Formal and Communicative Competence in English

Abstract

This thesis entitled "Formal and Communicative Competence in English" is an attempt to identify and compare between formal and communicative competence acquired by the students of grade ten. The study is a survey type of research in nature. The researcher selected five different schools of Kathmandu district, viz. Paramount English Medium Secondary Boarding School, Kuleshwar; Ujjal Shishu Niketan Academy, Panga, Kirtipur; Creative Academy, Kirtipur; Janasewa Higher Secondary School Panga, Kirtipur and Grammar Public Higher Secondary School, Koteshwor. The primary sources of data for the study were the grade ten students of Kathmandu district. The researcher selected 20 students (10 boys and 10 girls) of grade 10 from each school. The test items were the major tools for the data collection. He applied simple random procedures in the collection of data. He spent five days in each school for collecting the data. The students wrote more sentences and committed fewer errors. They committed 1175 errors in written form. However, they spoke fewer sentences and committed more errors in conversation. They committed 1450 errors in conversation. Thus, it was found that students committed more errors in spoken form than in written form. The overall finding was that students had better formal competence in comparison to communicative competence. The research consists of four chapters. Chapter one basically deals with the study in terms of general background, review of the related literature, objectives and significance of the study. Chapter two deals with the methodology that consists of sources of data, population of the study, sampling procedure, tools for data collection, process of data collection and limitations of the study. Chapter three deals with an analysis and interpretation of the collected data. In this chapter, the overall performance of the students, analysis of the errors in conversation and written form, gender wise comparison in written form and conversation and collective comparison between formal and communicative competence are analyzed and interpreted through statistical and descriptive approaches. Then, chapter four consists of the findings, recommendations and pedagogical implications of the study. The references and appendices are the concluding parts of the study.