INSTITUTO SUPERIOR

JOSEFINA CONTTE
PROFESORADO DE INGLS
UNIDAD CURRICULAR: Adquisicin de Segundas LenguasCiencias del Lenguaje
PROFESORAS: Prof. Mariana Sottile y Prof. Valeria Roldn
CICLO LECTIVO 2016
TERCER AO
FECHA:
TRABAJO DE INVESTIGACIN FINAL
INTEGRANTES DEL GRUPO:

Mara Sol Torres

DNI 39190126

INTRODUCTION
According to Rod Ellis, SLA (Second Language Acquisition) is the systematic study of
how people learn a language other than their mother tongue, inside or outside the
context of a classroom. SLAs main goal is to describe what learners do when trying to
learning a L2 (second language). Along with the last idea, SLA seeks to explain why
learners acquire the L2 the way they do in terms of internal and external factors.
In order to achieve these aims, researchers collect samples of learner language, that is
to say, the learners oral and written productions in the L2 and analyze them cautiously.
Consequently, these samples provide information about what learners know about the
target language.
In general, SLA has focused in the formal features of language that linguists have
focused on. Most often, the emphasis is placed on exploring how the learners ability to
produce grammar structures of the L2 develops over time.
The purpose of this report is, in a broad form, to describe and explain the process of
acquisition of the question form of the past simple tense. Precisely, this research
examines the errors made by a group of learners of English as a L2 with Spanish as
their L1 when producing questions in the past simple tense.
Upon reflecting on the processes carried out in the acquisition of this grammatical
structure, some questions were posed: is the acquisition process of the question form
of past simple the same in the L1 as in the L2? What factors influence the making and
the type of errors the selected subjects made as regards this grammatical structure?
In order to carry out this analysis of errors, first, a theoretical framework as regards the
topic will be presented. After this, it will follow the description of the methodology used
for explaining the errors. Finally, the analysis itself will be carried out.

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Interlanguage
Interlanguage is defined by Selinker (1972) as the separateness of a second language
learners system that has a structurally intermediate status between the native and
target languages. It is a system based upon the best attempt of learners to bring order
and structre to the linguistic stimuli surrounding them.
Intralingual errors
These errors are produced by intralingual transfer. They are generalization within the
target language when the student is more advanced in the acquisition of the second
language. Moreover, these kind of errors may be due to the creative construction of a
system in which learners are consciously testing hypotheses about the target language
from a number of possible sources of knowledge. Therefore, intralingual errors result
from the attempts of the learners to discover the structure of the language being
learned.
Interlingual errors
These errors occur due to interlingual or L1 transfer from their native language. L1
transfer refers to the influence that the learners L1 exerts over the acquisition of an L2.
There are two types of L1 transfer to the learners acquisition process of an L2:
negative transfer and positive transfer. The former is one of the sources of error in
learner language whereas the latter can facilitate the acquisition of the L2.
Error analysis approach
During the 1960s Corder developed an approach to analyze learners errors which he
termed Error Analysis. It aimed to discover and analyze the different the different kinds
of errors in order to understand second language learning and acquisition. In the
1970s, Error Analysis supplanted Contrastive Analysis, which sought to predict and
describe the errors that learners make by identifying the linguistic differences between
their L1 and the target language.
Global errors

Instances of deviant language in which it is difficult to locate the error: sometimes a

whole sentences or a paragraph is involved.
Local errors
Instances of deviant language in which it is easy to identify what portion of speech is
being affected.
Omission
Certain linguistic form may be omitted by the learner because of their complexity in
production. It should be noted that this phenomenon is not restricted to foreign
language learners but is observed even with native speakers. The difference, however,
is that native speakers tend to follow existing conventions while foreign language
learners do not.
Addition
Learners not only omit elements that they regard as redundant but they also add
redundant elements.
Selection
Learners make errors in pronunciation, morphology, syntax, and vocabulary due to the
selection of the wrong phoneme, morpheme, structure or vocabulary item.
Ordering
Misordering can occur in pronunciation by shifting the position of certain phonemes.
Productive errors
Occur in the language learners utterances.
Receptive errors
Result in the listeners misunderstanding of the speakers intentions.
Questions- fronting the tensed auxiliary
The rule for forming the question is: The tensed auxiliary verb moves in front of the
subject.
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The question is: what structural position does the tensed auxiliary move to?

There are two new nodes here (in bold). First, there is an S node. This is called S-bar.
Then there is a C node. C is for Complementiser. The complementiser position is:
sister of S and daughter of S-bar (S). So, the structural position that a fronted auxiliary
moves to is the complementiser position.

SUBJECTS ANALYZED
The subjects analyzed were a group of 18 people belonging to the regular course of
English 21era at Instituto Superior Josefina Contte whose L1 was Spanish. Their
errors were taken over a period of six classes of an hour and half each. The students
were in between 13 to 14 years old. Of the 18 students, seven were boys and 11 were
girls. Their level of proficiency was elementary. The learning context was that of a
formal instruction on a private institute.

METHODOLOGY
1) Identifying errors
The first step in analyzing learner errors is to identify them. This is in fact easier said
than done. To identify errors we have to compare the sentences learners produce with
what seem to be the normal or correct sentences in the target language which
correspond with them. Sometimes, however, learners produce sentences that are
possible target-language sentences but not preferred ones.
2) Describing errors
Once all the errors have been identified, they can be described and classified into
types. There are several ways of doing this. One way is to classify errors into
grammatical categories. We could gather all the errors relating to verbs and then
identify the different kinds of verb errors. Another way might be try to identify general
ways in which the learners utterances differ from the reconstructed target-language
utterances. Such ways include omission, misinformation and misordering. Classifying
errors in these ways can help us to diagnose learners learning problems at any one
stage of their development and, also, to plot how changes in error patterns occur over
time.
3) Explaining errors
The identification and description of errors are preliminaries to the much more
interesting task of trying to explain why they occur. Errors are, to a large extent,
systematic and, to a certain extent, predictable. Errors are not only systematic; many of
them are also universal. However, some errors are common only to learners who share
the same mother tongue or whose mother tongues manifest the same linguistic
property.
Errors, the, can have different sources. Some errors seem to be universal, reflecting
learners attempts to make the task of learning and using the L2 simpler. Learners
commit errors of omission. They also overgeneralize forms that they fin easy to learn
and process (overgeneralization). Other errors, however, reflect learners attempts to
make use of their L1 knowledge. These are known as transfer errors.
4) Error evaluation
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There is a need to evaluate errors. Some errors can be considered more serious than
others because they are more likely to interfere with the intelligibility of what someone
says. Teachers will want to focus their attention on these. Some errors, known as global
errors, violate the overall structure of a sentence and for this reason may make it
difficult to process. Other errors, known as local errors, affect only a single constituent
in the sentence and are less likely to create any processing problems.

ERROR ANALYSIS