English Writing Errors of Kurdish EFL Undergraduates: An Error Analysis

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to identify, characterize, and evaluate writing errors made by Kurdish EFL students at Cihan University in Duhok, Kurdistan Region of Iraq. In the study, 37 third-year students from the English language department participated. The primary data collection instrument was the students’ response sheets for the poetry midterm exam. The errors were first diagnosed and classified into several categories. According to the findings of this study, eight types of writing errors were committed by the participants which were spelling, punctuation, grammar, capitalization, prepositions, verb misuse, and pronoun misuse. The findings of this study also revealed that the most common errors committed by the Kurdish learners were punctuation and capitalization. Such results are important for EFL teachers because they encourage them to pay careful attention to their students’ writing errors and utilize them as pedagogical guidelines while designing activities.

Keywords

• error analysis
• sources of writing errors
• english writing errors
• efl
• writing skills