Examining and Analyzing Student Errors from the Perspective of a Pedagogical Grammar

Examining and analyzing student errors from the perspective of a pedagogical grammar

Introduction
Throughout this course as a language teacher in London, I have capitalized on Coder’s
theoretical structure of designing learning tasks through errors and mistakes (Corder, 1967).
Focusing on ESL students, this essay looks at how to improve learning through feedback from
tasks. Classroom exercises used in this analysis include tasks on writing clear sentences, and
effective use punctuation in grammar. Knowing that the learners often make these mistakes, I
tried to analyze their writing skills in connection with self-expression. The remedial task
highlighted shows practicing error through designing tasks. The student in focus is a non-native
student from India living in London. Feedback on the learners challenges in speaking, writing,
and reading skills channels the way forward. Since this was about a combination of skills, this
essay describes the learner’s error through strategic communication (Corder, 1981, p.79 ). It
explains the difference between errors and mistakes; it defines inter-language (IR), contrastive
analysis (CA) and Error Analysis (EA). This is an analysis of the learners errors described
through errors for a low beginner’s level in grammar and pronunciation. The tabulated response
shows errors in communication featured in response to spoken English in written form. I chose a
familiar situation presented in three questions.
Errors and Mistakes
In pedagogical perspectives, error analysis describes the errors by defining and analyzing its
context. The first question asked about where the child lived and brings out the interaction with
the learners environment. The second question was about what the child did in a familiar
situation. The questions bring out the social context with simple sentences and personal
information that relate to the individual.

Interlanguage IR factors and Errors
An error is an obvious wrong or knowledge deficiency caused by lack of understanding. For
example, incorrect punctuation and sentence structures by nonnative students who use direct
translation. On the other hand, a mistake represents an improper decision that is accidental. For
example incorrect sentence construction by proficient learners of Language. There are different
types of errors performed in technical operations or procedures. Corder (1975) defines
interlanguage error as second language errors. There are indicators to the fundamental language
skills and the formation of words through the lexico grammatical patterns features the sentence
structure (Dixon, et al., 2012).
From the student’s feedback, it is clear that this student has gaps in answering the questions
appropriately. This is evident in the use of punctuation marks with the first sentence
construction. In this first sentence, the student writes, “when I was child I lived um INDIa and
Now I live um LONDON”. From this sentence, it is clear that the student wants to say, “When I
was a child I lived in India but, now I live in London”. Missing words that connect the sentence
are the definite article “a” and “in”. The definite article ‘a’ often comes before a singular form of
a noun. In this case, the speaker refers to himself as a single person. Following rules when using
articles is important for identity recognition, and description of phrases. As part of understanding
when to use articles, it is important to avoid using articles in plural form and with reference to
general terms (Tribble, 2014). The student needs exposure to more exercises in this respect in
order to master and demonstrate sufficiency in this language. In this sentence the missing
preposition ‘in’ is useful in describing location and the relationship between a noun and pronoun.
The inability to use it means that the noun ‘London’ does not make sense when used with the

verb ‘live’ Failure to use these parts of grammar effectively means lack of fluency in a sentence
(Bardovi-Harlig, 2013).
The significance of learning language is evident in the learner’s application of phrases (coder,
1974). These call for teaching techniques that emphasize on how to deal with different types of
errors including developmental, interference and over-generalization. Learning second language
through circumstances involves the creation of hypothesis in order to enable the learner to
understand the context application. The second sentence is missing the conjunction “and” which
means that the sentence would read, “I was with my brothers and sisters but now I am with my
wife and son...” At this level, the learner should be able to recognize letters of the alphabet, basic
response and directions. Being able to identify and express themselves through questions and the
familiar is important at this level. Following simple models through sentence structures
facilitates for the development of the learner’s ability to read, write, speak and listen effectively
(Mohanan, 2012). In order for this student to comprehend simple sentences, there is need for
more tasks involved in the formation of sentences using the familiar vocabularies.
Contrastive Analysis
Accuracy, correctness and appropriate use of grammatical and lexical constructions represent the
systematic process or contrastive analysis. The structural differences and similarities in language
influence the student’s failure to meet all instructions. The inability to write proper sentences
with conjunctions shows errors in identification and explanation (Corder, 1967). An example is
the misuse of the conjunction ‘because’ in the second sentence. The writer could have written ‘I
was with my brothers and sisters in the past but not anymore because everyone settled in
different places”. Improper use of the phrase complicates the singular and plural form of the
noun ‘place’. An analysis of language construction takes into account the student’s application of