An Analysis Of The Errors In The Interlanguage Of Chinese English Learners

In recent years, the analysis of errors of interlanguage has become an importantdomain in the interlanguage studies. Some scholars research errors of interlanguagetheoretically and empirically. Theoretically, researchers discuss interlanguage theoryand error analysis theory, analyze the relations between interlanguage and erroranalysis, and explain causes of errors. Empirically, researchers mainly study the errorsof interlanguage based on case studies and English corpus. However, most researcheson interlanguage errors mainly focus on one kind or several kinds of errors whereasthe studies on the overall distribution of errors of interlanguage are not many. On thebasis of the researches on errors of interlanguage at home and abroad, the authorintroduces interlanguage theory and error analysis theory and researches the overalldistribution of interlanguage errors made by Chinese English learners.The thesis adopts the sub-corpora St3and St4in CLEC and tries to analyze thedistribution of errors in non-English majors’ writing, differences of errors between st3and st4and the possible causes of errors. It also puts forward some tentative strategiesof reducing errors.The research contains the following steps. Firstly,11classes of errors areclassified into two main parts according to the norming frequency counts that arecalculated by Gui Shichun and Yang Huizhong. Next, the overall distribution of errorsin non-English majors’ writing can be got by analyzing the norming frequencies of st3and st4. Then, the author analyzes11classes of errors from two parts by quantitativeand qualitative analysis, and learn the differences of errors in the two groups. Finally,the author summarizes the possible causes of errors and puts forward some tentativestrategies of reducing errors.The research shows that word form errors, word errors, sentence errors, verbphrase errors and noun phrase errors are the main errors in non-English majors’writing. Besides, by analyzing the total frequency of st3and st4, the result shows thatnon-English majors in higher grades make fewer errors than students in lower grades.In addition, by analyzing the11classes of errors, the results show that compared with that of lower grades, the error frequency of non-English majors in higher gradesincreases in some errors, and decreases in others. Finally, by thorough qualitativeanalysis, the author finds out that the transfer of mother tongue and insufficientlanguage input are the main reasons for errors.This study provides some pedagogical implications. It can provide somereferences for second language learning and teaching. For teachers, they can make useof some appropriate teaching methods to help students avoid errors. For students, theycan adopt some effective learning strategies to reduce or avoid errors.