Phân tích những lỗi và khó khăn trong việc sử dụng mệnh đề quan hệ của học sinh lớp 11 tại một trường cấp 3 ở hà nội

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study is to analyze errors and difficulties in using relative clauses by grade 11 students at a high school in Hanoi.. Types of difficulties encountered by s

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

PHẠM THU HẰNG

AN ANALYSIS ON ERRORS AND DIFFICULTIES IN USING RELATIVE CLAUSES AMONG GRADE 11 STUDENTS AT A HIGH

SCHOOL IN HANOI ( h n t h nh ng l i v kh kh n trong vi s ng m nh qu n h

h sinh l p t i m t tr ng p i)

M.A THESIS – Type 1

Field: English Language Teaching Methodology

Code: 8140231.01

HANOI – 2021

i

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

FACULTY OF POSTGRADUATE STUDIES

PHẠM THU HẰNG

AN ANALYSIS ON ERRORS AND DIFFICULTIES IN USING RELATIVE CLAUSES AMONG GRADE 11 STUDENTS AT A HIGH

SCHOOL IN HANOI ( h n t h nh ng l i v kh kh n trong vi s ng m nh qu n h

h sinh l p t i m t tr ng p i)

M.A THESIS – Type 1

Field: English Language Teaching Methodology

Code: 8140231.01 Supervisor: Asso i te rofessor Võ Đ i Quang, Ph.D

HANOI – 2021

i

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

I hereby state that I, Pham Thu Hang, being an MA candidate of the Faculty of Post Graduate Studies, VNU University of Languages and International Studies certify

my authorship of the thesis submitted today entitled:

“An analysis on errors and difficulties in using relative clauses among grade 11 students at a high school in Hanoi”

The thesis is my own work and the substance of the thesis has not, wholly or in part, been submitted for a degree to any other universities or institutions

Except where the reference is indicated, no other person’s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis

Signature:

Date: June 2021

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study is to analyze errors and difficulties in using relative clauses by grade 11 students at a high school in Hanoi Both qualitative and quantitative methods were used to analyze data, which was collected from tests and interviews as data collection instruments 100 11st grade students at a high school in

Ha Noi were employed to join in the research The researcher used percentage formula to calculate students’ errors in the relative clauses they use The findings show that all students participated in the research committed at least one error In particular, the author counted total 421 times commiting errors among all these kinds of errors, in which confusion between "who" and "whom" occupied the highest frequency of errors (109 times corressponding to 25.89%) Misuse of relative pronouns for people and lifeless things ranked approximately 20.90% among the errors Wrong use of relative pronouns in defining and non-defining relative clauses occupies 18.05% of the errors Moreover, the learners also committed other kinds of errors, including wrong use of commas, lack of concord between verb and subject, the irreplaceability of some relative pronouns, and omission of some relative pronouns Along with this, the difficulties encountered by the learners include the language phenomena not existing in students’ mother tongue, learning strategies, motivation, teaching methods, and lack of awareness related to background knowledge essentially important for the well-formed structuring of relative clauses

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

First of all, I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to my supervisor, Associate Professor Vo Dai Quang, Ph.D., for his great support, invaluable guidance, criticism and encouragement throughout the study Without his help, my thesis could not have been accomplished

My deep gratitude also goes to Dr Huynh Anh Tuan, Dean of Post-graduate Studies Department, VNU University of Languages and International Studies, and other lecturers and staff members of the department for their help

I am also grateful to my friends and colleagues for their constructive comments and criticisms Additionally, I would like to express my thankfulness to all the students from a high school in Hanoi for their active participation in my study

Last but not least, I wish to express my special thanks to my husband and all the members of my family, who always give me their love, support and encouragement Without their support, I could have never gone this far in the pursuit of knowledge and advancement for my life time career

TABLE OF CONTENTS

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP i

ABSTRACT ii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS iii

LIST OF TABLES vii

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS viii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Rationale of the thesis 1

1.2 Scope of the thesis 2

1.3 Objectives of the thesis 2

1.4 Research questions 2

1.5 Significance of the thesis 3

1.6 Structural organization of the thesis 3

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 3

2.1 Theoretical background 4

2.1.1 Relative clauses 4

2.1.2 Errors and mistakes 5

2.1.3 Difficulties in learning relative clauses 8

2.2 Previous studies 8

2.2.1 Major research works related to the thesis topic 8

2.2.2 The gaps left for further research to be dealt with in this thesis 10

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 11

3.1 Research setting 11

3.2 Research design 11

3.3 Research methods 12

3.4 Participants 12

3.4.1 Population 12

3.4.2 Sample 13

3.5 Data collection instruments 13

3.5.1 Test 13

3.5.2 Interview 14

3.6 Research procedure 15

3.7 Data analysis techniques 15

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION 16

4.1 Findings of the study 16

4.1.1 The errors related to relative clause uses by students at a high school in Hanoi 16

4.1.2 Types of difficulties encountered by students at a high school in Hanoi in learning how to use relative clauses in English 28

4.2 Discussion 32

4.2.1 The errors of using relative clauses made by the students at a high school in Hanoi 32

4.2.2 Types of difficulties in using relative clause and recommended solutions 33

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION 36

5.1 Recapitulation of the results 36

5.1.1 Concluding remarks on types of errors 36

5.1.2 Concluding remarks on the learners’ difficulties in using relative clauses 37

5.2 Pedagogical implications and recommendations 38

5.3 Limitations 39

5.4 Suggestions for further research 39

REFERENCES 40

APPENDICES………I

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1 The errors of relative clauses made by the students at a

high school in Hanoi Page 16

Table 2 Examples about confusion between “who” and “whom” Page 19 Table 3 Examples about the errors of wrong use of relative

pronouns to refer to people and lifeless things Page 21

Table 4 Examples about the errors of wrong use of relative

pronouns in defining and non-defining relative clauses Page 22

Table 5 Examples about confusedness when using commas in

relative clauses Page 24

Table 6 Examples about the errors related to subject-verb concord

in relative clauses Page 25

Table 7 Examples about the errors related to the irreplaceability

of some relative pronouns Page 26

Table 8 Examples about the errors related to omission of some

relative pronouns Page 27

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

EFL: English as a Foreign Language

RC: Relative clauses

1

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

According to Frank Palmer (1972), grammar occupies a central role and is of immense importance in language teaching and learning Good grammar enables English speakers to communicate well with each other in an understandable way; whereas, poor grammar can create misunderstanding in both oral and written language Mastering correct grammar is the key to a great leader and helps learners

to work their way up the career ladder in the future

In teaching English, a clause is one of the basic and crucial grammatical constructions that is frequently used It is made up of a group of words which comprise a subject and a verb phrase There are two types: independent clauses (also known as main clauses) and dependent ones (also called subordinate clauses)

A clause can be linked to other clauses to create complex sentences or serve as a simple sentence itself To be more precise, a main clause can stand alone and function as a complete and meaningful sentence; whereas, a subordinate one must depend on the main clauses for meaning and cannot form a sentence on its own

One of the clauses that is included in the school curriculum and of great significance is relative clause It is common knowledge in English language studies that the relative clause can be regarded as one effective way for making sentences more condense as regards information load to be conveyed During the time working as a teacher of English at a high school in Hanoi, I can see that many of my students do commit errors in using relative clauses With a view to helping my students improve their ability and skill in using relative clauses, I made up my mind

to go further into this issue of interest I decided to choose this topic for my

research The name of the research is “An n lysis on errors and difficulties in using rel tive l uses mong gr e stu ents t high s hool in noi”, with

the aim to explore the errors and difficulties that language learners face, then find out the solutions to the identified problems

Relative clauses have long been an essential part of English teaching syllabus at all high schools in Vietnam They are considered as one of key grammatical constructions that receive a lot of attention from both teachers and students during the journey of acquiring the target language This thesis is confined to scrutinizing the errors and difficulties encountered by learners of English in the use of relative clauses The study is carried out at a high school in Hanoi The participants are 160 students of grade 11th from 4 classes at a high school in Hanoi

The aim intended for this thesis is to help students improve knowledge and skill in using relative clauses In line with this purpose, two objectives have been set forth for the research These are as follows:

(i) Identifying different types of errors made by students at a high school in Hanoi

in using relative clauses

(ii) Pointing out the causes of the errors and difficulties encountered by students at a high school in Hanoi in using relative clause

These research objectives can be elaborated into the following research questions: (i) What are the types of errors made by students at a high school in Hanoi in using relative clauses?

(ii) What are the difficulties encountered by students at a high school in Hanoi in using relative clause?

1.5 Significance of the thesis

This study will be beneficial to both teachers and students in the teaching and learning of a foreign language First and foremost, the research supplies educators with valuable information regarding the problems encountered by learners in using relative clauses On account of this, teachers can conduct a comprehensive evaluation of their work and revision of class activities to overcome these difficulties Secondly, the study, to some certain extent, will help students understand why they commit errors, and it will also help teachers to provide instructions on how to correct those errors Last but not least, this paper will provide

an invaluable source for any future research for linguists and educators

This paper consists of 5 main chapters as follows:

- Chapter 1, Introduction, provides a brief presentation on research rationale, scope,

objectives and structural organization of the thesis

- Chapter 2, Literature Review, provides a review of the theoretical background

essential for the research and a review of previous work related to the research area

of the thesis

- Chapter 3, Methodology, is about research design, participants, and data collection

instruments which includes tests and interviews, data collection procedures, and data analysis

- Chapter 4, Findings and Discussion, offers a presentation of data analysis and the

findings obtained Discussion and necessary clarification are also provided for the study findings

- Chapter 5, Conclusion, provides a recapitulation of the main research theses,

implications and limitations of the study The central sub-section in this chapter is spared for the concluding remarks on each of the research objectives set forth

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter is concerned with the theoretical background needed for the research Also, the gap left for further research in this thesis is identified via some reviewing

of previous research works related to the research area of the thesis

2.1.1 Relative clauses

Clause is a part of the sentence A clause has the structure of a complete sentence The relative clause is employed as a post modifier to give more information about the referent of the noun preceding it Their purpose is to avoid the repetition of certain words previously mentioned in the sentence For instance:

They are the people who bought our house

Relative clauses contain relative pronouns and relative adverbs Relative pronouns

include who, whose, whom, which, that Who is used as subject and stands for people Which is used as subject or object and stands for things or animals Whose is used as possessive pronoun Whom is used as object and stands for people That is

used as subject and stands for both people and things

Meanwhile, relative adverbs contain why, when, where Why substitutes for the reason Where substitutes for the place and when substitutes for time

Relative clauses are of two types: non-defining and defining clauses Defining relative clauses provide information essential for identifying the head noun referent Commas or parentheses are not used to separate a defining relative clause from the rest of the sentence For instance:

The woman who is buying the black television over there is my mother

Non-defining relative clauses are a non-essential part in a sentence, which supply extra information Commas or parentheses are used to separate non-defining relative clauses from the rest of the sentence For instance:

Mary, whom I accidentally met yesterday at the meeting, is my employer‟s

daughter

Furthermore, there exist one more type of relative clauses that do not refer to a preceding noun, but to a whole complete sentence or clause They are known as sentential relative clauses, which begin with “which” after a comma For instance:

My father left the house without saying goodbye, which made my mother really angry

In addition, there are two forms of relative clauses: full form and reduced form Relative clauses in full form are introduced by a relative pronoun, and the other type is that relative pronouns are left out and the verb in relative clause is often in –ing or –ed form

Relative clauses make a tremendously useful contribution to both literary and everyday language by eliminating the repetition of certain words in written texts as well as daily conversations Thus, they prove highly practical and enormously helpful for students to communicate effectively with foreigners and produce well-written works As stated by Azar (2002), communicative competency of learners can be substantially enhanced for those who successfully utilize relative clauses Moreover, students can better comprehend unfamiliar words and complex texts with the presence of relative clauses

2.1.2 Errors and mistakes

2.1.2.1 Definitions

Learning a second language is a continuous and lengthy process, in which students are likely to commit errors in either speaking or writing According to James (1998,

p 56), errors are defined as the deviations from linguistic norms of the language to

be learnt Errors are apparently inevitable on the journey of achieving the target language and become a common issue for all learners As stated by Brown (2000, p

143), errors show the students’ competency in using the second language These are referred to as competency errors

There is a distinction between error and mistake Corder (1967, p 164) stated that

mistakes are usually slips and lapses in performance Students know the correct form but makes mistakes when they are nervous or tired Therefore, they can realize and fix the mistake by themselves Whereas, errors are defined as gaps in the learners’ target language, thus self-correction cannot occur

2.1.2.2 Types of errors

There are three types of errors, namely semantic errors, syntactic errors, and lexical errors

A semantic error occurs when it violates the rules of meaning of a natural language

or a programming language In this study, a sematic error means a kind of grammatical errors that students usually make in using relative clause

Syntactic errors often occur to English learners, especially learners at poor English proficiency Syntactic errors occur to the wrong arrangement of words in sentences, clauses, and phrases Many teachers and researchers found that many learners in Vietnam have difficulties in writing syntactically correct English sentences The reason can be due to their exposure to the second language less than the exposure to their mother tongue (Vietnamese)

According to Hikmah (2019, pp 48-55), more frequent syntactic errors in writing are the lack of the concord between subject and verb, the usage of who or whom in relative clause, sentence structure errors, and word order errors, etc

In this research, syntactic errors can be also classified in another way such as wrong use of commas, lack of concord between verb and subject, the irreplaceability of relative pronouns, etc

According to Hernandez (2011, p 263), lexical errors are related to errors of vocabulary For example, learners can choose the wrong word for the meaning that

they want to express Llach (2015, p 109) indicated that “when inappropriate lexical choices are made, they can lead directly to misunderstanding of the message, or at least to an increase in the burden of interpreting the text” In this research, lexical errors are such wrong use of who or whom

Types of errors in using relative clauses include confusion between "who" and

"whom", wrong use of relative pronouns to refer to people and lifeless things, wrong use of relative pronouns in defining and non-defining relative clauses, confusedness when using commas in relative clauses, lack of concord between verb and subject, some relative pronouns are irreplaceable and omission of some relative pronouns

2.1.2.3 The causes of errors

According to Richard (1980, p 59), there exist two main causes of errors during the process of second language acquisition They are interlingual transfer and intralingual transfer

Firstly, students’ mother tongue exerts a profound impact on second language learning Various aspects of their native language such as culture, patterns, etc can interfere or hinder the process of obtaining the rules of the target language Errors occurring due to the influence of learners’ mother tongue is called interlingual transfer

Secondly, intralingual transfer results from the misuse or faulty of the target language Learners make these errors due to inadequate understanding of the second language; thus, intralingual errors also demonstrates the students’ competency

2.1.2.4 Error analysis

With regard to applied linguistics and second language acquisition, error analysis is regarded as a crucially important field It analyzes the causes of errors, which are either natural or due to other factors as well as the results or effects of the failures during the learning process (James 1998, p 23) As claimed by Corder (1981, p

169), the aims of error analysis include diagnostic and prognostic Firstly, it diagnoses the problems encountered by learners so as to yield a detailed insight into the level of understanding students have reached at a given point of time Secondly, error analysis is prognostic since educators can alter methods and approaches as well as teaching materials to cope with the difficulties experienced by their learners

2.1.3 Difficulties in learning relative clauses

Students experience difficulties during the process of learning relative clauses Some problems come up as there is no equivalence in the target language (English) and mother tongue (Vietnamese) Relative clause is not popular in Vietnamese language According to Dang Bich Ngoc (2010), in English, the relative clauses consist of two types: defining relative clause and non-defining, whereas in Vietnamese, none of them exists She also said that relative clauses in English, in terms of structure, have relative pronouns while in Vietnamese, there is no equivalent concept for “relative pronoun” However, Vietnamese still has some

pronouns called: “đại từ” such as: tôi, chúng tôi, cô ấy, anh ấy, etc Because of the

marked distinction in the existence of relative clauses between English and Vietnamese, students struggle to understand and master these grammatical constructions Moreover, difficulties in using relative clauses can arise from students’ motivation, educational background and teaching method according to Wulandari (2018)

2.2.1 Major research works related to the thesis topic

In the study named “An analysis on students‟ errors and difficulties in using

relative clause”, Zulkarnein (2016) analyzed the students’ errors on using relative

clause In details, this research is aimed to explore the errors made by the EFL students in using relative clauses and to find out the reasons leading to making the

errors A descriptive research was employed in this study The sample of the research included 20 students of 8th semester of English department at UIN Ar-Raniry In order to explore the errors, the researcher used the paper test to collect data And in order to understand the causes of making errors, the researcher used semi-structured interviews 8 students who made most errors would be chosen to take part in interviews The findings presented that the students made most of the errors on relative clause “whose” (88.75% of the average error); followed by relative clause “whom” (60%) The result also showed that some factors leading to the errors included confusion in using relative clause, overemphasis on language forms, lacking in vocabulary mastery and language transfer problem

In the research “An analysis of students‟ error in using relative clause”, Kusdianty

(2016) also investigated error types of relative clause and focuses on error of selection items of relative pronoun The research did not focus on all types of relative pronouns, just focused on the students’ errors in using relative pronoun which included who, whom, which and whose The research also focused on the causes of the students’ errors A descriptive qualitative method was employed in the research Two instruments were used to collect data, including observation and interview Observation aimed to give relative pronoun test in report text; and interview aimed to gather information about the causes of the students made errors The participants of the research included 20 students from class XI IPA 1 and XIPA

2 of SMAN 1 Garawangi The results showed that 45 errors corresponding to 33.6% made by the students in relative pronoun “who” The error in using relative pronoun

“whom” were 32 errors (23.9%) The errors in using relative pronoun “which” were

29 errors or 21.6% The errors in using relative pronoun “whose” with number 28 errors or 20.9% The errors caused by the influences of intralingual transfer or most

of the students didn’t understand about the material, and interlingual transfer or the influences from their mother tongue in pronouncing and writing relative pronoun

In “Students‟ difficulties in using relative pronoun of adjective clause at the tenth

grade of SMA DHRMA WANITA 4 TAMAN”, Wulandari (2018) analyzed the

students’ difficulties in using relative pronoun of adjective clause and to find out the factor causing students’ difficulties in learning adjective clause A descriptive qualitative method was used to present the students’ difficulties and the causes of difficulties in learning adjective clause 57 10th grade students at SMA Dharma Wanita 4 Taman, Sidoarjo academic year 2017/2018 were chosen to be the sample

of the research Three instruments of the research were documentation, interview, and questionnaire The document and interview were used to obtain the data about the students’ difficulties in using relative pronoun of adjective clause Questionnaire was used to obtain data about the causes of making difficulties in learning adjective clause Interview was also done with an English teacher The result revealed that three difficulties encountered by the participants were comprehension, using unnecessary pronoun, and using the wrong relative pronoun In details, the difficulties were the problems of getting in using wrong relative pronoun, in comprehension of adjective clause, and using unnecessary pronoun The finding also showed that there were 3 factor causing students difficulties; motivation, teaching method, and educational background

2.2.2 The gaps left for further research to be dealt with in this thesis

Using relative clause is always a difficult matter for many students because of its complexity Previous studies pointed out some errors in using relative clauses and some factors accounting for the errors However, it is clear that previous studies cannot cover all errors in using relative clause in English writing And very limited research in Vietnam has been carried out on this problem Therefore, this research will point out other errors in using relative clauses At the same time, the present research will put forward some solutions to help students avoid committing the errors in using relative clause

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter offers a fairly detailed description of the methodology employed for the thesis The description includes research setting, research design, research approach, participants, data-related issues and specific data analysis techniques

3.1 Research setting

The research was conducted at a high school in Hanoi

English is one of the compulsory subjects, which is included in the high school curriculum It is taught in classrooms with seven lessons: Getting Started, Language, Reading, Speaking, Writing, Communication, Looking Back within 37 weeks

Relative clauses are first introduced to students in textbook English 7, and then they are re-taught in textbook English 11 They are one of the most important grammatical structures and frequently used in both written and oral language Relative clauses provide additional information to sentences, making it more interesting and relevant to listeners This grammatical construction proves to be tremendously useful for students in their early English studies Firstly, these clauses help learners to understand the meaning of difficult or unfamiliar words that they come across as well as in academic reading or writing Moreover, in daily conversation, students may not know a particular piece of vocabulary for a word that they are saying; and relative clauses can be used to help them understand words better

3.2 Research design

Exploratory research was used to carry out this study It is used to investigate a problem that has not been studied or thoroughly studied in the past The author employed exploratory research as the methodology for this study as it is believed to

be the appropriate method which provides an opportunity for teachers in the school

to gain an insight into the errors made and difficulties experienced by students in using relative clauses

universities and colleges, thus they do not have enough time to participate in the study enthusiastically

3.4.2 Sample

In research terms, a sample is a group of people, objects, or items that are taken from a larger population for measurement The sample should be representative of the population to ensure that the findings can be generalized from the research sample to the population as a whole Fraekel and Wallen (2012, p 125) stated that a simple random sampling is the technique in which each and every member of the population has an equal and independent chance of being selected For descriptive research, more than 10% of the population should be taken as sample as claimed by Gay and Diehl (1992, p 85) In order to obtain reliability of the research, 62,5% of the population is selected to be the sample of this research Precisely, in the first stage, 100 students took part in the relative clause test In the second stage, 10 students who had most errors in the test were taken purposively as the sample of interview

There are two instruments used to gather the data for the research, namely test (statistics) and interview (content analysis)

3.5.1 Test

The test is designed for students of grade 11th at a high school in Hanoi It points out the errors that are experienced by high-school learners in using relative clauses The test comprises of three main sections: multiple choice, gap filling and sentence combination Each section contains 10 questions and the students are allowed to complete the test in 45 minutes

The students were told that the test results would not affect their course grades The test was first designed by the researcher and then reviewed by three experienced teachers at this high school It followed closely what have been taught in textbook English 11 These teachers discussed with the researcher and helped to edit some questions Finally, it was checked by the supervisor and provided to the students who participate in the study

The results of the test were statistically analyzed with the use of Excel to measure the students’ scores The results of the tests will be presented in Chapter 4

3.5.2 Interview

Interview is used to figure out the problems encountered by students when they use relative clauses At this stage, structured interview is the main method adopted to gather the data Only 10 students who had the most errors participated in this interview Although the interview contains predetermined questions, the interviewer have freedom to ask more open-ended questions It creates a discussion with the respondents rather than a straightforward question and answer format These questions were aimed at investigating the causes of errors and difficulties encountered by students in using relative clauses (See Appendix B for “Interview Protocol”)

At the first stage, the researcher informs the learners about the study’s purpose and arrange suitable time for them to do the test 100 copies are distributed to students and collected after 45 minutes The teacher mark their tests and the scores are processed statistically and presented in tables and figures Test results would give some insight into the errors made by students in using relative clause The percentage system with the formula are as follows:

P =x 100%

P = the percentage of students’ problem

f = the number of frequency of the respondents answer

100 tests were coded from P1 to P100 The example of the errors in the tests would

be taken in the order; for example, E1-P7 meant the Example 1 was extracted from Paper 7, or E2-P10 meant Example 2 was extracted from Paper 10 The examples are written in a table so that the readers could easily see and understand

Last but not least, interview was conducted to figure out why students made such errors in using relative clause Researcher prepares 4 questions for each interviewee

First, data gathered from the test were quantitatively analyzed by utilizing an Excel computer program Frequencies and percentages were carefully calculated

Second, data gained through the interviews was qualitatively analyzed These results were examined to point out the causes of errors and difficulties in using relative clauses

CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

This chapter is devoted to the presentation of results and discussion of data after being collected from the tests and interviews with the students The data analysis of the errors of using relative clauses made by students at a high school in Hanoi is presented at first Then, the causes of the occurence of these errors and students’ difficulties in using relative clause are given

4.1.1 The errors related to relative clause uses by students at a high school in Hanoi

Research question 1 attempted to explore the errors of using relative clauses made

by the students at a high school in Hanoi Data was collected from tests of 100 students All 100 students participated in the test committed at least one error The table below displays all errors of relative clauses which were made by the students

in their test

Table 1: The errors of relative clauses made by the students

at a high school in Hanoi

1 Confusion between "who" and

2

Wrong use of relative pronouns

to refer to people and lifeless

things

3

Wrong use of relative pronouns

in defining and non-defining

relative clauses

4 Confusedness when using

5 Lack of concord between verb

of concord between verb and subject, (6) some relative pronouns are irreplaceable, and (7) omission of some relative pronouns In particular, the author counted total

421 times commiting errors among all these kinds of errors, in which confusion between "who" and "whom" occupied the highest frequency of errors (109 times corressponding to 25.89%) and ranked at the first position In other words, the extent level of verb tenses/ form errors was highest It was easy to understand that the learners of English had difficulty in determining “who” or “whom” for this sentence, and “who” or “whom” for that sentence So, the learners faced the use of

“who” or “whom” most “Wrong use of relative pronouns to refer to people and lifeless things” and “wrong use of relative pronouns in defining and non-defining relative clauses” ranked at the second and third position, with 88 times (20.90%) and 76 times (18.05%) respectively This proved that the extent of “wrong use of relative pronouns to refer to people and lifeless things” error and “wrong use of relative pronouns in defining and non-defining relative clauses” error made by high school students were high, but lower than the extent of confusion between "who" and "whom"

The researcher also identified four other relative clause errors with moderate frequencies, including “confusedness when using commas in relative clauses” and

“lack of concord between verb and subject” (63 times corresponding to 14.96%; 44 times corresponding to 10.45% respectively) And the extent level of “confusedness when using commas in relative clauses” and “lack of concord between verb and subject” errors was at the fourth and fifth rank In comparison with the determination between the use of “who” and “whom”, the determination between people and lifeless things, and the determination of defining relative clauses and non-defining relative clauses; the determination of commas in relative clauses and the determination of verbs and subject matter in relative clauses were easier to understand It is easier to understand and remember the usage of these relative clauses Therefore, the extent level of these errors was lower than the one of

“confusion between "who" and "whom"” and “wrong use of relative pronouns to refer to people and lifeless things” The error of “some relative pronouns are irreplaceable’ and “omission of some relative pronouns” ranked at sixth and seventh position, and at 6.65% (28 times) and 3.08% (13 times) respectively The low extent of “some relative pronouns are irreplaceable” error and “omission of some relative pronouns” error could be due to the students’ easy understanding of the use of these relative clauses

In order to understand more about each kind of errors, the author would like to give examples of each error which were extracted from the students’ tests There was the explanation for the commitment of the errors

4.1.1.1 Confusion between "who" and "whom"

Both "who" and "whom" are used to replace the noun of a person However, the relative pronoun "who" can be both the subject and the object; and "whom" can only be an object Therefore, learners should pay attention to avoid confusion in using these two pronouns

Table 2: Ex mples bout onfusion between “who” n “whom”

saved his son => whom

1 The father thanked the

saved his son => who

E2-P11

3 Three women, neither

of - I had met before, visited my house =>

who

3 Three women, neither of - I had met before, visited my house =>

whom

As seen in table 2, different examples of confusion between “who” and “whom” were made by high school students in different tests In Example 1 which was

extracted from Paper 2 “1 The father thanked the police woman whom had saved

his son” The error about confusion between “who” and “whom” was the word

“whom” Both "who" and "whom" are used to replace the noun of a person However, the relative pronoun "who" can be both the subject and the object; and

"whom" can only be an object Therefore, “who” in example 1 should have been used instead of “whom” As a result, the suggested revision must be “ 1 The father

thanked the police woman who had saved his son”

The second Example extracted from Paper 11 in table 2 showed another error of

confusion between “who” and “whom” The error in the sentence “3 Three women,

neither of who I had meet before, visited my house” was marked “who” The word

“who” must be converted to the word “whom” to satisfy the theory of the usage of

“who” and “whom” Thus, the sentence in example 2 must be revised into “3 Three

women, neither of whom I had met before, visited my house”

4.1.1.2 Wrong use of relative pronouns to refer to people and lifeless things

Learners need to pay attention to the use and function of the relative pronouns To understand more specifically, learners can refer to the table below:

People/thing Subject Object Possessive

pronoun

Learners should be aware of this distinction:

- Who, Whom: is used to replace the noun of the person

- Which, Whose, That: is used to replace both humans and lifeless things

Table 3: Examples about the errors of wrong use of relative pronouns to refer

to people and lifeless things Type of

a.who b.whom c.what

d.which

1 My mother likes the book my father gave her yesterday

a.who b.whom c.what

d.which

E4-P43

4 Mai loves the romantic novels These romantic novels have happy endings

=>Mai loves the romantic

novels who have happy

ending

4 Mai loves the romantic novels These romantic novels have happy endings

=>Mai loves the romantic

novels which have happy

ending

Or in the Example 4 and Example 5 extracted from Paper 43 and Paper 92

respectively, “the romantic novels” and “the hamburger” in front of the blanks were things Therefore, the correct sentence in E4 must be “4 Mai loves the

romantic novels which have happy ending”; and the correct answer in E5 must be

There were some examples about the error of wrong use of relative pronouns in defining and non-defining relative clauses made by high school students (table 4)

T ble 4: Ex mples bout the errors of wrong use of rel tive pronouns in

efining n non- efining rel tive l uses

who/whom

E7-P2

7 Mai sold her laptop, _she no longer needs,

to her ant => that

7 Mai sold her laptop, _she no longer

needs, to her ant =>

which

In English language, relative clauses was quite complex because learners are usually confused of the rule of relative clauses Learners were required to learn by heart all relative clauses; however, many students are still confused of using suitable relative pronouns in defining and non-defining relative clauses

The Example 6 extracted from Paper 43 was the case of the error of using suitable relative pronouns in defining and non-defining relative clauses In details, the

respondent used the word “that” to fill in the blank in the sentence “9 This

businessman, my sister knew in the university, just visited my house” This use

was not correct The reason is that this sentence included non-defining relative clause; however, the word “that” was just used in defining relative clause

Therefore, the respondent should use the word “who”/ “whom” Similar to the Example 7 extracted from Paper 2, the respondent should use “which” in stead of

“that” in the sentence “7 Mai sold her laptop, _she no longer needs, to her ant” because this was a non-defining relative clause

4.1.1.4 Confusedness when using commas in relative clauses

Learners should pay attention to using commas when using relative clauses Commas are used to separate an unknown clause from the rest of a sentence More specifically, when a noun to be replaced is defined, learners need to use commas when using relative clauses

Nouns are defined when they are:

- Proper noun

For example:

Ha Noi, which is the capital of Vietnam, is famous for many tourist attractions

- These, Those, That words come first

For example:

That book, which was published last week, is really interesting

- Possessive words like "my", "his", "their", etc before nouns

For example:

My mother, who is really gentle, always stands by my side

- It's the only thing that everyone knows For example, Sun and Moon

For example:

The Moon, which is far away from us, is especially beautiful tonight