

Significance of the study.

It is anticipated that the findings of this study will be of huge benefits to teachers of English Language, school administrators, authors of English Language texts and students in the following ways:

1. It will reveal the tense errors made by the students of English Language.
2. It will enable teachers of the Language to drill their students on the use of correct tense while writing any kind of essays.
3. It will promote effective and error free communication among school administrators, teachers and the learners.
4. It will help authors of English texts to realize the need for more to be done in the area tenses.
5. It will add to the body of existing Literature on the topic of this research.
6. Finally, this study will serve as a spring board and a reference material for further research on problems of tense errors in English essays not only among students in Eastern Obolo Local Government Area but in other local government areas in the state and nation at large.

Delimitation of the study.

The study was delimited to senior secondary school in Eastern Obolo Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom state. Analysis was on senior secondary two (ss2) students in the study area.

Limitation of the Study.

The study was without challenges. The major factors that limit the scope of this study to Eastern Obolo Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom state were insufficient fund, time frame for the research, the researcher’s academic work-load etc.

Operational Definition Terms.

The following terms used in this study were operationally by the research as explained below:

Tense: Tense  refers to the form of a verb that is used to show the time of the action or state expressed by the verb.

Error: have to do with the mistakes made in the construction or usage of tense of the verb.

Tense error: Tense errors are the mistakes committed due to the inability to equate the appropriate verb which corresponds with the time of the action, state of being or condition.

Essay: A short piece of writing by a student on a particular subject.

CHAPTER TWO

REVIEW OF RALATED LITERATURE

This chapter primarily focuses on the review of existing research works carried out by professionals on tense errors in English Essays of students. The review is presented under the following sub- heading:

• The concept of Tense Errors
• Types of Tense Errors
• Tense Errors Analysis in English Essays of students
• Summary of Review of Related Literature.

 2.1 The concept of Tense Errors

Tense errors are errors committed by learners of English language on their daily means of communication. Abia (2009) states that tense refers to an expression of the time an action take place. Also, the Writer acknowledges that tense tells whether an action, activity or state is was or will be complete, or whether it is, was or will be in progress over a period of time. In other words, when the present tense is misused for past tense or present progressive tense, it constitutes to tense errors. These errors can be viewed from different aspects. Olaniyi (2011) examines errors relating to tense as follows:

Example 1: first come, first serve is incorrect rather it is first come, first served because ‘ served’ expresses certainty, it will take inflection ‘d’.

Example 2: My father is working with NEPA in Lagos is incorrect. The correct form is ; My father works in NEPA in Lagos. The incorrect expression suggests that the action is still going on at the moment only, whereas it is habitual. Olashinde (2002) state that tense errors are inevitable among second learners of English. The writer also suggested that errors are unavoidable and a necessary part of the learning curve-the writer also makes a distinction between errors and lapses (simple mistakes).

According to the author, lapses are produced even by native speakers and can be corrected by themselves. Banjo, Ayodele and Ndahi (2010) refer to tense as changes in the form of verb to indicate time. The trio indicates that time is not the same thing as tense. Accordingly the writers acknowledge that errors can come from two tenses that are used to cover the three divisions of time, that is, simple present tense and simple past tense. Apparently the authors establish that there is no future tense since there are no formal changes in the verb that signal future hence errors are not categorized into future time.

Ibbi (2014) describes the tense of a verb as that which indicates whether an action has occurred in the past, is occurring in the present or will occur in the future. It indicates continuity of an action or explanation for such action. According to him, although the verb can be said to be complicated grammatically, verb forms constitute a life wire of every communication. Therefore any message passed. Pryse (2007) asserts that tense is a means of differentiating in time the various thoughts and happenings that humans usually chronicle in words.

Accordingly, by this postulation, tense are past of English sentence that need to be used accurately as every action could differ in time. The author acknowledge that in communicating ideas with the present tense, most students do not use the correct verbal form resulting in tense errors. Inekwe and comrie (2010) maintained that the grammatical category of tense relates the time of action, event or state of affairs referred to in a sentence to the time of utterance. According to the authors, tense grammaticalize the relationship between time of the situation described and the context.

2.2 Types of Tense Errors

Darus and subramaniam (2009) using corder’s (2009) model on errors analysis examined errors in a corpus of 72 essays written by 72 secondary school students. They found that students errors were in five types:

1. Singular/plural form: some of the errors were associated with singular/plural from such as adding ‘s’ to luggage ‘and’ ‘s’ to women and men.
2. Verb tense: Errors associated with verb tense were as follows: I having my vacation with my grandmother the addition of the gerund ‘ing’ to have makes the sentence erroneous were as it would have been ‘ I had my vacation with my grandmother. Another error associated with verb tense was the sentence “ on our way home we meet friend who travelling for a long time”. The first error was “we meet instead of few met and “who travelling” instead of “who travelled”.
3. Preposition: some of the errors associate with the use of preposition such as “the book is outside my bag”
4. Subject-verb agreement: Errors were also related to subject-verb agreement otherwise known as concord. The errors were “They has a house,” he have come already “ she is sing.”
5. Word order:- some of the students were unable to arrange words to make a complete and perfect sense. In a research carried out by Adeijare (2002), the writer assessed tense errors in the essays of 30 students in Maimuna Gwarzo Government college Kaduna discovered tense errors under the following.
6. Simple present:- Some examples of errors in the use of simple present tense are found from the script e.g:
7. I always spending my vacation in the home “spending” which is the present continuous tense is used wrongly in the above sentence. The tense without the ‘ing’. Improper use of present tense where the present progressive is required example

“He is come”.

“ Sarah is write the letter”. (Darus and Subramaniam(2009).  Some of the example of errors on the use of the present perfect tense are:

1. John has take the clothes.
2. My father’s ill health has get better.

The wrong use of verb in the present simple from instead of present perfect progressive.

Example

1. My mother have been attend lesson.
2. Blessing have been eat yam.

The write discovered twelve instances of errors of simple past tense in the scripts studies and analyzed while there were 5 instances of errors of past progressive tense. Errors of past progressive tense appeared in two places while that of the past perfect tense appeared thrice. Abisamra (2003) in his article entitled “An analysis of errors in Arabic speakers English writing” in graded samples of written work from 10 students in graded 9. He classified writing errors into five categories namely grammatical (preposition, articles, adjective etc): syntactical (coordination, sentence structure, word order etc): lexical (word choice): semantic and substance (punctuation, capitalization and spelling): and discourse errors.

The result revealed that one third of the students’ errors were transfer errors from the native language and the highest number of errors were in the categories of semantics and vocabulary. The rest of the errors (64.1%) were of over-application of the target language, the highest numbers of errors being found in substance (mainly spellings syntax and grammar). In addition  Ridha (2006) examined English samples of 80 college student and then categorized the errors according to the following taxonomy; grammatical, lexical/semantics, tenses and word order.

The result showed that most of the students errors is due to L1 transfer. Furthermore, the scholar found out that most of the learners rely on their mother tongue in expressing their ideas. The researcher added that although the rating process showed that the participants’ essays, grammatical errors and mechanical errors were the most frequent ones, many students could not make good sentence without one from of tense error or the other.

problems of Tense Errors in English Essays: A study of the situation among SS3 Students

2.3 Tense Errors Analysis in English Essays of Student

Error analysis is one of the most influential theories of second language acquisition. It is concerned with the analysis of the errors committed by second language learners by comparing the learners acquired norms with the target language norms and explaining errors identified. The concept of error was developed to solve problems and inadequacies in the use of tenses of verbs and other aspects of grammar among the second language learners of English language. Corder, Jain and Dulay (2009) viewed errors analysis as a means of providing valuable information for three beneficiaries: to the teachers, it clues them on the progress of the student in language learning, to the researcher,

 

CHAPTER THREE

RESEARCHER METHODS

 This chapter presents the research design, the study area, population of study, sample and sampling technique, instrument for data collection, validation instrument for data collection, validation of instrument, method of data collection and method of data analysis.

3.1 Research Design

The quasi-experimental research design was adopted for the study. This was considered appropriate for the study. This was considered appropriate for the study since intact classes were used.

3.2 The study Area

The study was carried out in Eastern OBOLO Local Government Area was created during the September 23, 1996 nation-wide Local Government creation exercise under the Abacha Administration.

 Easter Obolo Local Government Area, with a Land mass of 117.8sq.km, is located at the South-East end of Akwa Ibom State. It shares boundaries with mkpat Enin, Ikot Abasi and Ibeno Local Government Areas, and the Atlantic Ocean and Rivers State at the Southern end. The Local Government area has two clans, 70 villages, 10 wards and a human population of 125,000 people (obot, 2006).  The local government area is rich in diverse cultural heritage, such as dances, songs, plays, boat regatta, etc.

The area is rich in petroleum and gas resources. As one of the coastal Local government areas in Akwa Ibom State, Eastern Obolo Local government Area is teeming with marine resources such as fish, oysters, shrimps, etc. It also boasts of timber and arable Land for agricultural purpose. The people of the area are predominantly farmers and traders by occupation and Christians by religion. There are many Pre-Primary, Primary post primary in the area.

3.3 Population of the study

The population of the study comprised all Senior Secondary School Student in the three public Secondary School in Eastern Obolo Local Government Area. The target pollution was all Senior Secondary two (SS11) Students in the study area.

3.4 Sampling and Sampling Technique

A Sample Size of 120 Senior Secondary two (SS11) Students was used for the study. The Sample was drawn from two out of three public Secondary School in the study area. A total of 60 students from two intact classes were selected per school. The Simple random Sampling technique was adopted.

3.5 Instrument for Data Collection

The major instrument used for data collection in the study was “English Language Essay Test (ELET)”. The topic of the essay was “Traditional Marriage Ceremonies in My Village”.

3.6 Validation of Instrument

To ensure the validity of the research instrument, the topic of the essay test was given to the research supervisor and other experts in test and measurement to assess its suitability for the research. Their professional recommendations were well integrated in the final production of the essay test.

3.7 Reliability of the Instrument

 To ensure the reliability of the instrument, the test-retest method of reliability testing was adopted. By this, the test was administered twice to the research subject (students) at an interval of two weeks. The scores of the student in the first and second administration of the test were correlated using Pearson Product Movement Correlation (PPMC) to determine the reliability index. The correlation gave reliability co-efficient of. 73 which indicates positive correlation and confirms the reliable.

problems of Tense Errors in English Essays: A study of the situation among SS3 Students

3.8 Method of Data Collection

The researcher visited the selected School and Solicited for approval from the authorities to use their School for the study. With due approval from the school authorities, the ELECT was administered to the research Subject in their classes through the assistance of the regular English Language teachers. In addition to the instrument given in the ELET, the students were given verbal instruction and clarifications where necessary. After the test, the scripts were retrieved from the for marking, scoring and recording.

3.9  Method of data Analysis

The data generated from the study were analyzed using frequency and simple percentages. This was considered appropriate for the study in order to examine the percentage errors made by students in using the different tenses of verb in their essays.

problems of Tense Errors in English Essays: A study of the situation among SS3 Students

CHAPTER FOUR

          DATA ANALYSIS,  RESULTS   AND DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS.

This chapter Present the result and the discuss of the finding. Data obtained from the study were analyzed using frequency counts and simple percentages. The results are present in the tables as follows:

Presentation of the Results

Table 1: Errors involving the use of present tenses.

Tense	Frequency of  errors	No. of script assessed	Percentage of Occurrence
Simple present tense	14	120	11%
Present Progressive	26	120	21%
Present Perfect	38	120	30%
Present Perfect Progressive	48	120	38%
	126		100%

Result of data analysis in table 1 show that out of 80 Script examine for wrong use of present tense, there were 14 (11%) cases of errors in the use of simple present tense, 26 (21%) errors in the use of present progressive tense, 38 (30%) errors in the use present perfect and 48 (38%) errors in the use of present perfect progressive tense.

From the table, it can be observed that most student have problem in the application of present tense in their essays.

Below are some extract from the students essay on the wrong use of tenses:

1. I always spending my holiday in the home “spending” which is the present continuous tense is used wrongly in the above sentence. The “spend” is supposed to be in the simple present tense without the “ing”. Improper use of present tense where the present progressive is required example:
2. She is come………………
3. I am Written the letter………………….

In sentence (b) because of helping verb ‘is’ the verb ‘come’ should take the ‘ing’ inflection indicating progressive aspect.

The verb ‘written in sentence (c) is in the past participle tense which is supposed to be in the present progressive where the ‘ing’ form of the verb ‘written’ should be used to indicate progressive tense. The correct sentences is I am writing a letter……………………………………

Some example of errors on the use of present perfect tense are:

1. He has ate the food………………………..
2. Ukeme has take the so serious…………………………..

In sentence (a) Instead of the main verb to be in the simple past, it should be in perfective form “eaten” so the sentence should read;

He has eaten the food

In sentences (b) the verb ‘take’ in its simple present is not right to be used because of the perfective nature of the sentence. The correct m is the ‘en’ form of the verb which should be ‘taken’ so that ‘en’ form of the verb should be ‘taken’ so that the sentence should;

Ukeme has taken the serious …………………………………

The wrong use of verb in the present simple form instead of present prefect progressive.

1. I have been attend lesson………………………………………
2. My friend have been attended to party……………… …………..

In sentence (a) arises as a result of the wrong use the verb ‘attend’. The sentence is the progressive aspect because of the use of ‘has been’ Therefore, the verb which follows must be in progressive aspect/ from ‘ing’- instead of ‘en’  that the sentence should read; I have been attending lesson………………………………

The same thing with sentence (b).

Table 2: Errors involving the use past tense.

Tense	Frequency of errors	No. of script assessed	Percentage of occurrence
Simple past tense	26	120	17%
Past progressive	30	120	19%
Past perfect	43	120	28%
Past perfect progressive	57	120	36%
Total	156		100%

Result of data anal is in table 2 indicates that out of a total of 80 script examined for wrong application of future tense, there were 29 (17%) cases of error in the use of past tenses, 30(19%) errors in the use of past progressive tenses, 43 (28%) cases of errors in the use of past perfect tenses and 57 (36%) errors in the use of past perfect progressive tenses.

problems of Tense Errors in English Essays: A study of the situation among SS3 Students

From the table, it can be observed that most student have problem in the application of past in their essays.

Below are some extracts from the students essay on the wrong use of past tense:

1. I spend my holiday……………………………………
2. We come to house……………………………………….
3. I go to Lagos…………………………………..
4. We shall go to our village………………………………………….

All the verbs in the above sentence should be in their tense form.

The following are instances where the present tenses form of the lexical verb were used by the student instead of the progressive to make it past progressive tenses.

1. It was begin to rain
2. I was pray to God
3. Some are play ball

All he verbs in the above sentences should be in their past progressive.

The wrong uses of past progressive in the students’ essay are presented below:

1. I had been attend lesson…………………….
2. I have spending my holiday at home.
3. My elder brother had been sanded me………………

In sentences (a) the verb “attended” is not the correct form but ‘ing” form “attending” should be used so that the sentence should read correctly as I had been attending lesson………………………………..

In sentence (b) the problem arises in the wrong use of “has” with the first person pronoun “I” the right form of the verb should be “had” as had been spending my holiday at home…………………..

The same thing applied to sentences (c) as the underlined verb should have taken the “ing” form- “sending”.

Table 3: Data analysis of errors involving the use of future tense.

Tense	Frequency of errors	No. of script examined	%
Simple future tense	29	120	17%
Future progressive	37	120	22%
Future perfect	40	120	23%
Future perfect progressive	66	120	38%
Total	172		100%

Result of data analysis in table 3 indicates that out of a total of 80 script examined for wrong application of future tense, there were 29 (17%) cases of errors in the use of simple future tense, 37 (22%) cases of error in the use of future progressive, 40 (23%) errors in the use of future perfect tense and 66 (38%) cases of error in the use of future progressive tense.

From the table, it can be observed that most of the student have problem in using future tenses of verb in their essays.

Below are extract from the students’ script on the wrong use of future tense:

The wrong use of simple future tense is shown below:

1. I will came……………………………..
2. I will greeted my father……………………
3. I can bath every night………………………….

The underlined verbs in the sentences above should be in their future tense.

The wrong use of the future progressive tense is presented below:

1. I shall be attended……………………………………….
2. I will be come tomorrow……………………………………………..
3. I will soon be come back.

The correct form of the underlined lexical verb is “attending” “coming” and “be coming”.

The wrong use of the future perfect tense was also noticed. Example:

I will had enough money instead of ‘I will have enough money’.

The wrong use of future perfect progressive

Example:

I will be giving instead of I will be given.

Summary/ Discussion of Findings

The summary and discussion of findings presented in table 1,2 and 3 are given below:

Table 4: The overall analysis of errors in the three tenses studied.

Tense	Frequency of errors	No of script assessed	Percentages of occurrence
Present tense	126	120	28%
Past tense	156	120	34%
Future	176	120	38%
Total	458		100

Result of data analysis in the table 4 shows the summary of finding on the analysis f errors in the three major tenses of tenses of verb committed by the students examined.

From the table, it is obvious that there were a total of 126 (28%) cases of errors in the use of present tenses, 156 (34%) cases of errors in the uses of past tenses. This shows that the students have done well because out 80 scripts examined, a total of 458 errors were made which averages to 3.8 in stances of tenses errors per script.

problems of Tense Errors in English Essays: A study of the situation among SS3 Students

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