A Corpus-based Study On The Comparative Degree Errors In Senior High School Students’ Written English

Writing is considered as one of the most important purposes of learning English, but some English researchers begin to realize that the English writing ability of Chinese English learners is far less than satisfaction, and one of the reasons is language error. As a matter of fact, language learning is a process of trial and error so as to gradually improve learners’ language system, which indicates, to some degree, language errors cannot be completely avoided in the course of learning English. What’s important is to learn from these errors and then make progress. Some scholars have noticed that language errors can be collected, analyzed and corrected. Scientific error analysis can provide language learners with enlightenment, help teachers guide students to reduce the possibility of making errors in the process of learning language, and help students to reduce or avoid those errors consciously.This thesis mainly answers three research questions:(1) What comparative degree structures do Chinese high school students frequently use in compositions?(2) What comparative degree errors do Chinese high school students commit in their compositions?(3)What are the causes that affect the Chinese high school students’ misuse of comparative degree errors?This study applies Antconc to retrieve aj3(the marker of comparative degree errors) in the corpus ST2( a sub-corpus of CLEC). The structures of comparative degree sentence are firstly discussed, and then all these errors are classified into different groups. Next, students’ reflective thinking helps to reveal reasons for those errors. At last, some effective suggestions for Chinese high school students to study English comparative degree are listed. There are seven groups of comparative degree errors classified in this study. Group one is mischoosing analysis or synthesis, i.e., those adjectives which should adopt “er/est” add “more/the most”, and vice verse, taking up 29.2%. Group two is omitting comparative degree markers, i.e., there is no comparative degree marker “er/est” or “more/the most” in the sentences, taking up 20.8%. Group three is duplicative use of analysis and synthesis, i.e., both “er” and “more” are added to comparative degree structure, taking up 18.8%. Group four is overuse comparative degree, in other word, comparative degree applied to express idea while there is no context for comparative degree expression, taking up 16.7%. Group five is error in comparative degree structure, such as: more important and more important, taking up 6.3%. Group six is about irregular adjective errors, such as: farer, taking up 4.2%. And the rest errors belong to group seven. Three reasons accounting for those errors are put forward: interlingual transfer, learning strategies and incomplete application of rules.According to analyses, there are three main reasons accounting for those errors in this thesis, including the negative transfer of mother tongue, overgeneralization which belongs to language learning strategy and incomplete application of rules. All these errors and reasons give some enlightenment to language teaching and learning. First of all, teachers should treat language errors properly and hold the view that language errors cannot be completely avoided in the learning process. Language error, which has nothing to do with language competence, can be corrected. Secondly, corresponding teaching should be carried out according to the classification of errors. As for the negative transfer of mother language, teachers should lead students to adopt its advantages and avoid its disadvantages in the process of learning English. Lastly, Language learning strategy is also an important part in language learning which needs to be properly explained and taught in middle school.