EFFECTS OF SIMPLE PAST TENSE ON THE WRITING PERFORMANCE OF SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Title page – – – – – – – i
Declaration – – – – – – – ii
Approval page – – – – – – – iii
Dedication – – – – – – – iv
Acknowledgements – – – – – – – v
Table of Contents – – – – – – – vi
Abstract – – – – – – ix

CHAPTER ONE
1.1 Background to the study – – – – – 1
1.2 Statement of the Problem – – – – – 3
1.3 Objectives of the Study – – – – – 4
1.4 Research Questions- – – – – – – 4
1.5 Significance of the Study – – – – 4
1.6 Scope of the Study – – – – – 5

CHAPTER TWO
REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
2.1 Teaching Grammar – – – – – – 6
2.2 The Concept of Tenses – – – – – 6
2.3 Problems in Teaching Tenses – – – – 12
2.4 Verbs and Tenses – – – – – – 13
2.4.1 The Modals – – – – – – – 13
2.4.2 The Aspects – – – – – – – 14
2.5 Simple Past Tense – – – – – 15
2.6. Wrong Usage of Past Perfect Tense – – – – 16
2.7 The Concept of Error – – – – – – 20
2.7.1 Types of Errors – – – – – 21
2.7.2 Classification of Errors – – – – 24
2.8. Tense Error Patterns – – – – – – 26
2.9. Concept of Recount Text – – – – – 28
2.9.1 Types of Recount Text- – – – – – 29
2.10 Error Analysis – – – – – – – 29
2.11. Mistakes vs Errors – – – – – – 32

CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
3.0. Introduction – – – – – – – 34
3.1. Research Design – – – – – – 34
3.2 Population of the Study – – – – – 34
3.3. Area of Study – – – – – – – 34
3.4 Sample of the Study – – – – – – 34
3.5 Sampling Technique – – – – – – 35
3.6. Instrument for Data Collection – – – – 35
3.7. Validity and Reliability – – – – – 35
3.8. Method of Data Collection – – – – – 35
3.9. Method of Data Analysis – – – – – 35

CHAPTER FOUR
DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS
4.1 Introduction – – – – – – – 37
4.1 Mode of Presentation of Results – – – – – 37
4.2 Research Questions – – – – – – 38
4.3 Presentation and Analysis of Results – – – – 39
4.4 Discussion of Findings – – – – – – 42

CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY OF FINDINGS, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
5.1. Summary of Findings – – – – – – 45
5.2 Conclusion – – – – – – 46
5.3. Recommendations – – – – – – 47
5.4 Suggestion for Further Studies – – – – 48
References – – – – – – – 50
Appendices – – – – – – – 54

Abstract
The aim of this research was to study the effects of simple past tense on the writing performance of secondary school students of Langtang north local government area of Plateau state. The study employed a survey research design. The population for the study consisted of all the S S 2 students in secondary schools. The sample of this study consists of four selected secondary schools and the respondents were sixty(60). The instrument used for the collection of data was the test. The method of data analysis was simple table percentage. The findings reveal the simple past tense errors committed by senior secondary two (S.S. 2) students in Langtang North Local Government Area. It exposes the areas that pose challenges to the students as well as their frequencies this range from mis-formation (55.50%) or 111 items, error in omission (21.00%) or 42 items, error in addition (12.00%) or 24 items, and error in mis-ordering (11.50%) or 23 items. Then, based on Communicative Effect Taxonomy, global error (13.50%) or 27 items and local error (86.50%) or 173 items. This implies that the students still have a long way to go in reading and studies. This is conform by the enormity of errors discovered in their work. In the light of the findings, the study recommends that: in order to raise learners’ awareness to correct themselves, teachers could use these errors in class and revise the teaching activities, especially in their recount writing, in order to minimize the students’ errors, the teacher should improve the students’ knowledge of English grammar by teaching how to form or construct the sentences appropriately and meaningfully, and by telling the functions of the language area themselves, the teacher has to set the first priority to the errors which mostly occurred (mis-formation and local error).

CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1. Background to the Study
Language is a tool of communication used by people to relate with one another. By language, people easily express their ideas, feelings, opinions etc. There are many languages over the world. English is one of the languages that is used as an international language. Many people learn English in order to be able to communicate well and they will go abroad if they master English. In Nigeria, English is considered as a foreign language and taught from elementary school up to university level.
There are four language skills which should be mastered, they are: listening, speaking, reading and writing. Listening is part of the transactional of communication process; the receiver’s responses have a direct impact on the direction of conversation. Speaking is an expression of ideas, opinions, or feeling to the other by using words or sounds of articulation in order to inform, to persuade and to entertain that can be learned through teaching and learning process. Reading is the process of constructing meaning from the written text.
In Nigeria, English language is said to be the official language of the nation. It plays significant roles in almost all the sphere of human endeavor be it education, politics, the judiciary, administration, commerce, religion to mention just a few (olaye,2009)
However, there has been a loud cry in the field of education particularly on the alarming rate of failure in English language in Langtang north local government area of Plateau state (Ndam, 2017). It is a matter of concern that students in senior and junior classes cannot write a good essay because of wrong tense usage generally. Adeyumobi (2007) asserts that, the English language is not a native language in Nigeria. It is basically a foreign language because it is not the mother tongue of any ethnic group in Nigeria. Such a language with no indigenous native speakers in the country that has adopted it as official is called a second language (L2).
One of the characteristics or features among the learners of English language is the tendency to transfer the mother tongue (L2) grammatical features into English. As such, the learner tends to use the expressions in his/her mother tongue and transfer them into English tenses which may not be accommodated and as such, an ill-formed tense will be the result.
English language is pedagogically significant as the language of instruction in virtually the entire school system from primary to the secondary school and also to the highest tertiary level (Thomas A. 2015) in relation to this research, the correct use of tense in English is one of the element considered to be very important in performing well in English and in one`s general studies. The correct use of tense is therefore an index of grammatical competence.
Writing is the language skill that should be constantly improved from time to time. It means that this skill requires clear thinking about what to write. Students should be taught how to express their ideas though written from language without regular practice. Writing can be bored and outraged to students who learn English as the target language, because they did not enjoy or they have not ideas which developed when they write. Principally, the main function of writing is as an indirect device of communication. By writing, the students will be able to explain their thought or their purpose.
Writing is not easy. When the students write their feelings and ideas into a word, word into sentence, sentence into paragraph, and it needs hard thinking to
produce the good writing at the same time. As Tanko (2000:26), “Writing is a complex activity that requires much more than good language knowledge”. It means that to write the ideas need the knowledge and the time to develop our knowledge in writing.
According to Frank (2002), simple past tense is used to express a habitual action with adverbs like usually, always, or often. They often write ‘She love me’, instead of ‘She loved me’. Actually we have to add suffix –s or –es to the third singular person (he, she, and it).
In fact, the students have problems to write their ideas, feelings, opinions, etc especially in writing simple past tense. They made errors because they do not know the structure, rules in making a sentence, especially to write simple past tense.
According to Corder (1973), errors are breaking the rule, due to a lack of competence such as knowledge of language, which may or may not be conscious. It means that errors are breaking rule, because the students have limited knowledge. The errors occurred in conscious and unconscious when the students write the simple past tense. Dulay et.al in Ellis (1994) divided errors into the following categories: (1) omissions, (2) additions, (3) misformations, and (4) misorderings.
The researcher is prompted by the poor performance of students and intends to investigate into the effects of simple past tense on the writing performance of secondary school students in Langtang north local government area of Plateau state with the aim of preferring solution to the problem in order to reduce it to the barest minimum.
1.2. Statement of the Problem
When learning a language, learners are only provided with conditions in which they can develop a language simultaneously in the mind. In order to master the language, learners have to be adequately exposed to all the four(4) basic skills: listing, speaking, reading and writing (Brown 2002)
The standard of English in Nigeria is on the decline despite the teaching and learning of the language for several years. The Nigerian students still seem to take the wrong use of tenses most especially the past tense in writing. Nowadays, a lot of novels are written in past tense and it is interesting. Eyesi(2009) stated that, there are a lot of general mistakes learners of English make such as; spelling mistakes, wrong use of preposition and lastly concord and tenses. This language learning is seen as the process of personal growth. One`s inability to perform well in English is a sign that one has not learnt or acquire the system of the language and this will certainly affect one`s performance in other fields that requires the use of English language.
1.3. Objectives of the Study
The aim of this research is to study the effects of simple past tense on the writing performance of secondary school students of Langtang north local government area of Plateau state.
The specific objectives are:
a. To determine students’ errors in writing simple past tense.
b. To find out the dominant errors in writing simple past tense made by the students.
c. To discover types of simple past tense errors which are made by the students in writing recount text at SS 2 in Langtang North Local Government
d. To show the percentages of errors made by the students in using simple past tense in writing past events based on surface strategy taxonomy and communicative effect taxonomy?
1.4. Research Questions
The aim of the study will be investigated through the following questions to make the problem more specific.
e. What are the students’ errors in writing simple past tense made by the students?
f. What are the dominant errors in writing simple past tense made by the students?
g. What types of simple past tense errors are made by the students in writing recount text at SS 2 in Langtang North Local Government?
h. What are the percentages of errors made by the students in using simple past tense in writing past events based on surface strategy taxonomy and communicative effect taxonomy?
1.5. Significance of the Study
The ability of one to write a good essay in correct tense is dependent on one`s ability to understand the different patterns.
The importance of English language in the educational system cannot be over emphasis as such, incompetence in English language can impede the chance of higher academic pursuit for the learners. The ability to construct intelligible and Standard English sentences is generally believed to be the yardstick of good educational performance since English is used as a medium of instruction in Nigeria and learner’s competence In English affects their performance in other subjects.
1.6. Scope of the Study
This is limited to the analysis of some selected secondary schools in Langtang north local government area of Plateau state. Langtang north as a local government is in the south of Plateau state. Langtang north has more than 30 secondary schools and the dominant are private schools. The researcher choose to use two government schools and two private schools due to lack of sufficient resources and time.