An Investigation of Spelling Errors Found in Written Composition of Second and Third Secondary Students in the United Arab Emirates.

Abstract

This study aimed at investigating the spelling errors in compositions written by the second and the third secondary students in the United Arab Emirates. These errors were identified, classified and the frequency of these errors under each category was counted. The sample of this study consisted of (200) male and female secondary students in the academic year 2003/2004 chosen randomly from the secondary schools in Umm Al-Quwain Educational Zone in the United Arab Emirates. The study attempted to answer the following questions: (1)What are the spelling errors observed and occurred in the writings of the Emirati Secondary Students? (2)What are the linguistic strategies adopted by the students in spelling which ultimately contribute to more spelling errors? (3)In which type do the most frequent errors occur? (4)What are the sources of spelling errors made by the students? (5)In which position do the most frequent errors occur in the misspelt words? (6)Are there any significant differences between male and female students in spelling errors qualitatively and quantitatively? (7)What are the most difficult parts (hard spots) in the misspelt words? (8)What are the recommendations, suggestions and pedagogical implications to remedy these errors and to help students as well as teachers to overcome these difficulties? A Z test and a Chi – square test are used to determine whether the differences in the percentage of spelling errors are significant at the 0.05 level of significance. The results of the study showed that: vowels and silent letters were the most problematic areas, there were no significant differences between the percentages of errors due to the sex, the most frequent errors where in the middle of the misspelt words, male students in both classes committed less spelling errors than females students; the higher the grade was, the less errors were, the most frequent errors were in the intra-morphemic categories in both classes, very few errors were made in the area of derivations and morphemic errors, especially inflections were the most predominant errors. In the light of the findings of this study, it was recommended that spelling should be allotted more time to be taught in the United Arab Emirates teaching schedules and that teachers should draw their students' attention to the limitations, restrictions and exceptions of spelling rules through teaching procedures. Also, it was recommended to conduct a study on the effect of extensive reading on reducing spelling errors, to investigate the relationship between spelling achievement on the one hand and the auditory discrimination and visual discrimination on the other hand, to conduct a study on the relationship between motivation for learning English as a foreign language and the persistent spelling errors and to investigate the relationship between the effect of streaming and the yielded spelling errors.