A study on the errors of the English Department students encountered in their dictation papers

Being interested in measuring the English language mastery of the second semester students of the English Department of Widya Mandala University, the writer did this study. The purpose of this study was to find out the types of language elements that most globally and locally miscon-structed by the second semester students of English Department of Widya Mandala Catholic University and the causes of these errors by observing the students' dictation papers. Supporting this study, the writer used the theories of Errors Analysis of Dullay, namely the Communicative Effect Taxonomy to classify the types of errors and the Surface Strategy Taxonomy to see the causes of errors. She also used the theory of Interlanguage to interpret the students' errors. As the instruments of this study, the writer used a dictation test which consisted of three passages. The writer gave this test to the students in order to get the data for this study. After getting the data, the writer analyzed them by checking each word that had been written down by the students and marked it if she found and error. Then, she classified the errors encountered into two types: global and local errors. These errors types were then subdivided into: grammatical errors, meaning errors, and spelling errors. After that, she counted the frequency of the error occurences and ranked them from the highest to the fewest number of errors. The result of this study showed that the language elements which were most globally misconstructed by the students under study were meaning errors (45.63%), spelling errors (37.21%), and grammatical errors (17.16%). While the language elements which were most locally misconstructed by the students were grammatical errors (79.63%), spelling errors (16.80%), and meaning errors (3.57%). From the errors encountered in the students' dictation papers, the writer found that the students under study made these errors during dictation because they substituted the dictated words for other words, they omitted a word or an element of the words being dictated, and they added a word or another elements to the words being dictated. The writer found that substitution was the biggest cause of the students' errors (53.79%). It was followed by omission in the second rank (37.15%), and addition in the third rank 9.06%). Based on these findings, the writer concludes that errors of grammar are the result of improper strategies of second language learning and second language communication, and overgeneralization. Errors of meaning are the result of wrong strategies of second language learning. Errors of spelling are the result of wrong strategies of second language learning. While the basic reasons why the students added, omitted, or substituted the dictated words for another words are because the students' problems of hearing, understanding, and lack of knowledge of the English language elements