An analysis on errors of grammatical agreement made by the second grade students of SMP Negeri 10 Surakarta in 2009/2010 academic year

Oleh :
Asfitri - K2205004 - Sekolah Pascasarjana

Abstrak This thesis is written to achieve some objectives as follows: (1) to find the types of error made by the students in using subject-verb agreement, (2) to give the description and distribution of errors made by the students, and (3) to find the causes of error made by the second grade students of SMP Negeri 10 Surakarta. The method used in study is descriptive method. The research was carried out at SMP Negeri 10 Surakarta, on October 1st , 2009. The population of the research is the second grade students of SMP NEGERI 10 Surakarta. There are 39 students used as the sample. Simple random sampling by cluster is used to get the sample. To get the data, the writer uses the test as the instrument, i.e. an essay test. The total number of items is 30. The ten forms of subject verb agreement are observed. The collected data are analyzed by means of error analysis which starts from collecting the data, identifying of errors, classifying of errors based on the type of errors, describing errors on each type and finally analyzing error based on the source of and finally analyzing error based on the source of errors. From the computation of errors, there are 689 errors or 58.89% of the possible errors made by the students in using subject verb agreement (1170) that are classified into four types. They are omission errors, 100 or 14.51% of the total number of errors, addition errors, 77 or 11.17% of the total number of errors, misformation errors, 508 or 73.73% of the total of errors, and misordering errors, 4 or 0.58% of the total number of error. From the four types of error, misinformation errors have the highest number of errors. It happens because the students do not know the system of language or the lack of students’ knowledge so they make errors. The other causes are interlingual and context of learning. The students tended to be influenced by their language rules, because in Indonesia there is no change of verbs to conform to either a singular or a plural subject. The last one it can be caused by misleading explanation from the teacher, the faulty presentation of a structure or words in textbook. Because the total error made by the students is 689 errors or 58.89% out of possible errors (1170), the correct answers are 481 or 41.11%. Referring to Suharsimi’s opinion it is classified as poor level. It means that the students still have problems in these areas. This analysis is very useful for the teacher and students. It helps the students to know their weaknesses and difficulties in determining how the verb should agree with its subject in English sentence. From the number of errors, it can be seen the effectiveness of teacher’s teaching material and teaching technique. Teacher also can plan and determine an effort in teaching process, to minimize the same errors.