Error analysis in writing: a comparative study of Bangla medium and English medium schools in Dhaka

Abstract

This study attempts to find out Bangla and English medium students’ and teacher perception on errors in English writing class and the reasons behind commiting those errors in writing.Around 120 Bangla medium students , 120 English medium students and 8 teachers were the participants in the survey.The researcher employed a mixed method of analyzing data consisting of qualitative and quantitative data analysing methods.Corders’ (1974) error analysis model has been followed for error analysis in this study.The result suggests that L1 interference ,carelessness ,ignorance of rules ,lack of motivation all are sources of errors in writing. It is also suggested that Bangla medium students have more errors rather than English medium students. From the findings ,it was observed that many students had errors in sentence construction, subject Verb Agreement ,article, verb, preposition, tense ,spelling error and they use of capital letters instead of small letters. Basically,this research will help English teachers to know why the writing errors occur and also help them to improve their teaching material and design lesson plans according to the students’ needs.