A Study Of The Analysis Of The Errors Made By Prairie View Freshmen For The Year 1944- 1945

Origin of the Problem- Every teacher of English, whether he teaches in the elementary school, in the junior high school, in the senior high school, or even in college, knows how frequently the oral and written expressions of his pupils are marred by glaring errors in grammatical structure. He knows that unless he can eradicate these errors, the pupils will be handicapped for life. He, also, knows that before beginning a study of grammatical usage, certain principles must be used as bases upon which to build the objective study. Again, he knows that correct grammatical usage does not exist apart from expression, but as an aid to expression. For any teacher who fails to recognize this relationship, the teaching of correct forms becomes an end in itself, and not as a means to an end. Unless the teacher can show the pupils that the correct use of grammar is an aid to expression and that expression plays an important factor in determining their success in life, his pupils will not spend the time on drill necessary to make correct usage habitual. Certainly, the consideration of the purpose of grammatical usage is essential to the successful teaching of correct grammatical forms. When do pupils make errors? Do not errors in usage occur when the different parts of speech are to be used in sentence structure? The writer has found that hundreds of pupils could name and define the parts of speech , but the same pupils made errors in the use of the parts of speech . What is the value of knowing the definition and classification under these parts of speech , if they gain nothing in the use of grammar and the improvement of their speech