Abstract:
This study sought to find out the problems of composition writing among students in
the Senchi-Ferry Methodist Junior High School in Ghana. The focus of the research
work was on spelling and concord errors that were most common in their written
composition. The target population was all students in Senchi-Ferry Methodist Junior
High School, numbering 250 students. The sample used was thirty (30) students from
Form One „A‟ class. The instruments used for data collection were test, interview and
questionnaire. The results from the data collected indicated that the students have
problems with spelling, paragraphing, concord, punctuation and tenses. Since the errors
were many, and the researcher could not address all these problems in this study, the
researcher narrowed his study on spelling and concord errors only. The causes of these
errors were identified to be poor teaching methods, inadequate teaching and learning
material, and parents‟ engagement of their wards in selling of items after school which
made the learners not able to read their notes at home. The researcher came out with
some intervention strategies which include the use of language game (mother and
children), the substitution table, home visits, Team Teaching and shared writing to help
students minimize the amount of errors committed in composition in English. These
strategies helped learners to improve on their composition writing skills significantly.
Description:
A dissertation in the Department of Applied Linguistics, Faculty of Foreign
Language Education and Communication, submitted to the School of Graduate
Studies in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the award of the degree of
Master of Education
(Teaching English as a Second Language)
in the University of Education, Winneba
SEPTEMBER, 2O19
