Error Analysis in the Written Compositions of EFL Students: A Classroom Study

The aim of the study is to analyse the linguistic errors in the writings of EFL students in a Saudi university. For error analysis, the writing tasks of a group of students were collected and analysed. The results showed that the frequently committed errors were at the sentential level as well as the word level. The most frequent errors were the errors of spellings and the least were the errors of demonstratives. The marked errors were categorised as errors of omission, addition, misinformation and misordering. Further analysis of the collected data indicated interlingual interference, intralingual interference, inadequate practice in English writing and carelessness of students as the major sources of the errors. Hence, the study has pedagogical implications as it will help teachers to device appropriate measures for improving the students’ writing proficiency.