An Investigation of Grammar Problems Facing English Language Learners

Eman Elturki, United States

Eman Elturki is a doctoral candidate in the Language, Literacy and Technology program at Washington State University. She is an ESL teacher at the Intensive American Language Center of Washington State University. Elturki is interested in corpus-based research, SLA, and ELT. E-mail: eman.elturki@email.wsu.edu

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Introduction
Literature review
Methodology
Findings
Discussion and implications
References
Appendix A
Appendix B

Introduction

Grammar is one of the most difficult aspects of a foreign language to master. It is defined as “the rules that govern how a language’s sentences are formed” (Thornbury, 2000, p. 1). English grammar has been traditionally viewed as “a system of syntax that decides the order and patterns in which words are arranged in sentences” (Close, 1982, p. 13). It is argued that mastering grammar is a complex process that requires “making a series of decisions about when and why to use one form rather than the other” (Celce-Murcia, 2002, p. 121).Making the right decisions when speaking or writing in the second language (L2) requires grammatical proficiency. Shanklin (1994) suggested that “grammatical proficiency is both an important pedagogical skill and an important part of target language proficiency” (p. 147). What Shanklin means by “grammatical proficiency” is “the ability to make judgments about the acceptability and appropriateness of an utterance with specific reference to grammatical notions” (p. 148). Shanklin distinguished between the grammatical proficiency that native speakers (NSs) have versus the one that nonnative speakers (NNSs) acquire. NSs’ knowledge of grammar is implicit; they are competent in grammar but they do not necessarily know the different rules behind the use of grammar. NNSs, on the other hand, build an explicit awareness of how the different grammar rules are formed. Generating this awareness of grammar knowledge is not an easy process. The variety in forms and usages confuses English as second/foreign language (ESL/EFL) learners. They learn new grammar rules every day, but they have difficulties applying them when they speak or write in English. Shatz and Wilkinson (2010) argue that second language (L2) learners “often cannot express complex thoughts because of their inability to construct complex sentences showing complicated relationships” (p. 165). Shatz and Wilkinson also highlight some of the common grammar problems that face English language learners (ELLs) such as the misuse of prepositions, articles, past tense, and the third-person singular. Nonetheless, it is necessary for ELLs to master grammar in order to be competent in the four language skills because incorrect use or lack of understanding of grammar might hinder communication either in speaking, writing, listening, or reading (Savage, Bitterlin, & Price, 2010). Therefore, teachers should be able to identify the most common grammar problems and try to adapt their teaching. Employing the correct grammar helps ELLs create “clear, well-structured, unambiguous sentences” (Derewianka, 1999, p.3 as cited in Shatz& Wilkinson, 2010, p. 164).

Accordingly, this paper aims at mainly determining the most common grammar problems that upper intermediate ELLs have. A secondary goal is to provide some applications to ESL teachers that might help students overcome these issues. These recommendations are based on studies, methodologies, and theories in Second Language Acquisition (SLA) and English Language Teaching (ELT).

Literature review

Different studies have been conducted to determine and analyze students’ grammatical errors. For instance, in order to investigate the type of corrective feedback that results in the improvement of students’ writing, Bitchener, Young, and Cameron (2005) had to locate the most frequent grammatical errors in the first writing drafts of 53 adult post-intermediate ELLs to be focused on in the study. The researchers found that the three most recurrent grammatical errors, among 27 grammar topics, were prepositions which occurred 29.23% of all errors, the past simple tense (11.96%) , and the definite article which (11.45%). In another study that examined the effect of teacher error feedback on students' self-correction ability, the researchers used writing compositions, a grammar test, and a questionnaire with a total of 102 participants enrolled at a Jordanian university.36.3% of the 102 participants expressed that they have serious problems with grammar which negatively affected their writing (Alghazo, Bani Abdelrahman, & Abu Qbeitah, 2009).

Moreover, propositions are one of the most difficult aspects of English grammar to master by NNSs and “they account for a substantial proportion of all grammatical errors by ESL learners” (Chodorow, Tetreault& Han, 2007, p. 5).In the study of Bitchener and colleagues (2005), errors related to prepositions were accounted by 29% of all the errors that were detected in the writing of 53 post-intermediate ESL learners. Additionally, Dalgish (1985) analyzed sentences taken from the Writing Skills Assessment Test and in-class essays of 350 ESL students enrolled in a writing course at an American university. The analysis was undertaken to determine the most frequent errors in the writings of students from diverse L1ssuch as Chinese, Russian, Vietnamese, Greek, and Polish through applying computer-assisted analysis. A substantial number of the errors were related to the misuse of prepositions followed by subject-verb agreement. In a more recent study (Abushihab, El-Omari&Tobat, 2011) that investigated the most frequent grammatical errors in the writing of 62 Arab EFL learners enrolled in a paragraph writing course at a private Jordanian university, the researchers stated that the largest number of errors were related to prepositions comprising 26% of the total errors followed by morphological errors 24%, articles 21%, verbs 11%, active and passive8 %, and tenses7%.Moreover, Hinkel (2004) claims that “even after many years of L2 learning and use, advanced NNS students may have difficulty with the conventionalized uses of tenses, aspects and the passive voice in written academic discourse” (p.5).

From reviewing the literature, it can be seen that most of the work done to determine students’ problems with grammar was through error analysis (Abushihab et al., 2011; Alghazo et al., 2009; Chodorow et al., 2007; Bitcheneret al., 2005) which can be considered significant in helping researchers, teachers, and curriculum designers have a better understanding of the linguistic areas where ELLs have the most difficulty. However, through reviewing the literature, there has not been much done on students’ attitudes toward different grammar topics, except for some studies that looked at students’ attitudes toward explicit grammar teaching (Ikpia, 2007).Consequently, this paper attempts to acquire some understanding about the grammar topics that students find challenging. Knowing about these challenges would help in “making principled decisions in the classroom concerning the types of skills we wish to impart and the method of imparting them” (Shanklin, 1994, p. 147).Hence, this study aims to answer the following questions: (a) what are the most common grammar problems facing upper-intermediate ELLs? and (b) how can teachers help students overcome those problems?

Methodology

Participants The participants of this study consisted of 61 EFL students who were enrolled in a language center for teaching English to international students in the West Coast of the United States. This language center is specialized in teaching English for students age 18 and above who plan to study towards their undergraduate or postgraduate degrees in the United States. The center can be characterized as heavily academic and intensive. The 61 students who participated in this study were upper-intermediate EFL learners.38 of them were from the Middle East; Saudi Arabia, Oman, Libya, Kuwait, United Arab of Emirates, and Egypt, 21 from Asian countries; China, Korea, Taiwan, and Japan, and 2 participants were from Colombia. All the participants were enrolled in a level 4 grammar class in the aforementioned language center. There were four sections of grammar 4 taught by different teachers. 75% of the participants were males and 25% were females. The ages of the participants ranged from 18 to 39 years old. Additionally, about 57% of the participants have been learning English between 1 to 5 years while about 43% of them between 5 to 10 years.

Instrument

A questionnaire was the main research instrument. Using questionnaires is assumed to be “one of the most common methods of data collection in second language research” (Dörnyei, 2003, p. xiii).The questionnaire (Appendix A) was designed by the researcher who was also one of the teachers of the four grammar class sections. The reasons for self-designing the questionnaire were (1) there were no questionnaires available in the literature that meet the objectives of this study, and (2) it allowed the researcher (or the teacher) to adapt the questionnaire according to the grammar topics covered in level 4 that all the participants had been exposed to. The questionnaire asked the respondents to, first, provide background information about their gender, nationality, and age. Second, they were asked to identify the most challenging grammar points by rating each one on a 1 to 5 Likert-Scale (1 indicates being ‘Very easy’ and 5 ‘Very difficult’).17 grammar topics were listed with examples in case the respondents were not familiar with the technical names. Lastly, they were asked to check one choice that describes their use of grammar in writing and speaking such as Always, Usually, Somewhat, Little, or Never.

Procedures

On the last week of the course and before the final exam, the questionnaire was distributed in the grammar class. This was done in order to ensure that all the topics listed on the questionnaire were covered in class and students had enough exposure to these topics. Each level 4 grammar teacher was given a stack of the questionnaire to be distributed to the students and filled out at the beginning of the class. The teachers explained the purpose of the questionnaire and then left the class to have the students complete the questionnaire and to avoid answering any questions that may affect the participants’ responses. The questionnaires were then collected, coded, and analyzed by the researcher.

Findings

Data was collected through a questionnaire offered to 61 students enrolled in a level 4 grammar class at a language center in the U.S. The participants were asked to rate the grammar topics that they had studied on a 1 to 5 Likert-scale. This was done to determine the most common grammar problems faced by upper-intermediate ELLs and to provide recommendations to English grammar teachers.

The responses to the questionnaire were analyzed using descriptive statistics. For the purpose of this study, the analysis focused on the grammar topics identified as ‘Difficult’ and ‘Very difficult’. The questionnaire revealed the findings displayed in Table 1 and Figure 1.

Table 1 Overall Percentages of the Grammar Topics Rated as ‘Difficult’ or ‘Very Difficult’

Figure 1.The most difficult grammar topics identified by the respondents

It can be seen from Figure 1 that present/future unreal conditions, past unreal conditions, and reported speech (Yes/No questions) were rated ‘Difficult’. Figures 2 and 3 summarize the participants’ responses to how often they apply the grammar topics listed on the questionnaire when they write essays and when they speak.

Figure 2. The percentages of the use of grammar in essay writing

Figure 3.The percentages of the use of grammar in speaking

Discussion and implications

It can be seen from the results that students in such ‘pure’ grammar classes are overwhelmed from the different complex grammatical features that they need to understand and apply. For instance, as was shown in the results, of the 61 participants, 26% rated present/future unreal conditions as difficult and23% considered past unreal conditions as difficult as well. English conditionals have different forms and can express real and unreal conditions. Understanding and mastering such rules is a daunting task to ELLs. English teachers need not only to explain the rules but also to make them meaningful and applicable for the learners. In classes that are designated for teaching grammar, grammar is taught explicitly either by presenting the rules and then giving examples, which is referred to as deductive reasoning, or by providing examples and then students arrive to the rule, which is referred to as inductive reasoning (Thornbury, 2000).Then, some communicative based tasks might be used to practice the rules (Andrews, 2007). In order to help benefit the most from grammar classes; understand the rule and be able to apply it, the researcher sheds light on an approach to explicit grammar teaching the can be used by EFL/ESL teachers of grammar.

One of the examples proposed in the literature for explicit grammar teaching is the use of consciousness-raising(CR) grammar tasks (Ellis, 1995;Fotos, 1993).Ellis (1997) defines a CR task as “a pedagogic activity where the learners are provided with L2 data in some form and required to perform some operation on or with it” (p. 160). He added that the purpose of a CR task “is to arrive at an explicit understanding of some linguistic property or properties of the TL” (p. 160).Thornbury (2000) asserted that the pro-grammar teaching researchers claim that through CR “learning seems to be enhanced when the learners’ attention is directed to getting the forms right, and when the learner’s attention is directed to features of the grammatical system” (p. 24).For instance, in a study conducted by Fotos (1994) with EFL Japanese college students to examine the effectiveness of CR grammar tasks, she found that having the students work together to analyze and discover the rules was effective in generating accurate understanding of the grammatical structures and in using the target language. Accordingly, it can be understood that grammar CR does not only focus on developing awareness of English grammatical features but, also, on improving ELLs’ communicative competence through interacting with each other in different tasks to discover and practice the rules. See (Appendix B) for a sample activity of CR grammar tasks with explanations adopted from (Willis, 1996).

To conclude, this paper tried to gain some understanding of the grammar topics that upper-intermediate ELLs find challenging. The findings revealed that unreal conditions, reported speech, and passive voice were among the grammar topics that participants identified as difficult. In order to assist ELLs in classes that require explicit grammar teaching, this paper had also touched on CR grammar tasks as an approach to grammar teaching that focuses on generating awareness of grammar rules and at the same time developing communicative competence. The findings of this study might not be generalizable because of some limitations. The population was not randomly selected. It was limited to ELLs from level 4who studied at the same language center. Also, the grammar topics listed on the questionnaire were limited to the topics covered in level 4 in this particular center. Other grammatical points were not on the questionnaire such as prepositions and articles which may still pose some difficulties to even proficient EFL/ESL students. Moreover, students’ responses to the questionnaire might not be enough to determine the most challenging English grammar topics because some respondents marked all the listed grammar topics as ‘Very easy’. Accordingly, for a future study, the researcher recommends the following. First, a random selection for the participants should be taken into consideration to yield more generalizable findings. Second, core grammar topics such as articles, prepositions, and pronouns should be included as a part of the questionnaire. Finally, in addition to a questionnaire, another research instrument such as one-to-one interviews, students’ writing samples, or a grammar test can be utilized. This would allow for more reliable results in order to compare, for example, the questionnaire responses to students’ writing samples or answers in the one-to-one interview.

References

Abushihab, I., El-Omari, A. h., &Tobat, M. (2011).An analysis of written grammatical errors of Arab learners of English as a foreign language at Alzaytoonah private university of Jordan,European Journal of Social Sciences, 20(4), 543-552.

Alghazo, K. M.,BaniAbdelrahman, M. S., Abu Qbeitah, A. A. (2009). The effect of teachers’ error feedback on Al-Hussein Bin Talal University students’ self correction ability, European Journal of Social Sciences, 12(1), 145-159.

Andrews, K. L. Z. (2007). The effects of implicit and explicit instruction on simple and complex grammatical structures for adult English language learners,TESL-EJ, 11(2). Retrieved March 3, 2012, from http://tesl-ej.org/ej42/a5.html

Bitchener, J., Young, S., & Cameron, D. (2005).The effect of different types of corrective feedback on ESL student writing,Journal of Second Language Writing, 3, 191-205.

Celce-Murcia, M. (2002).Why it makes sense to teach grammar in context and through discourse. In E. Hinkel& S. Fotos (Eds.), New perspectives on grammar teaching in second language classrooms (pp. 119–134). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.

Chodorow M, Tetreault JR, Han NR (2007). Detection of Grammatical Errors Involving Prepositions.In Proceedings of the 4th ACL- SIGSEM Workshop on Prepositions, 25-30. Lowercase: Detection of grammatical errors involving prepositions.

Close, R.A. (1982). English as a foreign language, London: George Allen and Unwin.

Dalgish.G. (1985).Computer-assisted ESL research and courseware development,Computers and Composition, 2(4), 45-62.

Derewianka, B. (1999). An editorial footnote.Australian Journal of Language and Literacy, 22(1), 22-25.

Ellis, R. (1995). Interpretation tasks for grammar teaching,TESOL Quarterly, 29(1), 87-105.

Ellis, R. (1997). SLA research and language teaching,Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Fotos, S. (1993). Consciousness raising and noticing through focus on form: Gram-mar task performance versus formal instruction,Applied Linguistics, 14, 386- 407.

Fotos, S. (1994). Integrating grammar instruction and communicative language use through grammar consciousness-raising tasks,TESOL Quarterly, 28(2), 323-351.

Hinkel, E. (2004). Tense, aspect and the passive voice in L1 and L2 academic texts,Language Teaching Research, 8(1), 5-29.

Ikpia, V., I. (2007).Theattitudesandperceptionsofnon-nativeEnglishspeakingadultstowardexplicitgrammar,Humanities Review Journal, 5, 1-13.

Savage, K. L., Bitterlin, G., & Price, D. (2010).Grammar matters: Teaching grammar in adult ESL classes, USA: Cambridge University Press.

Shanklin, T. M. (1994). The communication of grammatical proficiency. In Varga L. (Eds.), The Even Yearbook (pp. 147-174).Dept. of Linguistics, SEAS, ELTE.

Shatz, M., & Wilkinson, L.C. (2010).The education of English language learners: Research to practice, New York: The Guilford Press.

Thornbury, S. (2000).How to teach grammar, London: Pearson ESL.

Willis, D. (1996). Consciousness-raising activities in the language classroom, In Willis, J. and Willis, D.(Eds), Challenge and change in language teaching. London: Heinemann.

Appendix A

QUESTIONNAIRE: GRAMMAR PROBLEMS FACING ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS

Level: 4 Gender: Male [ ] Female [ ] Age: ________ Nationality: __________ Native Language: _____________ How long have you been learning English?__________

II. Please check ONE choice that describes your use of grammar in writing and speaking in English: 1) I apply most of the grammar points mentioned above when I write essays. 0 Always 0Usually 0 Somewhat 0 Little 0 Never

2) I apply most of the grammar points mentioned above when I speak. 0 Always 0Usually 0 Somewhat 0 Little 0 Never

Appendix B

(CR grammar task activities adopted from (Willis, 1996)) C-R activities based on a written text

1. List all the phrases to do with aircraft and flying. What word occurs in nearly all these phrases? Why?
2. What does would mean in the second sentence?
3. What about ran in the first sentence? Would used to run give the same meaning? What about jammed and left in the second paragraph? Could used to be used here? 4 Cover your original text. Read the rewritten version of the text below. How has it been changed from the original?

5 Would: Review

Here are some sentences with would which you have seen before. Find sentences in which

1. would is used as a conditional.
2. would is the past tense of will.
3. would means `used to'.

How many sentences are left over?

1. If you were designing a poster which two would you choose?
2. Yes, I would think so.
4. My brother would say, `Oh your mother spoils you.'
5. Would you like to ask us anything about it?
6. Yes, yes, I would agree with that certainly.
7. Not the sort of letter I would like to receive.
8. Would people in your country talk freely about these things?
9. Then we said that we would play hide and seek.
10. Often there would be a village band made up of self-taught players.
11. Some would write their own songs or set new words to tunes.
12. What advice would you give to a young person leaving school or University?
13. That's right, yes, and it would slow the ship down.
14. I never had the light on. My parents wouldn't allow it.
15. But now a new fear assailed him. Would he get caught in the propeller?
16. This brief report would best be understood by a listener who had read the earlier story.

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