IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ibn/eltjnl/v6y2013i10p111.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A Corpus-Based Study on the Use of Past Tense Auxiliary ‘Be’ in Argumentative Essays of Malaysian ESL Learners

Author

Listed:
  • Janaki Manokaran
  • Chithra Ramalingam
  • Karen Adriana

Abstract

This research is a corpus-based study of secondary and college ESL Malaysian learner’s written work by identifying and classifying the types of errors in the Past Tense Auxiliary ‘Be’. This This research studied the past tense auxiliary ‘be’, types of past tense auxiliary ‘be’ errors and frequency of past tense auxiliary ‘be’ errors found in the Malaysian Corpus of Students’ Argumentative Writing (MCSAW) corpus using the WordSmith Tools Version 4.0 and using the Error Analysis (EA) approach. The findings revealed that there are seven types of errors. They are Tense Shift, Agreement, Missing Auxiliary Be, Wrong Verb Form, Addition and Misformation and Misordering. This study can be used as a guide for English Language teachers to identify the most common errors in using the Past Tense Auxiliary ‘Be’ made by the ESL learners and decide what remedial action can be taken to prevent them from making these errors. It can also help teachers improvise and develop materials which are not only more suitable but also cater to the needs of the students. In addition to the materials, teachers can also revise their teaching approaches and strategies to ensure effective teaching and learning of these grammar components.

Suggested Citation

  • Janaki Manokaran & Chithra Ramalingam & Karen Adriana, 2013. "A Corpus-Based Study on the Use of Past Tense Auxiliary ‘Be’ in Argumentative Essays of Malaysian ESL Learners," English Language Teaching, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 6(10), pages 111-111, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:ibn:eltjnl:v:6:y:2013:i:10:p:111
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ccsenet.org/journal/index.php/elt/article/download/30166/17873
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://ccsenet.org/journal/index.php/elt/article/view/30166
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Muneera Muftah & Shameem Rafik-Galea, 2013. "Error Analysis of Present Simple Tense in the Interlanguage of Adult Arab English Language Learners," English Language Teaching, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 6(2), pages 146-146, February.
    2. Norwati Roslim & Jayakaran Mukundan, 2011. "An Overview of Corpus Linguistics Studies on Prepositions," English Language Teaching, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 4(2), pages 125-125, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Darina Lokeman Loke & Juliana Ali & Norin Norain Zulkifli Anthony, 2013. "A Corpus Based Study on the Use of Preposition of Time ‘on’ and ‘at’ in Argumentative Essays of Form 4 and Form 5 Malaysian Students," English Language Teaching, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 6(9), pages 128-128, September.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • R00 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General - - - General
    • Z0 - Other Special Topics - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ibn:eltjnl:v:6:y:2013:i:10:p:111. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Canadian Center of Science and Education (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cepflch.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.