English Grammar Problems Encountered by Advanced EFL Learners

Abstract

This paper investigates English grammar errors made by advanced Arab Open University students majoring in English Language and Literature at Kuwait-Branch. A representative sample of 25 students’ Tutor Marked Assignments (TMAs) comprised the corpus of the study. These TMAs (take-home assignments) are long essays whose length ranges between 1,500 words for ordinary assignments, and 4,000-5,000 words for the final projects. The corpus is based on assignments for a senior level, 16-credit-hour course entitled E300: English Language and Literacy. This course is the last language course studied by students before graduation. It was selected because the study is aimed at finding residual errors made by senior English majors who had previously passed courses meant to eradicate their more discrete language errors. The data were analyzed, tabulated and interpreted to mark the learning difficulties which persisted in the grammatical structure of the target students. The research findings are expected to help teachers and syllabus designers to be more informed about the areas that need to be addressed and the most adequate teaching methods to be adopted. .