Errors Committed by Grade Ten Students in Writing Letters

Abstract

The research entitled “Errors Committed by Grade Ten Students in Writing Letters” is an attempt to find out the errors that grade ten students commit errors on agreement, articles and cohesion. To carry out this study, the researcher has selected four schools from Gulmi district, i.e. two public schools and two private schools through judgemental sampling and 80 students, 20 from each school, were selected randomly. The main objectives of the research is to find out the secondary level students’ ability to use agreement, articles, and cohesion. The researcher used both primary and secondary sources of data. A set of test items consisting of three letter writing questions was the tool for data collection. The first item was personal letter, the second letter of sympathy and the third letter of application. The research findings show that the total errors committed by the students were nine hundred and forty-four. The students committed four hundred ten errors in agreement, two hundred four errors in articles, and three hundred thirty three errors in cohesion. The students committed the highest number of errors in agreement and the lowest number of errors in articles. The researcher found that the students were comparatively better in the use of articles than in agreement and cohesion. Similarly, the students were better in the use of cohesion than agreement. Likewise, the findings showed that the students of private school were the most able and the students of public school were the least able to use the listed grammatical areas and cohesive devices. This thesis comprises four chapters. Chapter one deals with introduction which consists of general background, review of the related literature, objective of the study, significance of the study. Moreover, general background of the study includes writing skill, components of writing, writing letter, classification of letters, error analysis, stages of error analysis, importance of studying learner’s errors, errors in writing letters. Chapter two deals with the methodology. It consists of sources of data, population of the study, sampling procedures, tools for data collection, process of data collection, and limitations of the study, 9 grammatical items and cohesive device, test item wise errors in each school, school wise errors in test item. Chapter three consists of analysis and interpretation in terms of errors in grammatical item and cohesive devices, test item wise errors in each school, school wise errors in test item. Chapter four incorporates the findings and recommendations of the study. The findings have been outlined on the basis of the analysis and interpretation of the data, and appropriate recommendations for the pedagogical implications have been suggested. This chapter is followed by references and appendices.