Ai Nur Rofiq (09.22.0162) ainurrofiq209@yahoo.co.id
English Education Study Program Language and Arts Department Sekolah Tinggi Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan
(STKIP) Siliwangi Bandung
ABSTRACT
The objectives of this research entitled “An Analysis of Students’ Errors in Using Simple Past Tense at The
Eighth Grade of MTs Asy-syifa Cabangbungin” were to investigate how many errors made by the students in making Simple Past Tense and to find out what kinds of errors made by students in Simple Past Tense. The writer used descriptive qualitative method. The subjects of this research were 29 of the eighth grade students of
MTs Asy-syifa Cabangbungin in academic years 2012-2013. The study used document analysis which used essay test consisting 20 items as instrument. To know the percentage category the writer used Hatch and
Farhady’s formula and the collected data were identified, classified, and analyzed based on Dulay’s theory
(1982) to know types of errors. The results of this research, there were total of errors made by students based on surface strategy: (1). Omission was 11.16% (25), (2). Addition was 6.25% (14), (3). Misinformation was 79.02%
(177), (4). Misordering was 3.57% (8). And four kinds of errors that most occur is Misinformation (79.02%), it means that most of the students did not understand the formation form of simple past tense. Some of the students also made error in Omission (11.16%), it means that they always added or misplaced –s or –es; to be (is, am, are) or determiner (a, an, the). They also made errors in Addition (6.25%) which means that they added of to be (is, am, are), determiner (a, the, of, etc.) in sentences.
Key Words: error analysis, simple past tense
A.
BACKGROUND
English is a major international language for a number of reasons, among others: it is widely in many countries all over the world. The other is that it is used in the world of science, technology, commerce, and economic. In addition, successful
English learning is affected by many factors, and one of them is grammar. Other terms used for this phenomenon are ‘English as an international language’, English as a global language’ and ‘English as a world language’.
Grammar is description of the structure of a language and the way which linguistic unit as world and phrases are combined to produce sentences in language. Grammar is the rules in a language for changing the form of words and joining them into sentences (Oxford, 2003:586).
In the writer’s experience taught in the classroom, many students can mention grammar rules, but they have difficulties in applying them. They fail to grasp the function and appropriate context taught to them.
However, in learning grammar the student will face a lot of difficulties, such as in the use of the verbs. The problem of second grade students of MTS Asy-syifa is still confused in Using Simple Past Tense and they have difficulty in making sentences of Simple Past
Tense. Therefore in this research the writer only focus on the form of Simple Past Tense.
B.
LITERATURE REVIEW
1.
Error Analysis
According to Richard (1985:96) the error analysis is the study and analysis of the errors made by second and foreign language learner. Error analysis may be carried out in order to find out how a person learns a language and to find out how well someone knows a language.
And an error is a noticeable deviation from the adult grammar of a native speaker, reflects the competence of the learner. And error is the use of a linguistic item
(e.g. a word, a grammatical item, a speech, etc.) in a way which a fluent or native speaker of the language regards as showing faulty or incomplete learning
(Richard et al, 1985:95).
2.
Comparison Between Error and Mistake
Corder (1967) in Ellis (1994:51), distinguished
“errors” and “mistakes” An error takes place as a result of lack of knowledge (i.e., it represents a gap in competence). A mistake is a performance phenomenon, reflecting processing failures that arise

as a result of competing plans, memory limitations, and lack of automaticity.
A mistake refers to a performance error that is either a random guess or a slip, or caused by lack of attention, fatigue, or carelessness. And an error is a systematic deviation due to the learner’s stilldeveloping knowledge of the SL rule system or an error is a competence-based deviation, (Dulay, Burt, and Krashen, 1982:138 in Kaswan, 2010:49).
3.
Procedures of Error Analysis
Dulay
. (1982:155), Errors divide into the following categories: (1) omission, (2) additions, (3) misformation, and (4) misordering. a.
Omission
Omission errors are characterized by the absence of an item that must appear in a well-formed utterance.Although any morpheme or word in a sentence is a potential candidate for omission, some types of morphemes are omitted more than others.
Language learners omit grammatical morphemes
(e.g. is, the, of, etc) much more frequently than content morphemes/words (e.g. nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs).
b.
Addition
Addition errors are the opposite of omissions. They are characterized by the presence of an item which must not appear in a well-formed utterance. Addition errors usually occur in the later stages of SLA, when the learner has already acquired some target language rules. In fact, addition errors result from the all-toofaithful use of certain rules. c.
Misformation
Misformation refers to “the use of the wrong form of the morpheme or structure”. d.
Misordering
As the label suggests, misordering errors are characterized by the incorrect placement of a morpheme or group of morphemes in an utterance.For example, in the utterance: ’He is all the time late’ (Dulay et al, 1982:138 in Kaswan,
2010:50-52).
4.
Simple Past Tense
Simple past tense is a form of time that used to explain the events or acts committed at some point in the past in a simple form. The time of event or action that has been known (Hariyono et al, 2008:434).
In English, a verb is not standing alone; it must be helped by a Simple Past Tense is used to talk about activities or situations that began and indeed in the past (e.g., yesterday, last night, two days ago, in
1999) (Azar, 2003:25).
C.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Crowl (1996:10) states that qualitative research methods are used to examine questions that can best be answered by verbally describing how participants in a study perceive and interpret various aspects of their environment.
In addition, qualitative research is a research that intends to understand the phenomenon or what is experienced by the subject of the research such as behaviour, perceptions, motivations, actions, and other holistically and by means of a description in the form of words and language in a special context as well as to take advantage of variety of natural methods of natural causes (Tohirin, 2012:3).
1.
Research Instrument
The writer used document analysis as the instrument.
The technique test used the writer to get the data from the students. It was a series of question or exercise that used to measure the skill, intelligence knowledge, ability, or talent which is owned by the students.
The writer gave the students essay as much twenty items. The date of the test was 05 April 2013 and the time for doing the test was 60 minutes.
2.
Research Site and Subject a.
Research Site
This research was located in Cabangbungin district,
MTS Asy-syifa Cabangbungin Kabupaten Bekasi.
The writer chose this location by the reason that the
MTS Asy-syifa Cabangbungin Bekasi is not far from the writer’s place, so the research can be done as efficiently as possible. b.
Subject
One class was involved in this research consist of 29 students.
3.
Data Colletion
Since the purpose of the research is to analyze students’ errors in using Simple Past Tense, the writer gave just one kind of tests. The writer used a writing test (essay) as an instrument. This test should be completed by the subjects in order to find out the errors in their writing. The test explores the grammar use, especially Simple Past Tense.
4.
Data Analysis
After the identification of the errors, the writer analyzed students test in using simple past tense, the writer describes the error made by student themselves.
Next, those data calculated and presented in form of percentage as follows:

P = F x 100%
N
Hatch and Farhady
(1982:43) in Yuniar
(2009:49)
Where:
P : Percentage
F : Frequency (Number of instrumental response)
N : Population (Total number of response)
100% : Total sum
5.
Procedures
The research procedure of this research as follow: a.
Finding the research problem; b.
Collecting references relevant to research problem; c.
Writing a research proposal; d.
Conducting a research proposal; e.
Seminar proposal; f.
Writing the research paper; g.
Providing a test and answer key; h.
Giving a test of active and passive form in which each test provided time 60 minutes; i.
Correcting and scoring the student’s sheets; j.
Analyzing the error; k.
Computing the percentage of the errors; l.
Then, put the errors in the table of percentage.
D.
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS
1.
General Findings on Errors Made
200
150
100
50
0
Misformation Omission Addition Misordering
Chart 1: Errors Made by Students
The chart describes the number of error made by students. As can be seen in the chart, misinformation makes up 79.02% of the table errors, the second rank is omission (11.16%), the third is addition (6.25%), the least number of errors is misordering which has a small error made by students (3.57%). The greatest error made by students is misformation with value
79.02%, therefore the teacher should more focus on students’ errors in misinformation and give more sentences to the students concerning misformation errors, so that the student can understand what is causing the error on misformation.
2.
Errors Made By Their Types
In this classification, the writer classified the errors as errors of Omission, Addition, Misinformation, and
Misordering.
1.
Error in Omission
In this type, the writer found that there are (25) of errors made by students from all of number of words.
And the errors were caused by missing –s or –es; to be (is, am, are) or determiner (a, an, the).
2.
Error in Addition
In this type, the writer found that there are (14) of errors made by students. The students’ errors were caused by added of to be (is, am, are), determiner (a, the, of, etc) in sentences.
3.
Error in Misinformation
There are (177) of errors made by student in the sentences. They were caused by misinformation of in using to be (do, does), using of preposition (in, after, etc). The wrong of using verb or the wrong of written a letter.
4.
Error in Misordering
The students’ error in Misordering there are (8) of errors from all of number of words. The errors made by students are caused by the wrong place of verb or sentences.
3.
Number of Errors Made By Students
Table 1: Number of Errors Made by Students
Types of Error
Number of students made error
Number
Students
Percenta ge
Omission
Addition
Misinformation
Misordering
14
8
20
6
20
20
20
20
70%
40%
100%
30%
As we seen in the table above, in the types of error misinformation there are 20 people from 20 students who have made mistakes and can be percentage to
100%. Different from other types of error, almost all of students made a mistake in misinformation. And
14 of the 20 students made an error in omission; it can be percentage to 70% only 6 of the 20 students who did not make a mistake in omission. Then the error in addition, only 8 of the 20 students who have made mistake and can be percentage to 40%. And the final error in misordering, only 6 of the 20 students made this type of error and can be percentage to 30%.
All of types of error above, only misinformation which have the greatest value percent, whereas other

types of error there are some students who do not make the mistake in it.
E.
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTIONS
1.
Conclusion
Based on the result of the research that has done, the writer has come to the following conclusions: a.
There are four kinds of errors based on surface strategy, they are: Omission is 11.16% (25),
Addition 6.25% (14), Misinformation 79.02%
(177), and Misordering 3.57% (8). b.
Based on data from the test, the writer concludes that students’ error that most occur is
Misformation (79.02%), this means that most of the students did not understand the formation form of simple past tense. Some of the students also made error in Omission (11.16%), it means that they always added or misplaced –s or –es; to be (is, am, are) or determiner (a, an, the). They also made errors in Addition (6.25%) which means that they added of to be (is, am, are), determiner (a, the, of, etc) in sentences.
2.
Suggestions
Referring to the conclusion above, the writer would like to propose several suggestions as follows:
1.
For Teachers a.
To reach the goal of mastering in using simple past tense by the students, the teacher should motivate them, give them materials and correct their mistakes and errors at the right moment. b.
The teacher should find the teaching techniques and methods which are suitable in the teaching learning process. c.
The teacher should encourage his/her students in understanding simple past tense.
2.
For students a.
The students should be aware in learning simple past tense form because it is must be followed by verb 2 and the students should know every past tense verb. b.
The students need to practice in increasing their
English ability especially in structure and the use of regular and irregular verb.
F.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Azar, B. Schrampfer. (2003). Fundamentals of
English Grammar, Third Edition . Printed in the
United States of Amerika.
Corder, S. P. (1981). Error Analysis and
Interlanguage.
New York: Oxford University
Press
Crowl, Thomas., K. (1996). Fundamentals of
Educational Research . New York: Brown&
Benchmark Publisher.
Hariyono, Rudy., Carthy, Andrew Mc. (2008). ABC:
Accurate, Bright and Clear Plus English
Grammar . Surabaya: Gitamedia Press.
Hornby, AS. (2003). Oxford Advanced Learner’s
Dictionary . New York: Oxford University Press.
Richard, J. et. al . (1985). Longman Dictionary of
Applied Linguistic . London: Longman.
Kaswan. (2010). Language Acquisition . Cimahi:
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Pendidikan dan Bimbingan Konseling . Jakarta:
PT. Raja Grafindo Persada.
Yuniar, Wilan., R. (2009). An Error Analysis of
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http://is.muni.cz/th/180075/ff_b/Thesis_2nd_draf t.txt. June 25 th
2013, 13.00pm.