CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1. Background of the Study

Writing is a group of letters or symbols written or marked on a surface

as a means of communicating ideas by making each symbol stand for an idea,

concept, or thing, by using each symbol to represent a set of sounds grouped

into syllables, or by regarding each symbol as corresponding roughly or exactly

to each of the sounds in the language (Collins English dictionary). Writing is

the most difficult one. Because it requires demonstrating the control of a

number of variables simultaneously; they are control of content, format,

sentence structure, vocabulary, punctuation spelling, etc. Nunan (1989: 35)

points out, “It has been argued that that learning to write fluently and

expressively is the most difficult of the macro skills for all language users

regardless of whether the language in question is first, second, or foreign

language.” Another opinion comes from Heaton (1989: 138). He explain that

the writing skills are complex and sometimes difficult to teach, requiring

mastery not only of grammatical and rhetorical devices but also of conceptual

and judgment elements. It means that ability to write needs a special skill and

process in organizing language material by using learners’ own words and ideas

and to be a good composition.

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According to me, most of the students find difficulties, especially in

applying grammar in their speaking and writing. So, they will make mistakes

and errors. It describes that learners’ ability in English is still poor and they

need to be taught more effectively.

The learners often make mistakes and even errors in learning English,

especially when they try to arrange sentences or use tenses in their writing. As a

result, they will write sentences ungrammatically. Actually, ungrammatical

sentences have great influence when the learners are writing sentences. That can

be influenced by the first language which is different from the second language

in written form. Therefore, the first language can interfere learners in the

process of the second language. Abbort (1981: 216) wrote,

“For pedagogic purposes, teachers and others more likely to be concerned with the performances of whole groups and especially with the problems they have in commons. For these purposes, we need to ensure that the data comes from fairly homogeneous groups as regards mother tongue, age, previous teaching, and if possible, intelligence. Perhaps the most important of these factors is the mother tongue, particularly if phonological errors arte being studied

From the statement above, it can be seen that errors in learning a second

language are caused by the interference of the learners’ mother tongue. In other

words, errors made by the learners sometimes are caused by use of the first

language.

Students’ errors are very useful ways of showing what they have and

have not learnt. A study of learners’ errors describes what problems the learners

are having now and help the teacher to plan remedial work. In addition, the

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teacher should not see negatively as a sign of failure but see them positively as

an indication of what the teacher still needs to teach. So, if the teacher tries to

prevent students; errors, he/she never finds out what they do not know.

To make a good composition, the students must be able to master and

apply the structure correctly, especially about tense used. In this case, the tense

used is simple present tense. If they cannot do that, of course, errors will arise.

Automatically their writing will cause misunderstanding for the readers,

because the readers cannot receive the massage or expression of their idea well.

Most of the students still find problems in using it, because of their limited

mastery, especially the conditional time that usually use in simple present tense.

Therefore the writer wants to analyze the errors made by the students and tries

to give solutions to overcome their problems. He chooses the title “An Analisys

Students’ Errors in Using Simple Present Tense in Writing Descriptive Case

Study for Eighth Year SMPN Al-Ikhlas Taliwang Academic Year 2012-2013.”

1.2. Statement of the problems

Based on the background of the study there are problems, which can be

formulated after identifying the type errors, omitted among the eighth year

students of SMPN Al-Ikhlas Taliwang.

The problem can be stated as follows:

- What type of errors made by students on the use simple present tense

among students of the eighth year SMPN Al-Ikhlas Taliwang ?

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- What analysis to be described on the frequency occurrence of the errors

made among the students of the eighth year students of SMPN Al-Ikhlas

Taliwang on the use simple present tense ?

1.3. Purpose of the Study

This study has their purpose relating to the formulation of the problems

above. They can be stated as follows:

- To find out type of error, made among the students of the eighth year

students of SMPN Al-Ikhlas Taliwang on the use simple present tense.

- To find out the frequency occurrence of the errors made, among the students

of the eighth year students of SMPN Al-Ikhlas Taliwang on the use simple

present tense.

1.4. Limitation of the Study

In this study, the researcher used a test to find the students errors and

give some material to the students. The researcher only took students who were

in the eighth year students at SMPN Al-Ikhlas Taliwang.

The student did not concentrate on all structure/tense problems found in

students doing, since the researcher limited his study in the problem of tense

especially simple present tense.

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1.5. Significance of the Study

The use of the result of the study has great sign finance:

1.5.1 For teacher:

- Teacher will know the errors that usually make among students on

the use of simple present tense.

- Teacher will be able to predict the errors that probably will happen to

the students so that he will be able to overcome the troubles.

1.5.2 For the students:

- The students will be able to study the simple present tense more

easily.

1.6. Definition of key terms

To avoid misunderstanding of the concepts used in this study, some

definitions are provided as the following:

- Errors are flowed side learned speech or writing they are those parts of

conversation or writing that deviated from some selected of nature language

performance.

- Mistakes are due to memory, lapses, physical static such as tiredness and

psychological condition such as strong emotion of the language the learner

is making errors are systematically made, it is due to do the learners still

developing the knowledge of the target language rule system.

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- Simple present tense; the simple present is indicates that usually use the

conditional time to tell our habitual activity.

- Native language, the learner’s first language or mother tongue, in this case

Bahasa Indonesia.

- Target language, the new language the learners are learning, in this case

English.

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