The Nature of Learner Language (Chapter 2 Rod Ellis, 1997) Page 15 Septia Kurniawardani 2201410016

Error and Analysis Error Analysis is used for examining errors as a way of investigating learning processes. The study of learner errors showed that although many errors were caused by transferring L1 habits, many more were not. It was found that learners went through stages of acquisition and the nature of errors varied according to their level of development. Error analysis could not show when learners resorted to avoidance and it ignored what learners could do correctly.

Identifying Errors The distinction of error and mistake is also important. Mistakes are slip of the tongue. The speaker who makes a mistake is able to recognize it as a mistake and correct it necessary. The first step to analyze errors is to identify the errors. When we want to identify errors, we have to compare the sentences that learners produce with the correct sentences in the target language.

Describing Errors When all the errors have been identify, they can be described and classified into types. There are several ways to described and classified the errors : classify errors into grammatical categories. identify general ways in which the learners’ utterances differ from the reconstructed target-language utterances.

Classifying errors in these ways can help us to diagnose learners’ learning problems at any one stage of their development and to plot how changes in error patterns occur overtime.

Explaining Errors An error is systematic. It is likely to occur repeatedly and is not recognized by the learner as an error. The learner has incorporated a particular erroneous from the perspective of the target language into his/her own system. Some errors are common only to learners who share the same mother tongue or whose mother tongues manifest the same linguistic property.

Some errors seem to be universal, reflecting learners’ attempts to make the task of learning and using L2 simpler.

Error Evaluation To help learners learn an L2 when there is an error, there is a need to evaluate error. Some errors, known as global errors, violate the overall structure of a sentence and for this reason may make it difficult to process.

Developmental Patterns The Early Stages of L2 Acquisition In such circumstances, some L2 learners, particularly if they are children, undergo a silent period. Silent period is they make no attempt to say anything to begin with. They only learn from listening and reading something.

The second characteristic of early L2 speech is propositional simplification. Learners will begin to learn the grammar of the L2. This raises other question : One concerns the acquisition order, another question concerns the sequence of acquisition of particular grammatical structures.

The order of acquisition Researchers choose a number of grammatical structures to investigate the order of acquisition. Then, they collect samples of learner language and identify how accurately each feature is used by different learners.

Accuracy order is when the researchers rank the features according to how accurately each feature is used by learners. Then, the researchers argue that the accuracy order must be the same as the order of acquisition.

Sequence of acquisition The acquisition of a particular grammatical structure, therefore, must be seen as a process involving transitional constructions. Acquisition follows a U-shaped course of development. U-shaped course of development is learners may display high level of accuracy only to apparently regress.

Some Implications L2 acquisition is systematic and, to a large extent, universal, reflecting ways in which internal cognitive mechanisms control acquisition, irrespective of the personal background of learners or the setting in which they learn.

Variability in learner language Learner language is systematic. That is, a particular stage of development, learners consistently use the same grammatical form, although this is often different from that employed by native speakers.

Learners also vary the linguistic forms they use in accordance with the situational context. Psycholinguistic context is whether learners have the opportunity to plan their production. Variability plays an integrative part in the overall pattern of development, with learners moving through a series of stages that reflect different kinds of variability.

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