University of Nigeria
Research Publications
AFANGIDEH, Maria Emmanuel
Author
PG/Ph.D/00/27802
Interference of Anaan with English Verb Tense Among Different Categories of Secondary School Title Students
Education Faculty
Art Education Department
July, 2005 Date Date
Signature Signature
I F ANMA WITH ENGLISH VERB DIFFERENT CATEGORIES OF RY SCHOOL STUDENTS
AFANGIDEH, MARIA EMMANUEL PG/M.ED/Ph.DiO0127802
SUB-DEPARTMENT OF ARTS EDUCATION UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA NSUKW
JULY, 2005 INTERFERENCE OF ANAAN WITH ENGLISH VERB TENSES AMONG DIFFERE T CATEGORIES OF SECONDARY SCHOOL STUDENTS
A Doctoral Research Project Presented to the Sub- Department of Arts Education, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the award of the degree of the Doctor of Philosophy QPh.D) in Language Education
AFANGIDEH, MARIA EMMANUEL
PGIM.ED/Ph.Dl00127802
SUBDEPARTMENT OF ARTS EDUCATION UNlVERSlTY OF NIGERIA NSUKKA
JULY, 2005 CERTIFICATION
Maria Emmanuel Afangideh, a postgraduate student in the Sub-
Department of Arts Education with Registration Number
PG/M.EDlPh.D/00127802 has satisfactorily fulfilled the requirements for the
degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Language Education. The work
embodied in this thesis is original and has not been submitted in part or in full for any other diploma or degree of this University or any other
University.
Dr. T. 0.~bbodile Maria ~mmanuelAfangideh Supervisor PGIM. EDIPh.Dl00127802 iii C- APPROVAL PAGE
THIS THESIS HAS BEEN APPROVED FOR THE SUB-
DEPARTMENT OF ARTS EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY OF NIGERIA,
NSUKKA.
BY
(Supervisor)
EXTERNA EXAMINER (Co-ordinator) Sub-Department of Arts Education
...... REV. FR. PROF. A. U. AKUBUE DEAN OF FACULTY iv DEDICATION
This work is specially dedicated to my beloved husband, Emmanuel and our children - Etisang, Edikan and Abasiono. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
It is to the glory of God that this work has been successfully completed and on record time. God saw me through in the numerous trips
I made throughout the period of my study. Above all, He granted me unmerited favour before everybody I came in contact with throughout the programme. To the Great Jehovah, I say thank you.
I express an unreserved gratitude to my able and dynamic supervisor, Dr. T. 0. Mgbodile. He made the programme very easy for me. He granted me access to his home and office despite his tight schedule, and painstakingly read through my work no matter the short notice. He was a father, a friend and a supervisor. The researcher lacks words to better express her gratitude to him. Equal appreciation to Prof. E.
N. Egbe, my lecturer at the University of Jos. He laid the foundation for my interest in the present study. The researcher appreciates Miss Jeno -
Mary Enighe also of the University of Jos, who dutifully assisted her with relevant materials for the success of this work.
The researcher owes a lot of thanks to her lecturers at the University of Nigeria. Few names, however deserve special mention: Prof. Grace C.
Offorma, Prof. E. J. Otagburuagu, Prof. I. C. Obizoba, Dr. F. A. Okwo, Dr.
S.A. Ezeudu, Dr. Uju Umoh, Dr. Queen-Joy Nwoji, Dr. J. U. Akabougo and
Dr. J. C. Omeje for their invaluable contributions, necessary criticisms, corrections and inputs which led to the success of this work.
The researcher equally appreciates Prof. George Ibe-Bassey, Prof.
Queen Obinaju, Dr. G. A. Akpan, Dr. Alice Udosen, Mr. & Mrs. Sunny
Udofia, Mrs. Ekaette Urnoh, and His Royal Highness Obong Eft7ong lyawot vi for their irresistible enthusiasm and financial contributioins to this work. An
unreserved thanks to Dr. Joseph Udondata for all the materials and data on
Anaafi he willingly made available, and Dr. Mfon Umobong, Dr. Nsikak-
Abasi Udofia and Mr. Effiong Assian for their assistance on the data
analysis.
The researcher appreciates principals and staff of Holy Family
College, Oku Abak, Loreto Girls' Juniorate, Eriam, Southern Annang
Comprehensive Secondary School, lkot Okoro and Community Technical
College, Mbiakot for allowing her use their schools and students for the
fieldwork.
The researcher acknowledges with thanks the financial support of
her pastor and wife, Rev. & Mrs. Adelaja Are, other ministers, in the
persons of - Rev. & Mrs. Joseph Adeyemi, Rev. & Mrs. Olufemi Joseph
and Brothers Jonathan and Anselem.
A very sincere gratitude to Lt. Col. 0. S. Afangide (Rtd.) and wife,
Mr. & Mrs. Asuquo Afangide, Mr. & Mrs. Joshua Afangide, Mr. & Mrs.
Bassey Afangide, Mr. & Mrs. David Mendie and Mr. & Mrs Uwem Ekarika
for their financial support towards the success of this work.
The researcher appreciates her beloved husband, Mr. Emmanuel \ Afangide for his financial contributions, and the numerous materials on the
origin of the Anaang people which he made available to authenticate the
information on this study. The researcher appreciates her children who
accepted her absence and unending engagements. This led to the timely
completion of this study. vii Deserving of mention also is the memory of my beloved father, Late
Sir M. E. Ebi (KSJ), who laid the foundation for my higher education. The researcher appreciates her relations: Mrs. J. E. Ebi, Mr. & Mrs. A. M. Ebi,
Bar. & Mrs. L. M. Ebi, Mr. & Mrs. lsidore Udonna, Magdalene, Ndifreke and
Uduak for their indefatigable motivational support that led to the success of this work.
Finally, the researcher appreciates the Director of Emax Computers, who dutifully undertook the processing of this work.
Maria Emmanuel Afangideh University of Nigeria Nsukka. TABLE QF CONTENTS PAGE
Title Page ...... I
Certification ...... ii
Approval Page ... iii
Dedication ...... iv
Acknowledgements ... v-vii
Table of Contents ... viii
List of Tables ... xi-xii
List of Appendices ... xiii
Abstract ...... xiv-xv
CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION 1
Background to the Study ...... 1
Statement of the Problem ... . , . 6
Purpose of the Study ...... 8
Significance of the Study ...... 9
Scope of the Study ...... 10
Research Questions ...... 11
Hypotheses ...... 11
CHAPTER TWO: REVIEW OF LITERATURE 12
Historical Background of the Anaaii People ... 13
Characteristics of Anaafi Language ... 15
Theoretical Framework ...... 3 1
Inter-language Theories ...... 3 1
Language Acquisition and Learning ...... 36 IX PAGE
Interference in Languages in Contact ......
Approaches to Contrastive Analysis ......
Verbals in Languages ......
Importance of English in Nigeria ......
Objectives of the Language Curriculum ......
The Role of Contrastive Studies in Curriculum Development ...
Review of Related Empirical Studies ......
Empirical Studies on Anaaii and English Phonological Systems .
Empirical Studies on Phonotactics in Anaaii and English ......
Empirical Studies on Intonation of Anaafi and English ......
Empirical Studies on Anaaii and English Structural Patterns ...
Summary of Review of Related Literature ......
CHAPTER THREE: RESEARCH METWGDOLOGY
Design of the Study ......
Area of Study ......
Population of the Study ......
Sample and Sampling Technique ......
Instrument for Data Collection ......
Validation of the Instrument ......
Reliability of the Instrument ......
Method of Data Collection ......
Method of Data Analysis ......
CHAPTER FOUR: RESULTS ......
Research Question 1 ...... X Page
Research Question 2 ...... 130
Research Question 3 ...... 131
Research Question 4 ...... 132
Hypotheses ...... 133
Summary of Major Findings ...... 137
CHAPTER FIVE: DlSCUSSlON OF RESULTS ... 140
Discussion of Results ...... 140
Conclusion ...... 149
Implications of the Study ...... 150
Recommendations ...... 154
Limitations of the Study ...... 157
Suggestions for Further Research 158
Summary of the Study ...... 158
References ...... 163
Appendices ...... I?! LIST OF TABLES
PAGE
Table 1: Distribution of sample by gender, location and class level ...... 97
Table 2: Class 1 - Classification of irregular verbs Transformation ...... 105
Table 3: Class 2 - Classification of similarities of only the simple past and past participles of irregular verbs ... 106 Table 4: Class 3 - Classification of identical past and past participle along with a change of base vowel of irregular verbs ...... 106 Table 5: Class 4 - Classification of differing past and past participle of irregular verbs...... 107 Table 6: Class 5 - Classification of identical base, past and past participle of irregular verbs ...... 108 Table 7: Class 6 - Classification of identical past and past participle of irregular verbs...... 109
Table 8: Class 7 - Classification of differing base, past and past participle along with vowel change of irregular verbs ...... 109 Table 9a: Simple present in Anaati and English ...... 11 1 Table 9b: The present progressive in Anaafi and English ... 1 12 Table 9c: The future tense in Anaati and English ...... 112 Table 10: The simple present, present progressive and present perfect in AnaaA and English ...... 114
Table 11: The simple present (declarative) in Anaafi and English ...... 115
Table 12: The simple present (interrogative) in Anaaii and English ...... 116
Table 13: The simple present (negative) in Anaati and English ...... 117
Table 14: The simple past (declarative) in Anaafi and English ...... 118 sii PAGE
Table 15: The simple past (interrogative) in Anaaii and English ......
Table 16: The simple past (negative) in Anaaii and English ...
Table 17: Mean interference scores of Anaaii Learners based on their class levels .. .
Table 18: Mean interference scores of male and female Anaaii learners of ELVAT ......
Table 19: Mean interference scores of urban and rural based Anaaii learners of ELVAT ......
Table 20: Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) of students interference scores based on their class level . . .
Table 21 : lndependent t-test analysis of males and females in English lexical verbs interference test ......
Table 22: lndependent t-test analysis of English lexical verbs interference test between urban and rural-based Anaai'i secondary school students . . . LIST 06 APPENDICES
PAGE
Appendix 1: Interview Schedule ...... 171
Appendix 2: Letter of Introduction ...... 173
Appendix 3: English Lexical Verbs Achievement Test (ELVAT) ...... 174
Appendix 4: Model Answers to the English Lexical Verbs Achievement Test (ELVAT) ... I83
Appendix 5: Marking Scheme of the ELVAT ...... I85
Appendix 6: Table of Specification of the ELVAT ... I86
Appendix 7: Reliability Tests of the ELVAT ...... 187
Appendix 8: Inter-Rater Reliability tests of the ELVAT using Co-efficient of Concordance (w) ... 192
Appendix 9: List of Schools and population of students in Abak and Oruk Anam Education zones ... 198 ABSTRACT
This study set out to investigate intertierence of AnaaA with English verb tenses among different categories of secondary school students. The intention was to compare and contrast the lexical verbs of AnaaA and
English by highlighting the similarities and differences. It was also to determine how the differences constituted interference in the performance of the different grade levels, on the males and females and on the Anaafl secondary school learners of English lexical verbs at different locations.
Four research questions and four null hypotheses were formulated to guide the study. The study employed two research designs: survey
(analytic/coritrastive analysis) and causal comparative. One hundred and fifty secondary school AnaaA learners in Abak and Oruk Anam Education
Zones of Akwa lbom State were used. The population was sourced from two co-educational schools, one girls' school and one boysJschool by a non-proportionate stratified random sampling technique. The English
Lexical Verbs Achievement Test (ELVAT) was the instrument used for data collection, which comprised structure, translation and essay tests.
The data collected from the study were analysed by analytic/contrastive analysis, means, standard deviation, t-test statistics and analysis of variance (ANOVA). The major findings of the study were:
(I) That English and AnaaA lexical verbs have a number of
resemblances, but surprisingly, in spite of these apparent
similarities, there are many peculiar differences in both systems.
(2) That there is a signi5cant difference between English and Anaan
lexical verbs. SV That there is a significant difference in the mean interference
scores of the different grade levels of AnaaPi secondary school
learners of English lexical verbs.
That there is no significant difference in the mean interference
scores of male and female AnaaPi secondary school learners of
English lexical verbs.
That the language of AnaaPi secondary school students in urban
schools showed less degree of interference in English lexical verbs
than that of rural schools.
The educational implications of the findings were extensively discussed; various recommendations, among which was that the Akwa lbom State government should use the findings of this study to improve on learning materials to secondary schools in the AnaaPi community in order to curb interference problems were made, and suggestions for further research were also made. CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
Background to the Study
Anaaii denotes both a language and her speakers. Anaaii people are about two million in number and live mainly in Abak, Essien Udim,
Etim Ekpo, lkot Ekpene, Obot Akara, Ika, Oruk Anam and Ukanafun
Local Government Areas of Aka lbom State (Udondata, 2001). The
Anaati language is a member of the Lower Cross Group - one of the
many groups of languages, which are traced to the Niger-Congo group of languages. The Lower Cross sub-group spreads across Cross River,
Akwa lbom and Rivers States of Nigeria, and some parts of Cameroon,
(Udoh, 1998). Anaati language is usually grouped as a cluster of some sort with Efik and Ibibio, with which it is highly mutually intelligible,
(Greenberg, 1963,Williamson, 1989 and Connell, 1994). Members of
the Lower Cross are very close phonetically, syntactically and
semantically. Anaaii has the second largest population of speakers, and
while lbibio ranks first, Efik has the least number of speakers, (Udoh,
1998). Among the languages spoken in Akwa lbom State are AnaaA,
Ibibio, Oron, Okobo, Mbo, Eket, Itu Mbonuso, Andoni and Ibeno. Only
two (Anaaii and Ibibio) have gained prominence in linguistic research.
Anaaii has a variety of dialects. Essien (1 973) has identified two
groups to include AbaWCentral Anaaii, and Otoro in lkot Ekpene
varieties. This observation according to Udondata (2001) seems to
ignore the major dialects which include the lkot Ekpene dialects with its sonorants as in the pronunciation of the word 'akpere' ('if or 'incase'), the Essien Anaaii dialect with its flare for the palato-alveolar..affricates
ItJl, 1~1as in ichib (kernel) and 'ajob' (oil palm tree); Ukanafun dialect,
which is noted for its use of the alveoler lateral (I) as in 'Ua' (market);
and the Abak dialect which contrasts with the Essien Anaaii variety as in
the following examples:
Aba k Essien Anaaii Gloss
idadda idatta It is not ripe.
dabba dappa Remove from fire.
idebbe ideppe He has not bought
There are some minor varieties which can easily be noted among
speakers from lkpe Anaaii, Ika, Otoro (Obot Akara) and some villages in
Oruk Anam Local Government Areas (Udondata 2001). These
differences in dialects do not hinder communication among speakers in
the Anaaii community.
In the Anaaii speaking milieu, bilingualism, i.e. the use of Anaaii
and English is a common pattern of language use. In the homes,
marriage functions, commercial transaction and any formal gatherings,
Anaaii is commonly used, though English is equally used inter-
changeably. At the school domain, the language of instruction in the
primary school is initially Anaaii, and at a later stage English, but outside
the class, language events are chiefly in Anaaii. In the secondary
school, however, the language of instruction is English. Church
activities are conducted mainly in AnaaA. Sermons are given by
consecutive interpretation from AnaaA to English or vice-versa. The language has been written down with well-defined and acceptable orthography.
There is no doubt that English is a world language. Quirk,
Greenbaunm, Leech and Svartvik (1985) maintain that the spread of
English over most of the world as an international language is a unique phenomenon in the world's history. They assert that about 1,500 million people, over a third of the world's population live in countries where
English has some official status, or is one of the native languages, if not the dominant native language. English is essential to the everyday life of the average Nigerian. In a multilingual country like Nigeria, with over
395 languages (Hansford, Samuel and Standford 1976), English serves as an important medium of interaction for the various linguistic groups in the country. This implies that it serves as an instrument for unity in diversity. It is the dominant language of education, administration, law, press and commerce.
Although, the Nigerian language policy on education recognizes the importance of indigenous languages in the educational system, and has already directcd their teaching and learning in schools, English still maintains its position as the medium of instruction from the later stage of the primary school to the University (FGN, 1998). Today, the study of
English is pursued with much drive because of the fact that for now, it is an indispensable medium of education. In the secondary schools, the language is necessary for all learners and it is the singular language in which a credit pass is required for entry into a higher institution of learning. To be able to speak a language appropriately implies knowledge of that language. Native and foreign speakers of a language must follow its grammatical order. Corder (1974) asserts that it is an established fact that one of the major sources of learning difficulties that a second language learner experiences is the interference of the mother tongue.
Tyler (2001 ) views interference as an ~nstantof deviation from the norms of the target language, which is prominent in the speech of bilinguals, as a result of mastering of the first language or mother tongue. Corder (1974) posits that interference is the trace left by someone's native language upon the foreign language he has acquired.
Noticeable mother tongue interference among Anaaii secondary school learners is the proactive interference or inhibition, which results when information previously stored in memory interferes with a new material.
Rava (2001) opines that proactive interference makes it difficult for one to remember new structures, which are related to previous ones, and the
attempt to ignorantly manipulate the structures results in interference.
This is probably responsible for the mix up of tenses and grammatical
structures among Anaaii secondary school learners. Rivers (1968) in
trying to find reasons for interference opines that the major difficulties for
second language learners are found at those points where the foreign
language differs most radically from the native language.
The Current National English Curriculum for Junior Secondary
Schools (1985:6) recognizes the effects of the mother tongue
interference on teaching and learning of English as a second language,
and opines that: In constructing this syllabus, we have taken into consideration demands made on the Nigerian user of English at the national and international levels. Similarly, we have examined critically, how the usage patterns of the Nigerian user of the English language fall short of international expectations. In so doing, it has become obvious to us that the English usage in Nigeria is sub-standard when compared with its international expectation, for not only are the sentences full of grammatical and mechanical errors, but also reveal: (a) lack of intuitive sense of linguistic appropriateness; (b) inadequate knowledge of different varieties of forms and usage; (c) mother-ton~ue induced forms and usages (emphasis mine).
It is expected that any person who has undergone a school educational programme should speak grammatically correct English.
But what is experienced today in and outside the school system is disheartening and pathetic, as the use of English verb tenses has been subjected to all forms of deformation and reckless attention. The
Anaati milieu is not exempted from this predicament, because learners exhibit a high degree of the mother tongue interference, especially in their speaking and writing of the English language
The concern of this study was therefore, first to determine analytically the structural differences and similarities that exist in the verbal systems of English and Anaafi, with particular reference to lexical verbs, which are full verbs or finite verbs. Secondly, different categories ~f secondary school Anaati learners were examined to determine how they constituted interference in English lexical verbs. The different categories of students at the secondary school level in this study covered different grade levels, males and females as well as learners residing at urban and rural settings. The grade level included students of junior secondary one and three, and senior secondary three, who were native and fluent speakers of Anaafi. The choice was to ensure that the Anaaii language habits had been internalized right from birth, and not learnt as a second language. It was equally to enable the researcher observe variations in error frequencies across the different grade levels, in order to compare the errors produced in one grade level with those produced in others, and determine which error types decreased with increase in number of years spent in learning English. These variables were thought to constitute interference in the use of English lexical verbs among secondary school Anaair learners. Furthermore, in view of the fact that proactive interference is a psychological construct, involving internal dispositional mechanisms, its likely effects on males and females were highlighted especially in respect of the confirmed psycho-cognitive differences in response of males and
females in academic settings (Wolman 1973; lttelson 1990). In addition, the likely effect of the mother tongue interference based on location, were examined since urban-based students have more exposure and greater psycho-cognitive development, than rural students. Finally, the grade level of the learners was highlighted to ascertain whether there was resistance to interference at a higher proficiency level. All these formed the necessary experience for conceptual development (Tyler 2001). Statement of the Problem Recently, claims have been outrageous over the way English is
handled in African milieu (Lubasa and Adejare 1992). Besides, the
status of English in Nigeria as an official language, and as a medium of
instruction in schools and colleges, brings up another challenge
regarding how it is handled in our schools. They maintain that despite 6 the public and official emphasis on English, the standard of teaching and learning the language has not achieved our desired objectives - this is to say, producing pupils who are proficient in the functional use of the language.
Over the years also, there have been public outcries about the falling standard of education in Nigeria and the falling standard has always been blamed on the low level of competence in English (Lubasa et a1 1992). Many parents and teachers of English have observed that their children cannot construct grammatically correct English sentences according to Lubasa and his colleague. It is not far from the truth to say that most Nigerian students know and speak English only at the threshold level. In specific terms, the public outcries point to the need for English to be taught and learnt appropriately. However, events have proved that secondary school students' performance in English is usually far below expectation (Udondata 2001). The poor performance of students in English is clearly a nationwide phenomenon. The analysis of the GCEISSCE English examination results, the country over, for the years 1998 and 1999 reveal a sickening poor performance.
In the year 1998, out of a total number of 636,77 candidates that sat for the English language examination, 417,312 representing 65.54% failed.
Of the 190,863 candidates passed, only 53,990 representing 8.48% passed with credit. In 1999, out of 757, 233 candidates that sat for the examination, 171, 098 passed with credit 41 9,593 candidates
representing 64,92% failed (Chief Examiners' Report 1998). Further to the analysis above, the Chief Examiner of the English language for both GCEISSCE examinations for the year (1998:4) reports that:
The candidates' language is fast degenerating into Pidgin English. The 5 to signal the present tense third person singular has all but disappeared. So forms like " he don't come to see us again", are now commonplace. Again, many candidates are blissfully ignorant of the rules of concord and correct tense usage. One could write a fat volume to illustrate candidates' breach of these basic grammatical rules. A few examples will suffice: 'John beated me mercilessly; I have informed...' I has stop going to school; I knew that their are find the money.. .'
As an English language teacher, especially in the Anaaii community, the researcher has observed that some Anaaii speakers and writers of English as a second language tend to apply the grammatical rules of Anaafi to their use of English, and this results in lots of un-English expressions filled with distortions of meaning.
Therefore, the major concern of this study was too compare and contrast the lexical verbs of both Anaaii and English in order to establish whether location, gender and the class level of Anaati secondary school learners constituted interference.
Purpose.of Study
The main purpose of this study was to investigate the interference of Anaaii with English verb tenses among different categories of secondarj school students. Specifically, the study
intended to:
1. Compare and contrast the lexical verbs of Anaati and English, by
highlighting the similarities and differences between them.
8 2. Determine how the grade level of secondary school students of
Anaafi origin constitute interference in English lexical verbs.
3. Ascertain how interference is exhibited by male and female
Anaafi secondary school learners of English lexical verbs.
4 Identify the extent to which location leads to fewer or greater level
of interference in English lexical verbs among Anaati secondary
school learners.
Significance of the Study
This study will adopt contrastive analysis (CA) which is applied to every aspect of language: phonology, morphology, syntax and lexis.
The study, in adopting CA will help to determine what patterns of lexical verbs are identical in Anaaii and English to enhance facilitation to secondary school Anaafi learners; and which of the lexical verbs are absent in the first language (L,) of learners to pose interference problems in their study of the lexical verbs. The study equally will help
English teachers of Anaati students expose to them the interference d~Mcultiesof their students and equally understand how these difficulties arise.
This study, which sought to explore the similarities and differences in English lexical verbs among Anaati learners of English to determine causes of interference, will provide valid empirical support to previously related students' performance. That will be a basis for
advancement in learning. The study will also provide information for
policy makers and inspectors of education on whether or not CA should
be adopted in schools. The information on the pedagogical research findings will be useful to curriculum planners and developers to call for curriculum adaptation. The down-to- earth empirical findings of this
study will also be useful to language methodology teachers in colleges of education and universities to emphasize on the use of particular teaching methods like drills, substitution tables or games. The result of the study will equally equip textbook writers and instructional resource
developers with information on whether CA should receive due
attention.
The findings of this study will reveal the differential responses of
males and females in the area of English lexical verbs (an important
aspect in second language learning - SML), and so helped to decide
on whether to separate instructional techniques for male and female
secondary school Anaati learners. This study will create general
awareness on the efficacy of CA among Anaaii secondary school
students, and expose the differential effects of location on second
language learning. This would improve the teaching and learning of the
English language and improve students' performance in school
certificate examination.
Scope of the Study
This study was limited to the interference of Anaati with English
verb tenses among different categories of secondary school students,
within Abak and Oruk Anam education zones, comprising JSSI, JSSlll
and SSSIII. The study also surveyed the impact of some variables such
as gender, location and the grade level of students on interference of
English lexical verbs among Anaati learners. Research Questions
The following research questions guided the study:
What are the similarities and differences between AnaaA
and English lexical verbs?
To what extent does the grade level of AnaaA secondary
school learners of English exhibit interference in the use of
English lexical verbs?
How does the frequency of errors by females compare
with those of males on the interference of English lexical
verbs among Anaari secondary school learners?
To what extent does location lead to fewer or greater level
of interference in English lexical verbs among AnaaA
learners?
Hypotheses
The following null hypotheses were tested at 0.05.
There is no significant difference between AnaaA and English lexical verbs
There is no significant difference in the mean interference
scores of the different class levels of Anaari secondary
school learners of English lexical verbs.
There is no significant difference in the mean interference
scores of male and female Anaari secondary school
learners in English lexical verbs.
There is no significant difference in the mean interference
scores of urban and rural Anaati secondary school
learners in English lexical verbs.
I I CHAPTER TWO
REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
This chapter presents the literature review of the study under three broad headings and sub-headings as follows:
(1) Historical background of the Anaafi people
(a) Characteristics of the Anaaii Language.
(b) Anaaii Orthography, Alphabets and Phonemes.
(c) Anaaii Morphology.
(2) Theoretical Framework:
Inter-language Theories.
(a) Language Acquisition and Learning.
(b) Interference in Languages in Contact.
(c) Approaches to Contrastive Analysis.
(d) Verbals in Languages.
(e) Importance of English in Nigeria.
(f) Objectives of the Language Curriculum.
(g) The Role of Contrastive Studies in Curriculum Development. (3) Empirical studies Empirical studies on Anaaii and English phonological systems.
Empirical studies on phonotactics in Anaaii and English.
Empirical studies on intonation of Anaaii and English.
Empirical studies on AnaaA and English structural patterns.
Summary of Review of Related Literature. Historical Background of the AnaaA People
The history of the Anaafi people goes back at least one and a half thousand years ago. The name, Anaafi, was not given by the colonial masters as they did not know their origin, since the natives were already identified as such long before their arrival. Anaafi is the name of a tribe living in the South Eastern part of Nigeria, Udoh (1983:3) posits that:
Anaafi is a name derived from the characteristic behaviour of a certain tribe who cannot resist the least provocation and who are bequeathed with furious indignation and nature or an inborn nature of intolerance. In short, they have a war-like attitude and are naturally very vindictive in their way of life.
The researcher differs markedly from the above-observed opinion. This position is maintained because historians and political scientists, like
Appadorai (1974) postulate that the sum total of man encompasses life experiences. But succinctly, man is the product of his environment.
Also, from the investigator's oral interview with the immediate past secretary of Akwa lbom State Traditional Rulers' Council (1 997 - 2002), ihe Anaafi born interviewee maintained that the Anaafi people in their present location had faced incessant attacks from their lgbo neighbours of Abia State, who made successful attempts and encroached on their boarders. These attempts led to inter-tribal wars, and naturally made the Anaafi men to be always stern and on guard against attacks. See
Appendix I for the interview schedule. This submission by Udoh is outrightly incorrect and baseless because an AnaaA person is humane, trustworthy, liberal, open and friendly. Further to Udoh's account, the Anaaiis and the lbibios were known as bush hunters and fishermen who dwelt in the Delta County, east of the old Cross River. The Anaatis have no traditional legend of migration. According to their ancestors' argument, the Anaaiis and lbibios were regarded by the colonialists as one tribe. Today, the
Anaatis absolutely disagree to be called Ibibios. They do not regard themselves as belonging to the same tribe, though the dialects spoken by one can be understood by the other. According to ethical background, they are one race but not the same tribe. History has provided an account of their differences, which arose from 'idib' (a man, his wives and children). Several 'idibs' continued to multiply to form
'ekpuks' (consisting brothers, wives and children). Several ekpuks' formed a village controlled by a village head, who must be the descendant of that 'idib'. It is likely that the separation and distinction between the lbibios and the Anaatis originated from the notion of different 'idibs'. Thus, though the two groups appear to emerge from the same stock, the two groups are distinct and different, the difference accounting for the fear and suspicion that existed between the two groups from the beginning of their co-existence.
After many thousands of years of stay in lbom and the highlands of the Cross River, the Anaaiis migrated into different directions, where some groups temporarily settled along the coastal part of the Cross
River, and the eastern part of Niger Delta. After several years, they
migrated in small groups into different directions of the Cross River,
leaving large groups of their folks behind. Some of them settled at Eket, some moved to Oron, some to Western Nsit, all in Akwa lbom State.
From here also, the lbibios and the Anaaiis separated because the
Anaafis wanted to find a new location for their unification and maintenance of their identity as a people. The Anaaii ancestors did not forget some of their folks whom they left behind on the grounds of age, at the bank of the Cross River and the mainland of Eket. This simply explains the links between the Anaaiis and Eket villagers. From the oral interviews by the investigator, it was possible to trace the roots of Afaha
Eket in Eket Local Government Area, Afaha lkot Ebak in Essien Udim
Local Government Area, Afaha Qbofi in Abak Local Government Area,
Afaha Nsung in Qkobo Local Government Area and many other Afahas in Akwa lbom State. All of them are kinsmen (aruuk), who were separated during their migrations, but maintained the original name of their ancestors. 'Afaha' is connected with the Anaaii family, although many of them have claimed to be Ibibios. For many centuries now, Eket people have not accepted to be called lbibios because of their alien language and seemingly strange moral ideas. The Anaaii descendants are still among the Ibibios, as well as the Efiks and Oron tribe.
Characteristics of Anaaii Language
The characteristics of the Anaaii language are those of Bantu languages. Bantu languages have basic structural similarities, although they belong to eleven zones or areas. According to Clement Martyn
Doke, Prof. Emeritus of Bantu Philology, University of Witwaterand
(adapted from Udondata 2001), who illustrates radical connexion between the numerous Bantu languages by comparing two nouns, and two verbs, which run through a selection of languages representing the eleven zones; he concludes by intimating that they are eloquent proof of the family connexion of all Bantu languages. Two such words "see" and
"eat" reflect the following out of eleven zones:
Zone "see"
1 pona
bona
mona & muna
wona
ona
vona
mona
Anaa A mono (mo-ono)
Zone ''eat"
4 lya
1 gna
1 dla
I ja
I ria
1 cha, chya
Anaaii lya, dia, lia
Common characteristics of Bantu as reflected in Anaaii language
can be classified as morphological and phonetic.
(i) Morphological
The patterns of word formation in the Anaaii language include: (a) high inflexion;
(b) high conjugation of the verbs;
(c) concord agreement;
(d) non-existence of cases except with personal pronouns;
(e) quinary numeration - after itien (5),it is itiekiet (6), itiaba
(7),ltiaita (8).
(ii) Phonetic
The phonetic characteristics are straightforward and simple.
They include:
(a) intonation;
(b) open syllable ending usually in a vowel;
(c) use of pure vowel system -
(d) a e i o u which are either long or short.
Anaafi Vowels
AnaaA vowels in this study are those submitted by the Anaaii
Study Panel (ASP) in the AnaaA language to Afe Anaafi in 1992.
AnaaA Vowel Chart
front central back
High
Mid
Low
Adapted from Udondata (2001 : 239)
Anaafi has sixteen vowels. Of these seven /i,e,a,~,o,u,tt/are monophthongs; nine lie, i~,ei, ai, ai, oi, ua, LID, uel are diphthongs. The monophthongs are of three groups (fqllowing the part of the tongue used during their realization). The front vowels are two, represented thus /i,e/.
There is only one central vowel represented thus /a/. The back vowels are four and are represented thus /~~,o,u,tt/.
Front Vowels
/it - is a short, front close vowel produced with lips spread. It can be found in word initial, medial and final as in: ikut - tortoise, tia - kick, ujai - beauty let: It is a short front half-close vowel produced with lips spread. It is found word initially, medially and finally: tibetid - ladder dep - buy
11;mife - play
/at - is a central vowel, it is short and open, produced with lips neutral
and appears in all linguistic environments as shown below:
agwo - person
iban - women
ma - love
Back Vowels
These include h,o,u,d.
131 - is short, open and produced with rounded lips. It appears word
medial and final only as in:
abo6 - mosquito
icho - dwarf lo/ - is short, half-close, produced with rounded lips, and appears
only word medial and final, e.g. abom - abomination
~pono- respectlhonour
/u/ - short, close, produced with rounded lips, and appears in all
linguistic environments: uma - miser duk - enter atu - multitude
I - short, close, produced with rounded lips, and appears only word
medial as in:
6ft5d - buttocks
Diphthongs
Anaaii has nine diphthongs which include / ie, is, ei, ai, si, oi, ua, us, ue/
lie/ - is a glide, front close and produced with lips spread, as in
itieghe - it is not available
unyie - the owners
I - is a glide, front close and produced with lips rounded. It is found
word medial only: awiqfi - hunger lei/ - is a glide, produced with lips spread to front close. It is found at the medial position only e.g. teiye - remember /ail - is a glide, produced with lips spread and neutral to front close.
It appears only in words medial and final, e.g. ekaiya - they have gone akai - forest bil - is a glide from back open, produced with lips rounded to
front close and occurs only word medial and final, e.g. boiyo - imitate rinioi - bad peoplelthings
/oil - is a glide, produced with rounded lips to front close and in
words medial and final only: iboiyoke - Helshe has not passed aboi - big stick
Iual - is a glide, produced with lips rounded to central open, and
found only in final position: tlja - cry
Iu31 - a glide, produced with lips rounded to back open, and in
words medial and final positions only: rinuon - finger iruo - fall
Iuel - a glide, produced with lips rounded to front half close
position and appears word medial only: ndueghe - I'm not guilty
Below is a representation of the nine Anaaii diphthongs: front central back
High
Mid
Low
Anaaii Diphthongs (Adapted from Udondata (1993: 44)
Anaaii Consonants
Anaafi has twenty-one consonants. Eleven of these are voiced, and ten are voiceless. Those in the voiced group are /b,d,gw,d3,
,m,n,nw,p,q,y,w/;and those in the voiceless group are /p,t,k,kp,kw ~J,S,~,r/
Voiced Consonants
/b/ - a bilabial plosive which occurs in all phonological environments, e.g. ben - carryltake lbene - wall deb- - ,buy
Id/ - is an alveolar plosive and appears at all environments, e.g. daiya - sleep (V) idap - sleep (N) ded- - spread
/gw/ - a labio-velar plosive found only initially and medially, e.g.
gwed-- write egwok - swimming (N)
/a/ - a palato-alveolar affricate in initial and medial positions only, e.g. jed- - wash ujai - beauty /m/ - a bilabial nasal which occurs in all environments, e.g. mia - beat ima - love inem - sweetness
In/ - an alveolar nasal which occurs in all environments, e.g.
nuk - push
unari - wound
unen - right
/p/ - a palatal nasal found in all phonological environments, e.g.
nyamlpaml - sell
anyiii/apir]/ - name
nyiin /pin/ - dip
/r]/ - a velar nasal which occurs in all positions e.g.
iika /qka/ - society
ibana /ibaqa/ - gossip
ataii /ataq/ - fence
/nw/ - a labio-velar nasal found initially and medially only:
nwofi - drink
anwenwen - black
/y/ - a palatal approximant found in medial position e.g. kpeiye - beg
/wl - a velar approximant in initial and medial positions only:
22 w6ot - borrow
iwit - drum
Voiceless Consonants
These are ten in number, and they include: /p,t,k,kp,kw, r,fl,f,s,tr/
;pi - a bilabial plosive in medial and final positions only e.g. tipe - bore a hole
ndap- - dream (N)
It1 - an alveolar plosive in all environments e.g.
tia - kick
utebe - smell
utut - endlfinal
IkI - a velar plosive which occurs in all phonological environments:
ere - think
kt- wine
kok - grind
Ikpl - a labio-velar plosive found in initial and medial positions only:
kpeep- - teach
akpokoro - table
Ikwl - a labio-velar found in initial and medial positions:
kwoi - peellcarve
ukwak - piece of iron or bicycle
121 - an alveolar tap in initial and medial positions only, e.g. aruru/A~u~u/- power
/tf/ - a palato-alveolar affricate in initial and medial positions only:
ch~p- disappear
uchoro - feast If/ - a labio-dental fricative in initial and medial positions only feb- - dodge ufkn - suffering Is/ - an alveolar fricative in initial and medial positions only: sop - be fast isin - waist 1131 - a glottal fricative found in the medial position only:
/mbo136/ - assembly, gathering.
The voiced and voiceless AnaaiS consonants, as well as their places and
manner of artiuclation are presented in the figure below: Anaaii Consonant Chart
Manner of 'lace of Ar Articulation Palato- Alveolar Palatal VL VD VL VD
Plosives
Fricatives
Affricates tJ (3
Tap
Nasals
Approximants
Adapted from Udondata, (2001 : 241) 24 ($) AnaaA Orthography, Alphabets and Phonemes (i) Orthography
An orthography is a system of symbols and rules used in writing a language. The need for an orthography arises when a language is allocated functions to be realized. One of such functions is the local language in education as a medium of instruction, and as a taught subject. The National Policy on Education (FRN:1998), permits the use of Nigerian languages at various levels of education. The policy states that pre-primary and primary education will take place in the mother tongue (MT) or language of the immediate community (LC). From
primary to senior secondary school (SSS), Nigerian languages are to
remain taught subjects. The policy specifically recommends the study of the MT or LC, and a national language (Hausa, lgbo or Yoruba) at the junior secondary school level, and one major language at the SSS level.
Of immediate concern to the situation are the first two aspects of
the policy, which calls for development of the language, the foundational
step being the production of orthography. In line with this expectation, the Anaaii language has been developed with an acceptable
orthography. Anaaii sounds are peculiar to Anaaii language and, in some cases similar to alien sounds, as symbolized in the alphabet.
Where foreign words have been assimilated into Anaaii, the phonology
either remains unchanged, or is the closest to Anaaii sounds, for instance
English Anaaii ball bod basin basin pin pin zip sip Anaaii orthography incorporates tine sound and letters of the alphabet realizable in Anaati language. It is based on a seven vowel system (diphthongs not counted), and a twenty-one consonant system, seven monophthongs, six diphthongs which have been extensively discussed under characteristics of Anaati language. These sounds are represented below:
Alphabet Word Gloss Phonemic Representation
A abati Pot labar$
b biom carry on head /biom/
ch chak laugh /qa k/
d dia eat Idi a/
e ebod goat Iebod-/
f fad embrace /fad-/ /fig ub-/ B ngub grass /feuel g h feghe run
gw gwed write Igwed-/
I inuen bird /inuen/ @ed-/ j jed wash
k kan be able /kan/ Ikwad-/ kw kwad scrap /m ia/ m mia beat /n'3/ n no give /ekpar]/ ii ekpaA spoon /qw'3r] / nw nwoA drink nyam sell
agwo personal
aboti mosquito
koppo unhook
kpa cut
rud draw
soro squat
tia kick
ufok house
efud buttocks
iwit drum
daiya sleep
afai madness
ajei palm frond
koi draw water
boi collect
tui be woken up
gwui peg many things, e.g. sticks in the soil
*The velar nasal 101 has two allophones [rj] and [rjw] (a labialised velar nasal). (ii) The Alphabets
Conventional AnaaA Alphabet Sound Usage Meaning Alphabet
Abati Pot bo take che look di come eka mother afoti cloth feghe run feghe run ima love jak leave it ka 90 kpa die kwooro preach alan oil m bad dirt ne k dance anye helshelit nwoii drink m bood mound dep buy - - aru hole sana be clean tie sit utun sun aku priest - - weke breathe in - - iy a ah! - -
(iii) Phonemes
Four of the twenty-six (26) letters of the English Alphabets, namely Q, V, X & Z, do not feature in the AnaaA orthography. The remaining twenty-two (22) feature mainly as single phonemes and/or as two letter phonemes. In English, K and P are single phonemes, and can appear together only as a sequence. In Anaafi, although K and P are single phonemes, they appear together also as a phoneme. Others follow that pattern with their distinct sound value. Eight such sound combinations are listed below:
ch as in che - look
gh " I1 feghe - run
gw " ,I gwed- - write
kp kpa - die
kw " ,I kwoo-- - preach
nw I1 It nwoii - drink
nY I, ,I nyene - have
The Anaafi language student or child learns the English alphabet
on which the Anaaii alphabet is based, but observes definite variations
applied to C, G, H, Q, V, X & 2, which have no alphabet sounds of their
own in Anaaii.
(L) Anaaii Morphology
Morphology is one of the sub-systems of language, and is
concerned with the internal structure of words. Brown and Miller (1980)
consider a morpheme as a distributional unit of the syntax of a language.
Lexical morphemes naturally have stems which realize lexemes.
Potter (1957) has identified five morphological processes. These
include inflection, affixation, compounding reduplication and suppletion.
Suppletion is a morphological process by which a missing form in a
grammatical system is supplied from an unrelated root. Apart from suppletion, the other four morpholqgical processes are realized in
Anaati. A few examples are given below:
(a) InflectionlAffixation: These are mostly realized among
verbs, adverbs and adjectives as in:
Tia - kick
amatia - he kicked
ajaiya 8ka'n - more beautiful
ajaiya akan'na - most beautiful
asob aka'n - faster
asob akan'na - fastest
(b) Compounding: Some Anaati nouns combine with other
nouns to produce compounds with clause characteristics as in:
agwodeen agwo + idee'n \I/ \I/ \I/ (man) (person) (male) agwodeen - person who is a man. Others include the
following:
udughik'od-udLiphI + iko'dI
(snake) (rope) (bush)
Of 'oghibokj uf 'ok + ibok
(hospitalv, (house) + (medicine)
Reduplication: Anaaii verbs, adverbs and adjectives are
often reduplicated as in:
tia - kick atiatia - he has already kicked
s'ob - be fast
usob-usob - fast-fast (adverb)
nyi~'ii - be tall
hyio'ii-hyio'ii - tall-tall (adjective) inter-language Theories
There are several theories in the second language acquisition and learning (SLAL) literature. The choice of SLAL is aimed at making the distinction between language acquisition and learning. Several other terms like 'models', 'perspectives', 'hypotheses', 'theoretical claims' are synonymous with 'theory' in SLAL literature as well. The wide range of terms reflects the complexity of language as a phenomenon. There is also a wide range of theoretical constructs designed to investigate SLAL.
As a result, the theories are either too wide in scope (in order to
accommodate the wide variety), or too narrow (in which case they
cannot account for the phenomena at all the levels of linguistic
description).
The complexity of language has led to several theories of
language acquisition. Brown (1980) is of the opinion that theories of
language acquisition are studied to explain the fantastic journey from the first anguished cry at birth to adult competence in a language. In this
study, only two theories are examined - the environmentalists' and
cognitivists' or nativists' theories.
The environmentalists' theorists claim that the child's mind at the
time of entrance into the world is a clean slate - a tabula rasa, bearing no preconceived notion of the worldview or even language for that matter, and that the environment being conditioned through
reinforcement is responsible for shaping the child mentally and otherwise, afterwards. This suggests that the child learns to produce correct sentences because he is positively reinforced when he says something wrong as Fromkin and Rodman (1978) opine. Imitation is another major tenet of behaviourism. The child is viewed as attempting to copy what he hears, and by regular practice; he establishes a set of
acceptable habits in the new language.
Notable environmentalist theories are the behaviourist-based
stimulus - response (S-R) learning theories of Skinner (1957) with his
'Operant Conditioning'. In his experiment he put a rat in a cage with two
levers. As the rat was operating within its environment (the cage), and
pressed the second lever (stimulus), some food got released. At first,
the rat explored the cage and pressed the lever accidentally; then, after
several of these accidents, the rat learnt to associate the lever with food
and pressed it any time it was hungry (Skinner 1957).
Therefore, the satisfying effect (food) strengthened the bond
between motivation (hunger) and the response (pushing the lever). For
Skinner, this positive reinforcement tends to make the rat to repeat
actions on the second lever, while resisting from repeated actions on the
first lever. Skinner then concludes that positive reinforcement (response
to a siimulus) tends to promote increased occurrence, while negative
response tends to lead to a decrease in probability of occurrence. With the above conclusion in mind, Skinner attempted the analysis of language acquisitionllearning in terms of stimulus and response. To him, the child learns words by being reinforced. During the telegraphic phase, the child mixes up his tenses and this is gradually reshaped through reinforcement and refined through the child's practice.
For example, the lexical verb 'eat' can be used by the child at the simple present form with all persons without realizing the need to inflect the verb by using the -s morpheme to indicate the singular form, for example: 'i eat', 'you eat', 'helshe eat'. This can be reshaped into
'helshe eats' through reinforcement by the parents or anybody. In this way, the environment encourages the child to produce grammatically correct and acceptable sentences.
The behaviourists' views have attracted criticisms from various authorities. McLaughlin (1987) and Brown (1980) in Ndahi (1989) report some of them as follows:
It is hard for the behaviourists to account for the uniformity
of language acquisition throughout the human species.
The behavioursists' view cannot explain how the child can
learn a system so complex in such a relatively short period
of time, since it regards the child as beginning at level zero
(a tabula rasa).
Adult speech is not fault-free and so it is a wonder that the
child does not acquire the imperfect language of the adult.
Chomsky's review of Skinner's work brought about a shift of focus from environmental factors to innate abilities. This led to the nativists' or cognitivists' theories, which assume innate in-born endowment in man, which may be features of a particular kind. Chomsky (1965) categorised syntactic categories, distinctive phonological features and abstract parameters governed by rules and parameters, all of which make up an innate or in-born component called Universal Grammar. Chomsky further argues that even adults who belong to a particular linguistic community (i.e. the native speakers of a language) judge whether a sentence is correct or not, although they may not have made such a sentence in their lives previously. For example, a native English speaker will be able to say that "put the book in the blue drawer' is correct, but 'John is putting on a shirt black' is wrong.
According to Chomsky, nobody teaches these children to choose or not to choose alternatives. In line with this argument that language capacity is an in-built organ, Chomsky proposes that every child is born with a language acquisition device (LAD), which is programmed to recognise the universal rules that underline any particular language that a child is exposed to.
Within a background of these theories, certain modes of enquiry have developed in second language learning (SLAL) research. Also, different types of data analyses have been adopted depending on which theoretical model one sympathises with. For a long time, contrastive comparison characterised language teaching as grammars of languages involved in language teaching were accordingly designed to take care of the problem areas. Contrastive Analysis (CA) has some key notions underlying it.
Two of such notions deserve mention, even though they were motivated differently. One of such key concepts is "interference" which refers to those instances of deviation from the norms of either language which occur in the speech of bilinguals, as a result of their familiarity with more than one language. It operates at two levels, speech and the speaker's knowledge. At the level of speech, it is carried along like sand by a stream, and at the level of the speaker's knowledge, it is like deposits of sand at the bottom of a lake (Weinreich, 1953).
Another fundamental concept underlying Contrastive Analysis
Hypothesis (CAH) is Lado's (1957) "transfer", where individuals tend to transfer the forms of their native language and culture to the foreign language and culture. On the basis of this assumption, the CAH further predicts that areas of similarities between the two languages will be easy for the learners, while areas of differences would be difficult for the
learners, thus leading to both positive and negative transfer. The period following Lado's work saw extensive comparison of languages.
Although Weinreich and Lado's concepts of interference and transfer
have come under some disrepute with more research, they are still fundamental in SLAL research for they first recognised the special
relationship between first language and second language.
The foregoing discourse has shown clearly that there is no
generally acceptable consensus about the terminological distinction
between language learning and acquisition, but in this study, there is a
clear-cut distinction between them. The researcher will however, use the theories so far discussed, which invariably relate to language learning and acquisition, and precisely use the method of Contrastive
Analysis to determine interference of Anaaii with English lexical verbs among secondary school students of Anaaii origin.
Language Acquisition and Learning
In an attempt to establish a distinction between language acquisition and learning, Krashen (1988) posits that language acquisition is sub-conscious, while language learning is conscious. Acquisition according to him is a sub-conscious process identical to the process by which children acquire their first language. This means that acquisition is a natural communication which comes through meaningful interaction with one's environment. Learning on the other hand, is a conscious process which results in knowing and familiarising oneself with language in a classroom situation with particular attention to error detection and correction, formal rules and feedback.
The above is an indication that conscious learning does not become unconscious acquisition after a while; neither does unconscious acquisition metamorphose into conscious learning. In his reaction to
Krashen's acquisition - learning distinction, McLaughlin (1987) notes that in as much as language could be acquired in the classroom when the focus is on communication, an adult could also obtain instruction from friends and relatives in a non-classroom setting per se, but conscious attention to rules that distinguish language learning.
Furthermore, on language acquisition - learning distinction, authors like Cook (1978) in Ndahi (1982) use the terms 'formal' and 'informal' to refer to 'learning' and acquisition respectively. For Fromkin and Rodman (1 978); Crystal (1987) and Terrence (1989), a distinction between 'acquisition' and 'learning' is debatable, and an attempt to characterize them would rather result in confusion. So for them an interchangeable use of the two is a very safe solution. But in this study, the terms are not used interchangeably, because in a second language situation such as ours, there is a distinction between language acquisition and language learning.
First and Second Language Acquisition
In a chronological order, an individual could acquire a language as the first, second, third, etc. The first language (L1) is usually one's mother-tongue, and every other language subsequently learnt would be second, third, fourth languages.
Kleinmann (1 977) identifies three different stages of language acquisition as follows: ages 1 - 3, first language contact and acquisition; ages 4 - puberty, child language acquisition; after puberty and above, adult second language acquisition. This is indicative of the fact that between ages one and puberty, a child has the ability and can actually acquire as many languages as he is exposed to, with the first language acquisition limited to only between ages 1 - 3. It is however, noteworthy to infer from Kleinmann's position that first language learning and acquisition is possible only when the child-learner or acquirer is properly surrounded by adult native speakers who will then act as motivators to him. Most linguists are in agreement with Kleinmann's stage-by-stage language acquisition concept. However, the earliest cries and whimpers of the newborn are ruled out. According to Fromkin and Rodman (1978),
Mgbodile (1999), these cries are the child's involuntary responses to hunger and discomfort. The babbling period therefore marks the first stage. To further strengthen the assertion, Wallwork (1969) asserts that the phoneme like sounds produced during babbling is actually a result of the child's experimenting with its vocal organs. The stage between ages
1 - 3 is the period of the 'holophrastic' stage, during which the child makes one word sentence, e.g. food, water etc. This is quickly followed by what Fromkin and Rodman call 'telegraph to infinity' stage during which the child mainly makes use of content words to the exclusion of functional or function words.
In contrast with first language acquisition, second language acquisition can take place in various ways. First, a second language (L2) may be acquired by children, adolescents or adults. Second, the Lg acquirer may acquire his first language (LI) and L2 simultaneously or successfully. Third, a second language may be acquired in either an LI, environment (of the learner), a second language is usually acquired through instruction in the L2 environment and L2 is acquired through verbal contact with native speakers in a natural environment according to Els, Bongarets, Extra & Dietan (1984).
Interference in Languages in Contact
Interference in this study is applied to the trace left by someone's native language upon the foreign language he has acquired. Quirk and Greenbaunm (1972) note that interference is applied only to those traces of the first language that is pedagogically desirable to identify and eradicate.
Also, language contact situations arise whenever there is a meeting of speakers who do not all share the same language, and who need to communicate. When the communicative needs of people go beyond what gestures and other paralinguistic signals can achieve, some use of a second language becomes necessary. The languages learnt in contact situations may or may not show some kind of language mixing, that is, the merging of characteristics of two or more languages in any verbal communication. If mixing does occur, native language influence is only one of the possible forms it can take. Another kind of mixing according to Terrence (1989) is in the form of borrowing from a second language into the native language and code-switching, in which there is a systematic interchange of words, phrase and sentences of two or more languages.
Usually, the native language is the first to be acquired and because of this, it is bound to influence the foreign one to a certain extent, and thus it dictates the laws to the foreign one, according to
Vereboj (1971). It is this influence that this study focuses on. It is only apparent that in second language acquisition or learning, transfer takes place when an individual who already knows his mother tongue tries to apply rules in it to the one being learnt. When the transfer proves favourable, perhaps, because the structures of the two languages are similar, a "positive transfer" or "facilitation" is realized. But when the transfer proves unfavourable, perhaps because the structures are different, a "negative transfer" or interference occurs. The effects of this interference in language learning cannot be regarded with mute indifference in this study since language interference is an aspect of linguistics, which affects the teaching, and learning of any language. Bright and Mcgregor (1 971) in support of the above assertion note that the grammatical apparatus is programmed into the mind as the first language interferes with the smooth learning of the second. To further explain this, Veroboj (1971) declares that this interference affects both expressive and impressive speech bounds and is inherent in the use of a foreign language. He goes further to caution that the main
obstacle which any learner of a foreign language should guard against is the influence of the mother-tongue on language learning and acquisition, since grammatical notions such as gender, voice, tense are subject to
very strong interference. In spite of the problems of language interference, the first language usually serves as a foundation on which the teaching and learning of the second language is based. This assertion is further strengthened by Wilkins (1972:86-87) when he noted that: If we were to wander into a classroom where pupils were learning a foreign language, and if we listened to them speaking that language, or observed their attempts to write it, we should notice before long, that the same mistakes of pronunciation, spelling, grammar and vocabulary tended to recur in the language of different individuals. In time too, we should probably be able to identify the mother tongue of the pupils even if not a word in it had been spoken in the classroom ... If therefore we look at the speech and writing of the foreign language learner, there is little reason to doubt that we will find many mistakes, which can be traced back to the mother tongue. The Effects of Interference on Language Learning
Language interference is an aspect of linguistics, which affects the learning, and teaching of a given language. Obviously, a second language learner will experience learning inhibition due to interference since the two languages (L1 and L2) are bound to get in the way of each other. Harrison (1973:ZO) intimates that the fact that the systems of the mother tongue in sound and structure are learned so well in early childhood used so frequently and continuously afterwards cause special problems to the foreign language teacher and learner.
As earlier stated, Veroboj (1971) posits that this interference affects both expressive and impressive speech bounds and is inherent in the use of a foreign language. A yet corroborative statement on the effect of interference in language learning is made by Stageberg
(1981:79) that the phonotactic patterns of a language have a compulsive effect upon its speakers in that these speakers find it hard to break the patterns of their native tongue and habituate them to the use of new ones. Approaches of Contrastive Analysis
Contrastive Analysis is believed to have been developed originally by Fries (1945) and later expanded and classified by Robert
Lado (1957). Politzer (1965:6) describes the linguistic system of language as a set of building stones that are available repeatedly to every speaker of the language in order to build the bridge of communication between himself and others. Since houses are often compared with one another to see where they are similar or where they differ in structure or beauty, we take the liberty to run similar comparisons of the verb tenses in AnaaA and English, to see where they differ or resemble; and where these differences or similarities are likely to create problems or facilitate learning.
Tamen (1985) in his unpublished project identified two schools of language analysts who compared errors made by second or third language learners in order to see why and how these errors are committed. He named the two schools the "Contrastive Analysis School" and the Won-Contrastive Analysis School". He then suggests that while the "Contrastive Analysts", basing their contentions on proven
psychological factors argue that while a child is learning a first language,
he will tend to use his second language speech, and where structures in
his first language (L,) and his second language (L2) differ, he will
commit errors; the Won-Contrastive Analysts" also using empirical
evidence, contend that children actively organise the L2 speech they
hear and make generalisations about its structure as children learning
their first language do.
Politzer seems to agree more with the first school's argument
since he himself says that a great many, perhaps most, of a foreign
language interference is due to one simple and comprehensible failure:
the learner mistakenly equates building stones of the foreign system with
the individual building stones as if they had been taken from his own set.
Politzer (19656) holds the view then that:
The psychology of second language learning must take into account three important facts, which inevitably determine much of the learning process. First, and perhaps most important, is that the native language interferes with the acquisition of the new one; second, that language is habit; and third, that language is an elaborate system. As a matter of fact, the researcher does not want to take sides or join in the argument of the "Contrastive" and the "Non-Contrastive" proponents, but precisely to use the method of the "Contrastive
Analysts" to study English and Anaaii verb tenses in order to prove whether their contentions are correct.
Harris (1969) is of the view that it is important to carry out a detailed point by point comparison of target language and L1, so as to provide a good basis for efficient, well-informed instruction. In his view, contrastive analysis should cover aspects of phonology, morphology, syntax and those aspects of the culture, which affects such language learning and usage. Through contrastive analysis, we can in Harris opinion identify:
Identical language patterns in languages (identical
language patterns mean phonology, syntax, semantics,
lexis).
Patterns in the foreign languages, which have no
equivalents with the L1.
Problems in the foreign or target language which
predictably are possible points of interference, and which
can become useful learning experiences.
Besides, contrastive analysis will be of immense value when foreign languages are being designed for learners with the same linguistic background. Such an analysis would help the language teacher to determine the selective difficulty level of different patterns in the target or foreign language.
43 Contrastive studies play a very significant role in curriculum development among which are:
Contribution to language testing. For example, a teacher could
test only the learning problems predicted by C.A. According to
James (1980), if a multiple - choice type of objective test is being
constructed; a CA of L1 and L2will suggest the types of distractors
to use. This view is further corroborated by Harris (1968) in
James (1980) as he says that the most effective distractors in a
test item will be those, which evoke first language responses from
those subjects who have not fully mastered the very different
patterns of the target language.
Ability to influence the selection of learning materials. This does
not mean inclusion or exclusion per se, but intensity selection,
which is selection for emphasis.
Playing a significant role in the grading of learning materials by
contrastively teaching simple elements first, before contrastively
difficult ones, in keeping with the universal principles of education
where learning should proceed from the simple to complex.
Lending itself to any befitting language instructional strategy.
Providing contrastive information through bilingual dictionaries. In
support of this importance, Terrence (1989) states that although
the comparisons are sometimes restricted to words in the native
and target languages, the most carefully prepared dictionaries
often provide some comparisons of pronunciation and grammar
as well.
44 (f) Providing a basis for pedagogical grammar or applied grammar.
Rutherford and Smith (1988) assert that this is the means by
which acquisition of second or foreign language grammar may be
expressly facilitated.
Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis
The conviction that linguistic differences could be used to predict learning difficulty gave rise to the Contrastive Analysis Hypothesis
(CAH). Larsen-Freeman and Long (1991) opine that where two
languages were similar, positive transfer would occur, and where they were different, negative transfer or interference would result. This assertion gives predictive power to contrastive analysis, i.e where differences are identified between aspects of two languages in C.A., the
problems of the target language learner lie therein. Below are the words
of Lado (1957:2) - the pioneer of modern contrastive analysis on the
predictive power of CA.
We assume that the student who comes in contact with a foreign language will find some features of it quite easy and others extremely difficult. The teacher who has made a comparison of the foreign language with the native language of the student will know better what the real learning problems are and can better provide for teaching them.. . .
James (1980) summarizes that from the above quotation, it could
be restated that CA can predict what aspects of a given language will
cause problems, difficulties, errors or even the tenacity of certain errors
i.e. their strong resistance to extinction through time and teaching.
The CAH discussed above is often referred to as the strong
hypothesis because its predictive power is not without limitations. The
limitations of CA stem from the fact that not all errors are the result of 45 negative transfer or interference. Other sources of errors as identified by
Alatis (1968), Selinker (1WZ), and Richards (1974) include intralingual
(errors due to the nature of the target language) transfer of training; strategies of L2 learning and L2 communication strategies The weak version of the contrastive analysis hypothesis on the other hand stems from Error Analysis (EA). It was invoked by linguists to explain a number of errors. In this version, researchers start with learner errors and explain at least a subset of them by pointing to the similarities and differences between the two languages. By this development, CA possesses 'a posterori' (after the fact analysis) explanatory power rather than a predictive power
The Theoretical Basis of Contrastive Analysis
According to Hammer and Rice (1965) in Jackson (1981),
Contrastive Analysis involves a systematic comparison of selected linguistic features of two or more languages, the intent of which is to provide teachers and textbook writers with a body of information which can be of service in the preparation of instructional materials, the planning of courses, and the development of classroom techniques. The present study is based on the following conceptual framework in Lado
... individuals tend to transfer the forms and meanings, and the distribution of forms and meanings of their native language and culture to the foreign language and culture, both productively when attempting to speak in the language and act in the culture, and receptively when attempting to grasp and understand the language and the culture as practised by natives. The phenomenon of mother tongue interference that has been discussed in the preceding section is firmly rooted in this fundamental assumption of Lado (1957:l) in which he argues that:
A practical confirmation of the validity of our assumptions has come from the work of linguists who study the effects of close contacts between languages in bilingual situations. They report that many linguistic distortions heard among bilinguals correspond to describable differences in the language involved . . . .
Fiirther to the confirmation, and based on studies of language contact in bilingual situations, Sridhar (1981) reminds us that every experienced foreign language teacher knows that a substantial number of persistent mistakes made by his learners are traced to the 'pull of the mother-tongue'.
Prior to the fundamental assumption earlier cited, Fries (1945) in
Larsen-Freeman and Long (1991) stipulated that the most efficient teaching materials were those that were based upon a scientific description of the language to be learned, carefully compared with a parallel description of the native learner.
Following Lado's basic assumption above, the existence of cross- linguistic influence in language learning has been accepted as a fact.
The second language learner is naturally liable to applying first language patterns and 'rules' to second language learning situations. As long as the second language-learning situation is in one's native environment, the learner cannot be expected to suppress or abandon completely the first language influence. As Lado points out, it is obvious that knowledge of contrastive data is highly desirable. Error Analysis (EA)
Error Analysis according to Corder (1971) and Selinker (1972) is the study of learners' inter-language in order to better understand the process of L2 acquisition. Error Analysis also goes further to differentiate between mistakes and errors, and according to Sabe (1995), a mistake is failure to use the known system correctly, this failure may occur as a result of fatigue, excitement, ailment etc. On the other hand, an error is a noticeable deviation from the adult grammar of a native speaker made by learners who have not yet mastered the rules of the Lz, while a mistake can readily be self corrected, an error cannot be self corrected because the speaker does not possess the competence to correct.
Error Analysis examines errors attributable to all possible sources, not just those which result from negative of a native language.
It indicates that only some errors are attributable to mother tongue and suggests that learners do not actually make all the errors that contrastive analysis predicts they do. It claims that learners from
different native language backgrounds make similar errors in learning
one target language. Selinker (1974) posits that possible general
sources of errors include language transfer, transfer of training, strategy
of second language learning, strategies of second language
communication and overgeneralization.
On the whole, EA seeks to account for learners' errors that CA
cannot predict. To the proponents of error analysis like Dulay, Burt and
Krashen (1982), studying learners' errors serves two major purposes.
F~rst,it provides data from which inferences about the nature of the language learning processes can be made. Second, it indicates to teachers and curriculum developers which part of the target language students have most difficulty producing correctly, and which error types detract most from a learner's ability to communicate effectively.
The Limitations of Error Analysis (EA)
When researchers focus only on learners' errors, they are denied access to the whole picture and, and not what makes them successful according to Larsen-Freeman and Long (1991). The EA approach to second language acquisition causes doubt and uncertainty. As queried by Brown (1980), there is danger in paying too much attention to errors because while errors reveal a system at work, the classroom second language teacher can become so preoccupied with identifying errors that the correct utterances in the second language go unnoticed. To Corder
(1974), error analysis is a pseudo-procedure that purports to contain a methodology that is partly untenable in principle and partly impossible in practice.
Krashen (1988) views another limitation of EA in the sense that there is the lack of precision and specificity in the definition of error categories. No effort has been made to define error categories to allow replication or comparative studies to be conducted with scientific rigor. lntralingual error for example, has been imprecisely defined by Krashen
(1 988: 174) thus: "lntralingual errors are those which reflect the general characteristics of rule learning, such as faulty overgeneralization, incomplete application of rules, and failure to learn conditions under which rules apply." Inter-lingual errors occur when L1 does not have a rule which L2 has; the learner applies an L2 rule, producing an error, (Lococo, 1976).
According to Krashen and his friends, the definitions above are quite different and would lead researchers to report different findings for the same data, with respect to types and frequencies of intra-lingual errors.
Lastly, EA fails to account for the strategy of avoidance. Areas, which learners know that could be problematic, could be avoided, and in such a case, EA will fail to account justifiably for the avoidance area.
Based on the limitations cited above, Larsen-Freeman and Long (1991) conclude that the weaknesses of EA are too blatant for it to continue to serve as the primary mode of second language acquisition analysis.
Udofot (1998) while investigating on phonological facilitation and interference in English and lbibio asserts that facilitation deserves more research since lbibio seems to exert a phonological tyranny over
English. She concluded in her study that similarities between a few consonants of English and lbibio constitute positive transfer only in the area of articulation, while other factors like orthography and ignorance of phonology of both languages stand to nullify the advantages that could exist.
Afangideh (2002) in a study entitled "Present Tense Errors by lbibio Learners of English as a Second Language" discovered that one of the major sources of errors and difficulties, apart from interference from the mother tongue is the peculiarities inherent in the English
language. She asserted that the first level of error is caused by the inconsistencies and irregularities that characterize the structures and systems of the English language. Most of its rules, she opined abound with exceptioi r, some of which seem to contradict the rules and introduce confusion in the mind of the learner. This often leads to over- gereralization and misapplication of rules, resulting in ungrammatical construction and developmental errors.
Offorma (1998) while investigating " Error Analysis in Written
French: The Case of University of Nigeria, Nsukka, French 101
Students" expected these learners who were adult beginners and did not have any pre-knowledge of French to have some difficulties in their
French. The author thought that non-language students would make more lexical errors than language students. In her study, the author discovered three different types of errors, which were numerated as follows:
1. Lexical errors, which were traced to phonological interference
between L1 and 12 (English and French).
2. Structural interference, which was also traced to influence of the
structure of English on the written French.
3. Developmental errors, which was equally traced to lack of mastery of the target language (French). Learners frequently used words and structures in contexts and situations to which they do not apply. The author also discovered that both language and non-language
students encountered lexical and structural difficulties, though non-
language students made more structural errors than language students.
In her cmclusion, the author submitted that there was need to improve
5 1 on the description of French I01 as a service course, textbook currently in use and the strategies for the teaching of the course. Finally the author recommended that teachers should emphasize the exception of grammatical rules so that students do not engage in faulty generalizations. She went further to say that the students should be drilled in the structures, while periodic diagnostic assessment of the students' behaviours should be employed to enable the teacher to know what to stress and how.
Verbals in Languages
Emenanjo (1978) asserts that a 'verbal' is a general name for the verb, or anything derived from or related to verb, or as the combination of verb, complement and bound cognate noun. Every language has both a verbal system and a verb in a sentence. Put broadly, verbs are used to express an action, a process or a state of being. In almost all languages, the verb serves as the nerve centre of any meaningful utterance. Among the major words referred to as content words (noun, adjective, adverb and verb), the verb plays the most important role in the communication of ideas. Like the other major words, it contributes to the total meaning of the utterances and also performs the additional function of unifying the separate ideas, contents and functions of the major and minor words.
The verbal system has always been pointed out as the most
difficult problem area in language teaching and learning. Palmer
(19655) succinctly puts it this way:
The most difficult part of any language is usually the part that deals with the verb. Learning a
52 language is to a very large degree learning how to operate the verbal forms of that language, and, except in the case of those that are related historically, the patterns and structure of the verb in each language seem to differ very considerably from those in every other language.
All languages use verb forms to express time relations. While the
notion of time is universal, tense is a grammatical category that is
realized by verb forms. Hornby (1975: 1) illuminates the concepts of time and tense as follows:
The word "time" stands for a concept with which all mankind is familiar, divided into past, present and future. It is something independent of languages. The word "tense" stands for a verb form or series of verb forms used to express a time relation. Tenses may indicate whether an action, activity, or state is past, present or future. Tenses may also indicate whether an action, activity, or state is, was, or will be in progress over a period of time.
From the explanation cited above, it could be noted that while
time is something independent of language, tense in a linguistic device, varying from language to language.
Importance of English in Nigeria
The English language in Nigeria is the most important single
school subject in education. Because of this, parents and the general
public gauge one's academic standard by the English such as one
speaks. In this respect, Oluikpe (1979) observes that it does not actually
matter to the parent whether the child is able to develop a nuclear
energy for Nigeria as long as the child cannot speak the English
language with the golden voice, he is considered uneducated in the
Nigerian context. English language is a tool for academic excellence,
and is the medium of instruction at the tertiary level of education. At this
level, students do a lot of independent studies, and so, must have 5 3 mastery of the language in use before hoping to achieve academic excellence.
Adetugbo (1984) believes that most of the complaints against falling standard in education hinge on students' lack of competence in
English as a tool with which to acquire informational aspects of knowledge. English obviously plays an enviable role in the Nigerian national environment. It is the language of most newspapers and magazines radio and television programmes and street signs, it is the language of government, the law courts, commerce and banking, and even the Nigerian constitution is written in it. Other than these roles, it is perhaps in the field of education that English plays an extremely crucial role. The Nigerian National Policy on Education (1 981 :3) in recognition of the vital role of English maintains that the government will see to it that the medium of instruction in the primary school is initially the mother tongue (LI), or language of the immediate community, and that at a later stage English.
This implies that for a Nigerian child to be considered adequately educated, mastery of the English language is a necessity.
English does not only occupy a dominant position in learning, but also in general living, and because of the Nigerian society, it readily assumes the role of language for national cohesion. Adekunle (1985) posits that to get a Nigerian language to take over the internal communication roles of English effectively will be a 21st century miracle.
Adekunle further opines that English is the language of wider communication between different groups, the lingua franca and the "other tongue" and "further tongue" of many Nigerians. To further emphasize the importance of the English language, Quirk et al
(1972:484) say that:
It is a common heritage of British and Nigerians since the 19th century; the language of common wealth, a world language, one of the two working languages of the United Nations, and indeed the most frequently used both in debates, and general conduct of United Nations business.
The importance of the English language in the field of science and technology cannot be overlooked. In Nigeria's technological efforts,
English has been the major language in use. Because of its importance, teachers of English in technological institutions should sit up and gear their goals in teaching the subject towards communicative competence for useful and purposeful scientific and technological expertise.
The Role of the English Language Teacher
In discussing the role of the English language teacher, the
ri!estion that comes to bear is 'how does the lot of the English language teacher differ from that of the other teachers?
First of all, the English language teacher's role is one of many
pads. It is probable that some people prefer to use the term "English
language practitioner" as against "English language teacher." To them, the practitioner has more to do to contribute than the teacher in terms of
time, resources, intellect etc. For example, the English language
practitioner deals with needs analyses, syllabus design, materials writing
and/or adaptation, and evaluation in addition to the normal functions of
the classroom teacher and instructor. Hutchinson and Waters (1987) in support, assert that it is likely that in addition to the normal function of a classroom teacher, the
English language teacher will have to deal with needs analyses, syllabus design, materials writing, adaptation or evaluation. Secondly, because a great majority of English language teachers have not been trained as such, they therefore need to orientate themselves to a new environment for which they have been ill-prepared. He is also confronted with new realms of knowledge, and he has got to do some extra homework in order to cope; it is an uphill task calling for extra effort for no extra pay.
Krashen (1 988) puts forward the following requirements for the language teacher(s), who are expected to:
(1) carry out and interpret needs analysis for a group of individuals;
(2) design a syllabus for a class based on his analysis, select and
adapt learning materials for a class from the many published
materials now available;
(3) develop a working knowledge of his students' subject.
Although no English teacher can be expected to become acquainted with a specialist subject, Krashen says that overnight,
English has bridged the great divide between arts and sciences, and English teachers can no longer afford to remain aloof from the world of science and technology. Hutchinson and Waters (1987) further reiterate that all language teachers are in effect pioneers who are helping to shape the world of language.
The English language teacher's role is also made manifest in the area of educating his fellow teachers or colleagues from whom he is likely to face the problem of the lack of co-operation. He should regard his colleagues as partners in progress, and make them aware of his intentions. Method of approach here is very important.
Again, to solve the problem of limited resources, the English teacher should improvise where necessary, and as much as possible liaise with other teachers, especially science and technology teachers for help in supplying some of the needed materials.
Team teaching is another function of the English teacher. For him to succeed in this, he should first of all orientate the students on the need and importance of this exercise because his learners might not understand and may tend to look down on the teacher and count him as inefficient.
Even though there is a clear consensus that examination is not the true test of knowledge, our teachers in Nigeria teach for examination purposes. These result-oriented teachers are reminded that education can afford to wait, but the meal ticket cannot, according to Ubahakwe
(1979). Neither the students nor the parents are actually to blame for this very low rationalisation because ours is a society of certificate worship where one can only survive meaningfully based on one's certificate.
Objectives of the Language Curriculum
It is not true that anybody who can speak English can teach it.
English is used both for academic purposes (EAP), and for social purposes in Nigeria, and its teaching objectives include the development of both linguistic and communicative competence. The objective calls for the teacher's complete mastery of the language, that is, proficiency in all four language skills - listening, speaking, reading and writing. The learner is equally expected to have adequate control over pronunciation, vocabulary, grammatical elements and structures, and mechanical accuracy or technical control. He should also possess fluency in spoken
and written English, and be able to comprehend the meaning of a
relevant spoken or written discourse. He should also be able to use the
English language appropriately in its socio-cultural and interpersonal
domains.
In realization of these objectives, the current secondary school
English language curricula actually go beyond mere grammatical
competence. This is in keeping with the JSS English language
curriculum as published by the Federal Ministry of Education (1 985:2),
which aim is to; promote a systematic development of both the language
skills and the literary knowledge that are considered essential for
effective use of English in oral and written communication as well as in
learning other subjects in the school curriculum.
Even though the curriculum can be said to have given full
attention to linguistic competence, the same cannot be said of
communicative competence which treatment in the curriculum is rather
sporadic.
Curriculum Content
The organization of content in curriculum, taking into cognition
the English language teaching and learning objectives earlier discussed,
is viewing language teaching essentially as a two-stage operation, with
early emphasis being on form and later emphasis shifting to function
(James, 1980). According to James, teachers, though convinced of the
value of the national functional syllabus and its uses, are skeptical about how it could be implemented with beginners. This claim brings to mind what Adeyanju (1 989) describes as basic classroom protocol (i.e how to interact with teachers, other students and learning materials), while commenting on students' need in the now widening range spin-off effects of English in Nigerian education.
Citing WAEC 1985, for example, Adeyanju notes that over 70% of candidates in the GCE examinations are said to be unable to express what they have in mind in readable English. He further states that in a significant number of cases, this is equally true of undergraduates during sessional examinations. As a result of these observations, he advises a good foundation at the JSS level with a view to improving matters. It would not be too late, according to him, if the foundation is even extended to the SSS level when the learning characteristics above are apparent.
Ideal curriculum content should reflect its standing objectives.
There should be no room for a purely structural curriculum, which is based on the assumption that knowledge about language will somehow lead to language use by the student. There is the need to introduce systematic communication very early in the syllabus, rather than delay it to a later stage. At the same time, it should be added that a purely communicative curriculum in an LZ situation is neither feasible nor necessary. in this sense, the ideal curriculum content should be integrative in its organisation. This integration, according to Williams
(1990), involves bringing together the many facets of language teaching, which include practice and theory, the different skills, structure, and functions of language, various kinds of content and activity. Essentially therefore, a properly integrated curriculum content should motivate or inspire learners to greater efforts.
In their contribution to the ideal curriculum, Hutchison and Waters
(1987) suggest that in the interest of the learners, they need to be given materials which have contents of the right kind integrated in the right way. This implies that the learners should be given topic-related problems that require the use of English to solve them, thus actively mobilizincj content to generate language work.
National English Language Curricula Content for JSS and SSS
The National JSS and SSS English Language Curriculum
(1985:2), as explicitly stated in its introduction is an integrated English studies curriculum embodying the following essential elements: vocabulary development, comprehension-listening and reading,
structure, spoken English and literature. The introduction goes further to
state that the various skills are broken down into their component sub-
skills for purposes of systematic instruction but the essential inter-
dependence of the skills taught through the various units, has to be
emphasized.
Even though the curriculum content is largely grammar based, the
development of communicative competence has been fairly taken care
of both by design and co-incidence according to Sabe (1995).
On the other hand, the selection and organization of aspects of
grammatical structure are very adequate. This according to the
designers is to enable the learners acquire knowledge of the rules of grammar as well as the structural pattern of the language as an aid towards the development of their skills in speaking and writing.
Language and the Literature Component
It is stated in the National English Language Curriculum for JSS
(1985:5), that the ultimate goal of the exposure to literary and creative works produced by highly talented artists is to develop in the students, the desire and ability to produce their own literary and creative materials.
Initially, they may begin by imitating the styles of writers they know and admire.
It goes further to say that a good blend of language and literature in English studies would provide opportunity not only for students to develop their communicative competence in English, but it would also enhance cultural and intellectual awareness of their environment, as well as the world beyond. This implies the inter-relationship between language and literature and an attempt to integrate them.
Even though the curriculum does not state how literature can be used as a language lesson (which is a limitation in connection with the innovation), it does suggest that African and non-African folklore, myths, legends, stories, African poetry, prose and drama be exploited as resources .for the teaching of language. This is because all genuine literature contains imaginative vitality, and language is the means of sharing it. In literature, one meets language in its most varied and
powerful forms, and learns to value both language and its use.
Methods
According to James (1980), whatever method one subscribes to,
one will always view the learner's possession of the L1 as a powerful factor to be reckoned with. Thus, the methods, often, have as much influence on what the learners learn, as does the content. Audrey and
Nicholls (1978) point out that it is very difficult to separate content from methods, and to say where one ends, and the other begins. To further explain, Rutherford and Smith (1988) hold that language; whatever else it may be is rule-governed behaviour. It would no doubt be difficult to find anyone who could quarrel with this concept.
Even though various language-teaching methods exist today, no single method can claim superiority over the others. Williams (1984) holds that a specific method or technique be applied to suit specific objectives identified in terms of the needs of the learner, the item to be learned and the environment in which the learning takes place.
In the curricula, the teaching methods are purely reflections of cognitive code and situational methods. And according to the designers
of the National Curriculum for JSS, (1985:3) it stipulates that
methodologically, there are three approaches to syllabus construction:
First, we have the grammar - induced syllabus.. . second, is the situation
induced syllabus ... Finally, the meaning - induced syllabus.
Lubasa and Adejare (1992) observe in part that in terms of
methodology, there seem to be no unified practice, but there is a greater tendency towards situationallcontextual teaching. Adeyanju (1989)
notes that grammatical or structural syllabuses are normally taught
through audio-lingual methodology, whose techniques are intensive oral
drills, pattern practice, and mimicry - memorization and over-learning.
But the national curriculum designers declare that the Nigeria
experience in English language usage in our schools reveals that our
62 problems cannot be solved if we restrict ourselves to a particular approach in syllabus construction. Consequently, our approach is eclectic for we have drawn from the three approaches with a view to solving our problems.
Evaluation
Johnson (1989) declares strongly that curriculum development and renewal can only proceed effectively if supported by evaluation.
This implies that the learners' attainment and progress be evaluated at regular intervals, because according to Audrey and Nicholls
(1978), the curriculum can be improved, and pupils' progress towards the objectives is the main criterion for determining the success of the curriculum. Thus provision of feedback is the core relevance of evaluation. And because feedback reveals both weaknesses and strengths, it could be positive or negative. Corder (1973:350) commenting on the role of evaluation observes that:
Whether we have to do with the improvement of existing programmes or the devising of new ones, we must have a means of evaluating our plans and their execution, in a way of monitoring our activity. In other words, we need continuous information or feedback about our performance.
Again, Audrey and Nicholls (1 978) contend that it is a well-known fact that those aspects of the curriculum, which receive the focus of attention in examinations, whether these are internal or external, also receive the focus of attention in teaching and learning.
The above corroborates the fact that teaching methods and
content are reflected in testing methods and content, and vice-versa.
Because of this, even students adopt study strategies that suit test
6 3 requirements. Generally, when a given test measures what it is expected to measure, it is said to be reliable.
Williams (1990) discusses three different approaches to language testing:
(1) Discrete-point testing -which refers to testing one item at a time.
Examples of this kind of testing include multiple choice questions,
sentence completion or subjective questions and sentence
transformation.
(2) Integrative testing - which seeks to measure ability to make
appropriate responses by bringing together different language
skills, and a knowledge of the different aspects of the language.
Examples include close tests, oral interviews and dictation.
(3) Testing communicative competence, which involves both
integrative content and integrative method. A conceptual
framework of communicative competence that can be used for
testing includes functional competence and discourse
competence. Examples are interaction dialogues involving some
role-playing between the teacher as tester and the students,
language functions (e.g. persuading someone), and
communicative tasks, (e.g. story telling, tasks and instructional
tasks).
The Role of Contrastive Studies in Curriculum Development
In specific terms, contrastive analysis can be reasonably
expected to do the following: It can predict areas of potential error and explain actual occurring errors, which are caused by interference from the mother tongue of the learner. This information as viewed by Jackson (1981) may help the teacher of English as a second language understand, and then perhaps more readily remedy at least some of the errors of his students caused in this way.
It can provide appropriate basis for the establishment of a hierarchy of difficulty, which shows which of the target language structures, present the most, and which present the least difficulty to the learner. Such hierarchies as posit by Marton (1981) may give us insights into the nature of linguistic interference and language learning.
It can contribute to language testing. For example, a tester could test only the learning problems predicted by the contrastive analysts. James (1980) asserts that if a multiple-choice type of objective test is being constructed, a contrastive analysis of L1 and L2 will suggest the types of distractors to use.
It can influence the selection of learning materials. This does not mean selection in the sense of inclusion/exclusion, but intensity selection. That is, while the linguistic content of a foreign language course should be based on the apparent differences between the learner's native language and the language to be learned, the apparent identities and similarities are not ignored.
It can play a significant role in the grading of learning materials. It means that contrastively simple first before the contrastively difficult ones, which is in line with a universal principle of
education that learning should proceed from simple to complex.
(f) It can lend itself to any befitting language instructional strategy.
James (1980) succinctly affirms that one is justified in saying that
the CA hypothesis, is metho-neutral, that whatever method one
subscribes to, one will always view the learners possession of the
L1 as a powerful factor to be reckoned with.
(g) It can provide contrastive information through bilingual
dictionaries. Terrence (1989) maintains that although the
comparisons are sometimes restricted to words in the native and
target languages, the most carefully prepared dictionaries often
provide some comparisons of pronunciation and grammar as well.
(h) It can provide basis for pedagogical grammar. Rutherfield and
Smith (1 988) view pedagogical grammar as the means by which
acquisition of second or foreign language may be expressly
facilitated.
Typically, to the foreign language teacher, the grammar may be conceived as a kind of reference book, of the same importance as a dictionary or a descriptive grammar of the target language. It may particularly prove useful to the teacher who does not know the native language of his students.
Curriculum Development
Generally, the meaning of curriculum development is often based on whatever meaning is ascribed to curriculum itself. By implication and inference therefore, there are many definitions of curriculum development as there are of curriculum. To Audrey and Nicholls (1978), curriculum development is the planning of learning opportunities
intended to bring about certain changes in pupils, and also, the assessment of the extent to which these changes take place.
Alaezi (1993) holds that curriculum development is the process of choosing and refining the school curriculum materials for purposeful curriculum implementation. The bridge or meeting point of the two
definitions above is that curriculum development calls for the choice and
production of instructional materials, and the development of classroom
strategies for the purpose of achieving educational objectives. Again,
this process involves the four elements of curriculum: objectives,
content, methods and evaluation.
Review of Related Empirical Studies on Anaaii
Empirical Studies on Anaari and English Phonological System
Udondata (1993) is one of the significant studies undertaken on
Anaati. The work is an analytical comparison of English and Anaati
phonological systems. The purpose of the analytical comparison was to
identify similarities and differences between the sound systems of the
two languages. The need of the study was to undertake a study of the
phonological system of Anaati so as to identify the segmental as well as
the non-segmental features of the language and compare them with
those of English. It also callec! for a proper highlighting of the similarities
and differences to acquaint one with the peculiarities of each language.
The following hypotheses were developed and tested: Differences existing between English and Anaati
segmental features do not significantly hinder the
production of English sounds by Anaati speakers.
Similarities existing between English and Anaati segmental
features do not significantly facilitate the production of
English sounds by Anaati speakers.
Differences existing between English and Anaan non-
segmental features do not significantly hinder
communication in English by Anaati speakers.
Similarities existing between English and Anaati non-
segmental features do not significantly facilitate
communication in English by Anaaii speakers.
The study was conducted in the then six local government areas of the Anaati community, namely, Abak, Essien Udim, Etim Ekpo, lkot
Ekpene, Oruk Anam and Ukanafun. The inhabitants of these local
government areas speak mainly Anaati. The population consisted of
Anaaii speakers from the six local government areas earlier mentioned.
Twelve secondary schools were randomly selected - two from each of
the local government area in the study.
The sample consisted of one hundred and twenty (120) final year
secondary school students through stratified random sampling. The
selection of the twelve schools was stratified along urban and rural
locations. The sample was also stratified along gender. The sex
stratification was not intended to measure sex differences in sound the rural locations of the informants. No informant in any of the rural schools in the study could produce the rhythm. In some cases, they could only produce one accent in the entire structure. Informants in the urban schools performed better.
Test two had ten items and tested for the informants' ability to
recognise pitch and appropriately place either the falling or the rising
patterns of intonation. The findings revealed that all the informants
could appropriately produce the falling tune in each of the given
sentences. This facilitation could be traced to the presence of the falling
intonation pattern in both English and AnaaA. Conversely, the findings
recorded a high degree of low performance of pitch on the items tested.
The percentage of 'Not Able' was rather high and ranged between 82% and 92%.
Test three was to determine the level of the informants'
competence in oral communication. Only forty percent (40%) of the
informants could articulate their words properly. This trend could be
traced to the differences existing between English and Anaaii sounds as
well as the influence of Anaat7 phonology on the informants. Only
twenty-six percent (26%) of the informants took cognizance accentuation
in their speech behaviour. Seventy-nine percent (79%) of them
disregarded intonation patterns. Seventy percent (70%) of them were
not fluent while seventy-two percent (72%) of them lacked the
vocabulary and idioms with which they could illustrate their points.
Generally, the problems encountered by the informants in this
study could be traced to the differences existing between English and production but to take care of the reliability of the results. In each school five male and five female students were randomly selected.
The instruments for data collection consisted of three oral tests.
Test one was a reading passage in English. The intention was to find
out the informants' ability to re-organise and produce English sounds. A
list of words and sounds were provided with which the researcher
assessed the informants. The sounds with which informants had
difficulty were noted. In test one also, a list of phrases and sentences
picked from the reading passage were provided with which the
informants were tested for accentuation and rhythm. Test two provided
a set of sentences meant to assess the informants' ability to recognise
and use appropriate intonation in sentences. Test three was an oral
essay in English. It consisted of three topics. The informants were to
choose one and speak on it for five minutes. It was intended to assess
the informants' ability in acceptable pronunciation, accentuation,
intonation, fluency, vocabulary and suitable use of idioms. The weighted
score for each informant was one hundred percent (100%). The
researcher used chi-square (X2)test for statistical analysis.
In the analysis, it was discovered that test one which, had twenty-
eight (28) accented items and which tested for the informants' ability to
recognise and use accentuation and rhythm in utterances and passage
recorded low performance. The performance was generally poor as
there was none of the test items in which 50% of the informants scaled
through. Between 14% - 26% of the informants performed well, and this
was relatively low. A high degree of low performance was recorded on the rural locations of the informants. No informant in any of the rural schools in the study could produce the rhythm. In some cases, they could only produce one accent in the entire structure. Informants in the urban schools performed better.
Test two had ten items and tested for the informants' ability to recognise pitch and appropriately place either the falling or the rising patterns of intonation. The findings revealed that all the informants could appropriately produce the falling tune in each of the given sentences. This facilitation could be traced to the presence of the falling intonation pattern in both English and Anaaii. Conversely, the findings recorded a high degree of low performance of pitch on the items tested.
The percentage of 'Not Able' was rather high and ranged between 82% and 92%.
Test three was to determine the level of the informants'
competence in oral communication. Only forty percent (40%) of the
informants could articulate their words properly. This trend could be
traced to the differences existing between English and Anaaii sounds as
well as the influence of Anaaii phonology on the informants. Only
twenty-six percent (26%) of the informants took cognizance accentuation
in their speech behaviour. Seventy-nine percent (79%) of them
disregarded intonation patterns. Seventy percent (70%) of them were
not fluent while seventy-two percent (72%) of them lacked the
vocabulary and idioms with which they could illustrate their points.
Generally, the problems encountered by the informants in this
study could be traced to the differences existing between English and Anaati segmental and non-segmental features, the influence of Anaati
phonology on the informants, inadequate exposure of the informants in
English, consequent upon the poor quality of teachers in some of the
schools as well as poor school environment, including lack of books and
other materials for teaching and learning.
The researcher in this study agrees with previous studies that
Anaati, lbibio and Efik form a cluster of mutually intelligible idioms
(dialects). Though the author has not supported this observation with
relevant data, the mutual intelligibility of these languages can be
demonstrated with the following data by the researcher:
Group A:
Anaati Efik lbibio Gloss
ami ami ami I Pronouns afo afo afo YOU J
mi Adverbs ko ko ko therei tie tie tie Sit 1Verbs dia dia dia eat J
Group B
It provides differences among these three languages as in the
following:
Anaaii Efik lbibio Gloss
efud mbombom efAd buttocks 7 mbri mbit mat )--Nouns iwuo ibuot iwuut head J The author in this study concludes that similarities between the phonological features of Anaati and English facilitate communication in
English by Anaati learners, while differences hinder communication.
Empirical Studies on Phonotactics in Anaaii and English
Udoka (1998) is on phonotactics in Anaati and English. The study was aimed at achieving the following objectives:
(i) to analyse specific phonological structures of AnaaA and
English phonemes;
(j) to identify similarities and differences between Anaati and
English phonemes;
(iii) to examine what areas of phonotactics are likely to pose
problems for the Anaaii speakers of English and to account
for the situation to determine the implications of and to
make recommendations for improved language
performance in relation to AnaaA-English bilinguals.
The study had the main purpose of investigating specific phonological structures of Anaati and English as well as examining phonotacically the type of constraints experienced by Anaati-English bilinguals.
The need of the study was on the fact that the area of phonotactics has not received good attention from language scholars as other aspects of phonological study. The author emphasized that apart from Eka (1996), no serious work was done on phonotactics, that there was a great need to carry out an investigative study in it so as to be aware of both the problems and prospects of its speech behaviour. The scope of the study was limited because the investigation was conducted in a few schools at post primary and post secondary levels, in spite of numerous schools. The test items were based on a handful of vowels and consonants selected from Anaaii and English, and the reason was to encourage further research on the topic using phonological structures not represented in the study.
The data for the study were collected from secondary and post- secondary schools in Akwa lbom State. A total of 100 Anaaii-English bilingual students comprising 30 from three secondary schools, 40 from
Akwa lbom State Polytechnic and 30 from University of Uyo were selected and ~sedfor the study. The informants were both male and female selected on the basis of course and year of study.
The instrument used for data collection was a set of questionnaire, which consisted of two parts made up of:
(i) A Recognition Test requesting respondents to identify
permitted combinations and those not properly combined
in Anaaii and English.
(ii) An Achievement Test requiring respondents to justify their
choice in any five of the items they had indicated in (i)
above.
The Recognition Test comprised two areas of spoken language, namely, consonants and vowels. The test of consonants consisted of 40 items of possible and impossible word combinations in Anaaii and
English. The reason for including impossible word combinations was to test the respondents' understanding of Anaari and English phonotactics. These combinations do not exist in Anaati and English. The test on vowels consisted of 20 test items of permitted combinations in Anaati and English. A total of 60 speech sounds were used in the 60 test items grouped under sections A, B, C, D, E, F of the questionnaire on the empirical analysis of vowel combinations in Anaafi and English. It was discovered that respondents from the secondary schools tended to perform better in certain aspects in Anaati than those from the Akwa lbom State Polytechnic and the University of Uyo. The reason was that the secondary schools investigated for this study were located in rural areas where everyday interaction occurs in Anaati. Also, 70% of the respondents had some difficulty identifying words in Anaati as much as they did in English, which confirms the fact that they are not familiar with the phonology of Anaati language. The remaining 30% of respondents missed the correct option for an ill-formed word, and this was due to the fact that they are not familiar with either the spelling or sound combination of most Anaati words.
Results on well formed items in English showed that the percentage performance was better than that of Anaati. Although none of the test items attracted loo%, yet it was discovered that respondents had a better grasp of the allowed combinations in English than in Anaati.
The worst item in the analysis of vowel combinations in English was /ad: couch. This glide is not present in Anaati except in informal expressions
such as SAu, meaning 'God forbid'. This may have contributed to the
unimpressive performance by respondents. It was generally observed
that glides are more problematic at initial position than pure vowels in both Anaaii and English. The achievement test revealed that not all the informants could justify their choice in any of the items identified as well formed. It is a further proof that the majority of the informants lacked the basic knowledge about phonotactics.
In consonant combinations in both Anaafi and English, the results indicated that respondents were better able to recognize ill-formed items in English than in Anaafi. Surprisingly some respondents in an effort to identify ill-formed clusters ended up with the well-formed ones. The
percentage of good performance stood at 46% against 80°h, and the
level of performance also varied among respondents. For example,
respondents from the University of Uyo recorded a very unimpressive
performance, whereby only 10 out of 30 recognised chsan as an ill-
formed word or option. Respondents from the secondary schools,
especially those from Community Secondary School, Nkek in Ukanafun
Local Government Area and Okon Secondary Commercial School in
Essien Udim Local Government Area performed significantly better. The
reason being that the sound It11 which occurred in the ill-formed
sequencelitem chsan is more frequently used by the communities where
the mentioned secondary schools are located, so it was possible for
informants from these communities to recognize the structure as ill-
formed. It was equally revealed that respondents tended to perform
poorly and in a number of test items on initial clusters, for example, they
could not recognize thdrew as an ill-formed word. This goes to confirm
the view that much is not done on the area of phonotactics in our
schools. The analysis on consonant combinations in Anaati and English final clusters revealed an impressive performance in English than in
Anaati. For example, the percentage of poor performance stood at 40% in AnaaA, while its English version attracted 65%. The reason is because Anaati does not have final clusters, even when it appears to possess values similar to those of English, it was discovered that their distributional patterns are often different. For instance, any attempt to use /k,m,t,p,f,n,b,!l,s/, which also occur in English will result in
meaningless expressions.
The study has the summuy of findings as follows:
With regard to vowel combinations in Anaati and English, it was observed that the front vowels /i/ and /el occur in different distributions in the two languages. In Anaati /i/ occurs initially and finally with plosives;
in English, it is found initially and medially, but rarely finally.
The diphthongs Iai, 5, eil, occur only medially and finally in Anaati
and never initially in English.
The long vowels Ii:, a:, u:, 3:/ are not present in Anaati. The
diphthongs cannot combine freely with the nasal consonant /IJ/.
Generally, English vowels have a wider distribution than /!I/ vowels. It was also revealed that phonological structures involving glides were not
easy to identify by respondents.
Investigations on initial clusters in Anaat7 and English also
revealed that in Anaat7 the plosives /p, b, t, d, k, g/ do not form clusters
at initial positions, whereas in English, there are clusters beginning with
plosives: bleed, breed, train, drain.
76 The fricatives cannot form initial clusters in Anaaii but they do so in English: stream, free. The only class of consonants that form initial clusters in Anaaii is the nasal: ndap, mbok, mfin. Among the affricates, only the voiceless counterpart /tS/ occurs in Anaafi and is highly infrequent, but the /kw/ and /kp/ phonemes are largely peculiar to Anaaii.
Initial clusters in English are often derived by inflectional changes in noun or verb-forms. Respondents were better able to recognize ill- formed initial clusters in English than in Anaaii. English does not permit clusters of more than three sequence words, initially. The analysis of final clusters in Anaaii and English revealed that there are no final clusters in Anaaii. In English, not more than four sequences of clusters are permitted: mpts - contempt. The affricates do not form clusters word, finally in English.
The plosives are more complex in their combinations word finally than initially. The segments Is/ and If/ do not occur word finally in any known Anaaii word. Clusters involving nasals in Anaaii and English were easy for informants.
This study is quite revealing especially as it is a pioneer work on the phonotactics of Anaati, but there are some questionable issues raised in the work. The author asserts that in Anaaii /i/ occurs only in initial and final positions, whereas, it occurs at all the phonological environments. The research does not permit the voiced palato-alveolar sound I@/in its inventory of Anaati consonants. Moreover, one would . expect the study to use a model that reflects the generality of Anaati community. The data reflects dialectal variants used mainly by lkot
Ekpene and Obot Akara speakers. The researcher wishes to modify
7 7 some of the items in the data to reflect what is used by the generality of Anaaii community:
Udoka's version Modification Gloss abio'fi awio'ii hunger nuo'n nnuo'n finger eduat eruad spear edim erim rain edkt er8d teeth
Y~Q jio endure e y ei ajei palm frond yed jed wash ayafi ajafi broom sak chak laugh
The above data reveals inconsistencies in the author's use of the alveolar plosives It/ and Id1 as in "eduat and "yed." These two sounds are unreleased in final positions in Anaati and therefore require a consistent choice in their usage.
Empirical Studies on Intonation of Anaaii and English
Udoh (1998) probes the effect of duration on the intonation of
AnaaR learners of English. The study observes that most language learners have peculiar accents arising from the timing of portions of their sentence in relation to the whole sentence. Moreover, native speakers are faster in their speech habits than non- native speakers, and this often creates misunderstanding for the latter, and variation in pronunciation creates socia! problems. Generally, the work has given I:There is no significant difference between the duration patterning
of AnaaA learners of English and the English native speakers.
H,I: There is a significant difference between the duration patterning
of Anaaii learners of English and the English native speakers.
H,2: There is no significant difference between the pitch range of
Anaaii learners of English and the English native speakers.
H12: There is a significant difference between the pitch range of Anaaii
learners of English and the English native speakers.
W03: Duration has no significant correlation with pitch in the Anaafi
English learners' intonation.
The performance of four groups in which all the groups were tested on twenty sentences of two intonation tunes made up of questions and answers was employed.
The samples were made up of fifteen AnaaA speakers of English with varying educational backgrounds in this manner:
(i) Anaaii low learners of English (secondary school level).
(ii) Anaaii intermediate learners of English (university
undergraduates).
(iii) Anaafi advanced learners of English (graduates).
Two nat~ve speakers of English who speak the Received
Pronunciation (RP), (a male and a female) from Britain served as control.
The experiment involved the reading of the Anaaii and English
data by the informants. Their performances were compared with the
control to find out how close the intonations were to the controls. The data were analysed from four perspectives: metrical, acoustic, contrastive and statistical analyses. The metrical analysis of the data revealed a clear deviation of Anaati learners from the native speakers as the speech of the Anaati learners were characterized by a proliferation of stressed syllables, which led to wide spread occurrence of adjacent stressed syllables and which equally led to stress clashes.
The acoustic analysis corroborated with the metrical analysis up to a point because pitch by its very nature is so dynamic that their measurements are often a bit problematic. The author indicated having problems in measuring pitch. From the contrastive point of view, the pattern of timing in the performance of the learner groups has transfer implications from Anaaii. Anaaii has a timing pattern that does not reflect different degrees of duration governed by strong versus weak syllables. The phenomenon of stress operates very differently from tone with which the Anaati learners are familiar. The peculiar interaction between duration and pitch, which, plays such an important role in the
English Rhythm rule, does not exist in Anaati. Therefore, stress is a strange phenomenon, which the Anaaii learners cannot even appreciate, let alone perfect.
The statistical analysis did not show much significant difference in the comparison of the fundamental frequency (FO) for the different groups with the control. Out of the seven categories used for the pitch analysis, only one-the maximum pitch category-reached the table significant level in the comparison of the control and the low group. The experimental findings, which, were designed to test the hypotheses, revealed that in hypothesis one, the table of rho at 0.05 level of significance at 20 degree of freedom is 0.45. The calculated coefficient values of the different groups showed a high level of difference in the duration patterns. In all the six categories measured, there were significant differences between the control and the learner groups. Since these differences were more than the table value of significance level on these categories, the null hypothesis was rejected in favour of the alternate hypothesis. It means that there is a significant difference between the duration patterning of Anaari learners of English and English native speakers.
In hypothesis two, it was discovered that since there is no significant difference in the comparison between the pitch range of the control and the learner groups, the null hypothesis was upheld. It also means that there is no significant difference between the pitch range of
Anaaii learners of English and the English native speakers.
In hypothesis three, the phi-coefficient correlation, which was used to compare the two variables, revealed that duration and pitch in the stressed syllables of the experimental groups yielded a negative correlation in all the three groups. Since there is no significant positive correlation between the two variables in the performance of the Anaari learners, the null hypothesis was upheld.
Finally, there is a correlation between duration and pitch in
English, which the AnaaA learners do not observe. The pitch range in the performance of the Anaaii learners may be close to those of the native speakers, but their patterning are quite different within the sentence, and it is this that creates the obvious deviation from the native speakers.
In conclusion, it can be observed that the study being a pioneer work on duration and intonation of Anaati learners of English is extremely detailed and revealing. However, the researcher differs from the author of this study in a number of areas. The author has not
provided answers to the research questions raised to guide the study.
Secondly, the author maintained that Anaaii does not have a
standardized orthography like her Efik and lbibio counterparts, and that
because of the absence of an approved orthography; there are no
materials available. The researcher disagrees out rightly with the above-
observed opinion because Anaati language was in print since 1854.
And in 1992 the Afe Anaati study panel met and approved an acceptable
orthography, sounds-vowels, consonants, diphthongs and many others
(Udondata, 1993). There are several research works on Anaati
language as evidenced in various previous studies.
Empirical Studies on Anaaii and English Structural Patterns
Udondata (2001) is a contrastive study on Anaati and English
structural patterns, in which he reveals that emphasis has shifted from
mere vocabulary control to patterns of structures of the English language
wherein was the need of the study. The intention of this research
therefore was to find out if there are any significant differences andlor
similarities between the structural patterns of Anaati and those of English, and if such differences and/or similarities could hinder or facilitate communication in English by Anaati speakers.
A preliminary study was undertaken with twenty educated AnaaA speakers as respondents. The conclusion drawn from the pilot study was that the word and group structure of Anaati and English exhibit differences whereas the sentence structures do not.
The main study posed the following research questions:
What structural patterns are identifiable in Anaati and
English?
Are there any differences between Anaati and English
structural patterns?
If there are similarities between the structural patterns of
Anaafi and those of English, could these similarities
facilitate communication in English by AnaaA speakers?
If there are differences between the structural patterns of
Anaafi and those of English, could these differences hinder
communication in English by Anaafi speakers?
The following null hypotheses guided the study:
H,1: There are no significant differences between the structural
patterns of Anaati and those oi English.
H,2: Differences between the structural patterns of Anaati and English
do not significantly hinder communication in English by Anaafi
speakers. H,3: Similarities between the structural patterns of Anaai'i and English
do not significantly facilitate communication in English by AnaaA
speakers.
The population of the study consisted of AnaaA speakers of
English in the eight local government areas of the Anaafi community. # Two secondary schools were randomly selected from each of these
eight local government areas, one from urban and one from rural
location. This was not intended to measure differences in performance
but to ensure a wide geographical spread. The sample was also
stratified along sex differences, and it was merely intended to cover the
entire stratum to make sure the results were reliable.
The sample consisted of one hundred and sixty (160)
respondents. Ninety-six (96) of these were final year secondary school
students, while sixty-four (64) were secondary school teachers. Six (6)
students were randomly selected from each of the sixteen-(16)
secondary schools in the study. Four (4) teachers were also selected
from each of these schools. In each school, three (3) male students and
three (3) female students were selected. Two (2) male teachers and two
(2) female teachers were also selected. There were therefore a total of
ten (10) respondents from each school.
Three research instruments were used for data collection. The
first was a picture containing a house with a tree in front of it, two girls
playing on the ground and two boys playing football. The respondents
were expected to look carefully at the picture and construct four
sentences on it. In test two, they were expected to translate the four sentences into Anaati. These instruments were intended to elicit
spontaneous response from the respondents in the construction of
sentences. The Anaati arid English sentences were meant for
identification of the different structural patterns such as word, group and
clause. The third test consisted of eight sentences comprising simple,
compound, complex and compound-complex structures. The
respondents were expected to translate these sentences into Anaati.
On the test of structural differences, less than 50% of the 160
respondents could produce the structures tested, and on structural
similarities, 5% and above of the 160 respondents had no difficulty
producing the structures tested.
At 0.01 confidence level and 1 degree of freedom (df)', the
calculated value of X2 (102.04) was greater than the table value ~f X2
(6.63)'. Consequently, the null hypothesis was rejected in favour of the
alternate, and this implies that there are significant differences between
the structural patterns of Anaati and those of English.
The test on structural patterns and communicative skills posed
problems to the respondents. They performed very poorly in the
production of meaningful sentences, proper manipulation of issues
relating to word order and collocation. Therefore, at 0.01 confidence
level and 1 degree of freedom (df), the calculated value of X2 (87.64)
was greater than the table value of X2 (6.63). The null hypothesis was
consequently rejected in favour of the alternate which equally implies
that the structural patterns of Anaati and those of English do significantly
hinder communication in English by Anaati speakers. Also, at 0.01 confidence level, and 1 degree of freedom (df), the calculated value of X2 (87.64) was greater than the table value of x2
(6.63). Consequently, the null hypothesis was rejected in favour of the alternate, and this implies that similarities between the structural patterns of Anaafi and those of English do significantly facilitate communication in English by Anaafi speakers.
The following were the major findings of the study:
The structures of simple, compound, complex and
compound-complex sentences exist in Anaaii and English.
The structures of noun, adjectival and adverbial clauses
exist in Anaaii and English.
The group structures of nominal, verbal, prepositional and
adjectival exist in Anaari and English.
The indefinite article of the word structure does not exist in
Anaafi and English.
The definite article, adjectives, nouns, verbs, adverbs,
pronouns, conjunctions, interrogatives and inflections exist
in Anaati and English.
Some English nouns take the - s morpheme as plural
inflections; Anaafi nouns do not.
Some Anaafi adverbs inflect for number, English adverbs
do not.
The English conjunction 'and' joins all forms of structure in
the grammar, but in Anaafi 'ne' joins nouns, while 'anufi'
jam verbs. (9) English grammar is characterized by verbal suffixation,
while Anaari is characterized by verbal prefixation.
(10) In English, cardinal numbers come before nouns whereas,
in Anaati, nouns come before cardinal numbers.
(1 1) English tends to be richer in vocabulary than Anaari.
(12) There are instances of noun and verb reduplication in
Anaari.
From the foregoing discourse, it is obvious to assert that the study is quite exhaustive and revealing, though there are a few comments to make on it. The author of this work was a member of the Afe Anaari
Study Panel, wherein modifications on the acceptable spellings and words to reflect general Anaari were made, he stuck to the old
Europeanized spelling of 'Annang' throughout his work instead of
'Anaati', which is actually pronounced by native speakers as confirmed by linguists (Udondata, 1993).
Furthermore, the author did not provide adequate and coricise examples to back up his summary of findings. The researcher here will provide examples to most of his summary in this order:
(a) Some English nouns take the - s morpheme as plural
inflections; Anaaii nouns do not for example:
English Anaaii
goat(s) ebot (singlular)
cow@) enaii
beast(s) unam (b) English grammar is characterized by verbal suffixation,
while Anaaii is characterized by verbal prefixation, e.g.
English Anaaii
jumped mtama
wal ka amasaria
(c) In English, cardinal numbers come before nouns, whereas
in Anaaii, nouns come before cardinal numbers, e.g.
English Anaaii
ten birds inuen ina6 (bird four)
three bags ekpat ita (bag three)
five tins iko itien (tin five)
(d) There are instances of noun and verb reduplication in
Anaaii, e.g.
Anaaii English
f tia kick I tia-tia kick-kick Verbs gwed write
cgwewed write-write
(ujai beauty
ujai - ujai beauty-beauty Nouns 1 ideen male (ideen-ideen male-male (e) The English conjunction 'and' joins all forms of structure in
the grammar, but in Anaati, 'ne' joins nouns, while 'anuti'
joins verbs, e.g.
English James and John
Free and fair
Anaati James ne John (James and John)
amia anuti gkoA (beat and knock)
(f) Some Anaati adverbs inflect for number; English adverbs
do not, e.g.
Anaati English
da ko (one persoii) stand there
edak ko (many people) stand there
anam m'fon-m'fon He does it well-well
enam m'foo'n-m'foo'n (they) do it well-well
Agwed irio'k- irio'k (he writes it badly-badly
egwed n'nio'i- n'nio'i (they) write it badly-badly
From the study, we can see that there are significant structural similarities between Anaat7 and English. Such similarities are common among structures that are universally present in natural languages. But within these apparent similarities, there are a number of underlying dissimilarities and these are rather stubble. Udondata concludes his study by submitting that communication in English by Anaaii speakers is largely affected by similarities and differences existing between the two languages. Similarities in structures tend to facilitate communication, while differences in structures tend to hinder communication.
90 Summary of Review of Related Literature
The review of related literature covered a wide range of studies.
It includes a history of the Anaati people and her language, language acquisition and learning, interference in languages in contact, the theoretical bases of Contrastive Analysis, Error Analysis, the link between Error Analysis and Contrastive Analysis. Other aspects are the approaches of Contrastive Analysis, verbals in languages and curriculum development. As a result of the theoretical review, the following conclusions were reached:
Contrastive Analysis has long been a part, of second
language pedagogy.
There is extensive evidence for interference (negative
transfer) in languages in contact.
Interference in languages in contact is a phenomenon,
which calls for concern in second language teaching and
learning.
Despite the fact that the strong Contrastive Analysis
Hypothesis gives predictive power to Contrastive Analysis,
both Contrastive Analysis and Error Analysis are viewed as
complementary to each other. In other words, although the
theoretical predictions stemming from Contrastive Analysis
are both adequate and powerful (on their own), they need
to be validated by actual fieldwork and subsequent error
analysis. (5) Contrastive studies play a vital role in second language curriculum development.
The review of empirical studies on Anaaii was also carried out. It was discovered that not much work has been done in Anaaii, and most importantly, no research study in Anaaii verbs has been carried out.
However, the few works available were reviewed. They include the following: an analytical comparison of English and Anaaii phonological systems which undertook to identify the segmental as well as the non- segmental features of Anaaii and compared them with those of English.
The author in this study concluded that similarities in the phonological systems of both Anaaii and English facilitate communication, while differences hinder communication; the effect of duration on the intonation of Anaaii learners of English was reviewed, and the study concluded that there is a correlation between duration and pitch in
English which the Anaaii learners do not observe, and it is this which creates the obvious deviation from the native speakers of English. Also, phonotactics in Anaaii and English was reviewed. The study investigated specific phonological structures of Anaaii and English, and examined phonotactically the type of constraints experienced by Anaaii-
English bilinguals. The study concluded that the area of phonotactics has not received good attention from language scholars as other aspects of phonological study, and it was discovered that this was responsible for the mix-up of consonant and vowel clusters by Anaaii learners of English phonemes. Finally, a contrastive study on Anaaii and
English structural patterns was reviewed and the study revealed subtle similarities and much difference in Anaafi and English structural patterns. The study concluded that communication in English by AnaaA speakers is largely affected by similarities and differences.
Reviewed literature showed a high concentration on phonological interference in Anaafi and English, and only one on English and Anaafi structural patterns. Right now, it does appear that no previous comparative work was done on verb tenses in AnaaA and English.
Therefore, this work was carried out to determine the interference of
Anaaii with English verb tenses among different categories of secondary school students. Of all the theories discussed, the researcher adopted the method of contrastive analysis on the present study. CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCHMETHODOLOGY
This chapter presents a description of the research design, area of study, population of the study, sample and sampling technique, instrument for data collection, validation of the instrument, reliability of the instrument, method of data collection and method of data analysis.
Research Design
This study employed two research designs: survey (analytic or contrastive analysis) and casual- comparative design. Survey is a form of descriptive research, which is chiefly concerned with finding, describing and interpreting "what is" (Ali and Denga, 1988). The researcher chose this design because it is concerned with processes that are going on, and effects that are being felt. Also,causal- comparative design as used in this study is aimed at investigating possible cause and effect relationships (Ali et al, 1988). The researcher observing the effects of interference of the mother tongue on Anaaii secondary school learners of English lexical verbs informed the choice of this design. An attempt was then made to establish some causal connections by searching back through the data for plausible causal factors.
Specifically, the designs aimed at contrasting English and Anaaii lexical verbs, with a view to finding areas of similarities and differences in both languages, and equally establishing how location, gender and the grade level of learners constituted interference in the use of English lexical verbs by Anaaii learners.
94 Area of Study
The study was limited to Abak and Oruk Anam Education zones of Akwa lbom State. These zones are just two local government areas, namely, Abak and Oruk Anam Local Government Areas. There are twenty-six (26) post primary schools in these zones. The choice of these zones was informed by the fact that the acceptable Anaati is spoken there.
Population of the study
The population of the study comprised all students of JSSI, JSSlll and SSIII: all the Secondary Schools within the Abak and Oruk Anam
Education zones of Akwa lbom State. Documents in the Local
Education Authorities of Abak and Oruk Anam reveal that there are twenty-six (26) Secondary Schools in Abak and Oruk Anam Education zones. The population of JSl students was three thousand, one-hundred and eighteen (3,118); JSlll was three thousand, five - hundred and ninety-five (3,595) and SSlll was four thousand, and thirty -three (4,033) in 2003/2004 academic year, with a total students' population of ten thousand, seven hundred and fourty-six (10,746). See Appendix 9. The choice of the three levels of learners was to adequately establish the degree of interference at the three class levels. Learners at the different class levels differ in their resistance to mother tongue interference. At the lower proficiency level, interference was prominent and at the higher level, it was minimized. Sample and Sampling Technique
The sample for the study comprised four (4) secondary schools,
which were drawn from the secondary schools within the Abak and Oruk
Anam Education zones of Akwa lbom State. Abak and Oruk Anam
Education zones were stratified into two sections: urban and rural
respectively. In urban section in which Abak Education zone was used,
the only two available schools (Boys' and Girls' schools) were picked for
the study. In the rural section, two co-education schools were drawn for
the study through a non-proportionate stratified random sampling. The
respondents were equally drawn through a proportional stratified random
sampling, in which 10% of the entire number of students in each class
was drawn. The total number of students used was one hundred and
fifty (150). Therefore, in urban section for example, seventy-five (75)
students were drawn as fcllaws: in JS I, thirteen (13) that represented
32.5% of the total number in the class were selected. In JS Ill also,
fourteen (14) students, which represented 28% of the total number in the
class were selected. And in SS Ill, twelve (12) students, which
represented 20% of the total number in the class were selected. The
same method was used in the rural section. The samples are distributed
and shown in the table as follows: Table 1: Distribution of Sample by Gender, Location and class
Level.
Name of School Location Gender Level Total
M F J S 1 J S Ill SS I11
Holy Family College Urban J Oku Abak (Boy's School)
Loreto Girls' Juniorate - Urban Eriam, Afaha Obong- Abak (Girls' School).
Southern Annang Rural J Comprehensive sec. Sch., lkot Okoro, Oruk Anam (Co-education).
Cmmunity Technical Rural College, Mbiakot, Oruk Anam, (Co-education).
Grand Total
Instrument for Data Collection
The instruments that were used in data collection comprised three
kinds of tests- English Lexical Verbs Achievement Test (ELVAT), that
was developed by the researcher. This test comprised specifically structure, translation and essay. The purpose of the tests was to enable the researcher validate the predicted difficulties arising from the contrastive analysis. Secondly, the tests provided insight into the
subjects' learning problems. The ELVAT was designed under four (4)
sections, A-D as follows:
Section A - Personal Information
Section B - Structure Test
Section C - Translation Test
Section D - Essay Test
Section A required mere ticking [dl of the appropriate box or
filling in the correct information in the spaces provided. See Appendix 3
Part (2). Section B comprised the five aspects of English lexical verbs in
a fifty (50) multiple choice objective questions (see Appendix 3, Part 3.)
Section C consisted of all the aspects of the regular and irregular
forms of the English lexical verbs. There were forty (40) questions in all,
twenty (20) sentences from Anaaii to English, and twenty (20) from
English to Anaaii. See Appendix 3, Part (4).
Section D was made up of three (3) different essay topics on
which respondents were required to write on only one. See Appendix 3,
Part (5). Appendix 4 shows the model answers as well as the maximum
score allotted to each section in Appendix 5.
Validation of the Instrument
The ELVAT was face-validated by specialists in Research
Methodology and language teaching and testing. During face validation,
the five English lexical verb forms, the regular and irregular verbs and associated questions were scrutinized in terms of relevance, content, clarity and difficulty level. See Appendix 6 for table of specification.
Reliability of the Instrument
The measure of stability of ELVAT was established using the trial- testing procedure. A sample of 40 examinees were drawn from equivalent study sample and used for trial testing of the items of the instrument. The essence of the trial testing was to find out how the respondents would react to the instrument. The internal consistency of the test was determined using the split half method. The items were split based on even and odd numbers. The two sets of scores were correlated using the Pearson Product Moment Correlation. The multiple choice objective test of the ELVAT yielded an index of 0.83 and the translation section yielded an index of 0.91 (see Appendix 7 for the computation).
To make sure that all secticns of the ELVAT had appropriate reliability, the inter-rater reliability co-efficient of concordance was used.
Two research assistants were used to rate the students' performance.
The co- efficient of concordance obtained was 0.67 for the multiple choice, 0.31 for the translation and 0.70 for the essay test. See
Appendix 8 for the computation.
Method of Data Collection
The test was personally distributed and administered by. the researcher with the help of the research assistants in the sample schools. The respondents were given enough time to do the tests at their own pace. For sections B and C (structure and translation tests), the items were controlled. Both correct and incorrect responses were presented for each verbal category across the three proficiency levels.
The essay test (section D) did not lend itself to correct or wrong responses as such. It was not controlled, but rather free. The scoring of the three tests were done by the researcher and her research assistants using the marking scheme shown in Appendix 4
Method of Data Analysis
Research question 1 was answered by using analytic/contrastive analysis, while research questions 2-4 were tested by using mean scores and standard deviation. Hypothesis 1 made use of analytic/contrastive analysis, while hypothesis 2 was analysed by the use of Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and hypotheses 3 and 4 were tested with t-test statistics. CHAPTER FOUR
RESULTS
In this chapter, the analytic/contrastive analysis, results of data analysis based on the four research questions and four hypotheses that guided the study are presented in tables according to the various research questions and hypotheses.
Research Question 9
What are the similarities and differences between AnaaA and
English lexical verbs?
To answer this qustion, the following procedure was followed:
1. A description of the lexical verbal system of English;
2. A description of the lexical verbal system of Anaaii;
3. A contrastive or differential analysis of the lexical verbal systems
of English and Anaaii, with a view to highlighting areas of
similarities and differences in three modalities of declarative,
interrogative and negative.
4. Observations are made based on the analysis.
5. Summary of predicted areas of learning difficulty.
The Lexical Verbal System of English
Quirk et a1 (1985) assert that English verbs can be divided into
three major categories according to their functions within the verb
phrase: full verbs or lexical verbs, e.g. dance, shout; primary verbs, e.g.
be, have and do, and modal auxiliary verbs, e.g. will, might, may, etc. Of
the three classes, Quirk and his colleagues maintain that the full verbs or
lexical verbs, which is our point of focus, act as the main verbs. 101 Many English lexical verbs have five forms: the base, the -s form, the past, the -ing participle, and the -ed participle, e.g. speak, speaks, speaking, spoke and spoken. Some verbs have four forms, e.g. call, calls, calling and called, because they have the same -ed inflection for both the past tense and the -ed participle. Yet other verbs have only three forms, e.g. cut, cuts cutting.
Morphology of Regular Full or Lexical Verbs
Full or lexical verbs are either regular or irregular. They are regular in that we can predict the other forms, if we know the base of such a verb. Their past form and the -ed participle form are identical, e.g. C
e 5 8; + 4, -7 ,a;p.'. The base - call ,** j" -%. ,? *ILF:~ - -d* The -ing participle - calling
The -s form - calls
The past or -ed participle - called
The -ing form of both regular and irregular verbs is a straightforward addition of - ing to the base, e.g. jump -jumping, push - pushing. The
-s form of the regular verbs is also predictable from the base. It has three spoken realizations: /iz/, /z/ & Is/ and two spellings -s and -=. \ The following phonological conditions apply:
1. It is pronounced /iz/ after bases ending in voiced or voiceless
sibilants, and spelt - es unless the base already ends in e, e.g.
catch - catches /ka:Jiz/ buzz - buzzes lbhzizl. 2. It is pronounced /z/ after bases ending in voiced sounds other
than sibilants, including vowels. It is spelt s, e.g. call - calls
/k~:Is/.
3. It is pronounced 1st and spelt s after bases ending in voiceless
sounds other than sibilants, e.g. lock - locks /laks/.
The past and the - ed participle forms of regular verbs have three spoken realizations. They are spelt -ed unless the base ends in - 2, e.g.
1. /id/ after bases ending in /dl and It/, e.g. pad - padded /psdid/,
pat - patted /paetid/.
2. /dl after bases ending in voiced sounds other than Id/, e.g. call -
called / k~:id/ mow - mowed /mo:d/.
3. It/ after bases ending in voiceless sounds, other than It/,e.g pass
- passed /pa:st/, pack - packed /pa: kt/.
Furthermore, in the inflection of regular verbs, one of the following
changes apply: doubling of the final consonant of the base deletion or
acdition of a final e; substitution of i for a final y or vice - versa for, e.g.
(a) A final base consonant is doubled when the preceding vowel is
stressed and spelt with a single letter, e.g. beg - begging -
begged; occur - occurring - occurred. There is normally no
doubling when the preceding vowel is unstressed or written with
two letters, e.g. visit - visiting - visited, dread - dreading-
dreaded.
Exceptions to the rules above irlclude: I. Verbs ending in an unstressed vowel followed by 1, e.g. travel -
travelling - travelled.
2. Verbs ending in an unstressed vowel folluwed by - me, e.g.
programme - programming - programmed.
3. Some verbs ending in an unstressed vowel followed by p. e.g.
worship -worshipping - worshipped.
(b) Final g is regularly dropped before the - ing and - ed inflections, e.g. create - creating - created.
(c) The following changes apply to bases ending in a consonant,
followed by - y, e.g. - y changes to - before - S; carry -
carries, - y changes to - i before - a:try - tried. But - y remains
where it follows a vowel letter, stay - stayed. Exceptions: pay
and lay: pay - paid, lay - laid. Also, changes to - lbefore -ing
is added: die - dying.
The Morphology of Irregular Full or Lexical Verbs
Like regular verbs, the - s forms and - ing forms of irregular verbs are predictable from the base. The difference between them lies mainly in the fact that either the past inflection or the - ed participle inflection or both, of irregular verbs are irregular. Typically, the major differences are:
1. lrregular verbs either do not have the regular - ed inflection, or
else have a variant of that inflection in which the /8/ is devoiced to
It/,e.g. burn- burnt. 2. Irregular verbs typically, but not necessarily, have variation in
their base vowel: e.g. choose - chose - chosen; write - wrote -
written.
3. Irregular verbs have a varying number of distinct forms. The
varying numbers of distinct forms are to be found in the form (v),
the past (v-edl) and the - ed participle (v-ed2). Consider the
following:
V V- edl V - ed2
All three forms alike cut cut cut
V - edl = v -ed2 meet met met
V=V-edz beat beat beaten
V=V-ed2 come come come
All three forms are different speak spoke spoken
Following the similarities and differences above, the researcher decided to introduce this classification:
Table 2
Class I: The suffix is used, but voicing is variable, V- edl and V - ed2 are identical; there is vowel harmony in all parts, e.g.
(a) V V-edl Wed2
burn burnt burnt
learn learnt learnt
spell spelt spelt.
V Wed, Wed2
build built built
lend lent lent send sent sent
v V-edl V-ed2
have had had
make made made
Table 3
Class 2
V - ed2 has two suffixes, one alveolar and identical with V - ed,, the other nasal. There is no change of the base vowel for V -edl e.g.
V Ledl V - ed2
mow mowed mown
mowed
saw sawed sawn
sawed
swell swelled swollen
swelled
Table 4
Class 3
The suffix is used, but voicing is variable. V -edl and V -ed2 are
identical, and there is change of base vowel
V V-edl Ledz
bring brought brought
buy bought bought
teach taught taught
dream dreamt dreamt
bereave bereft bereft keep kept kept
(6) lose lost lost
sell sold sold
tell told told
Table 5
Class 4
V-edl and V-ed2 differ, and in practically all cases.
(a) V-edl and V-ed2 have the same vowel
V Wedl Wed2 break broke broken freeze froze frozen bite bit bitten forget forgot forgotten tread trod trodden bear bore borne tear tore torn lie lay lain
(b) V - v -edz but not V-edl have the same vowel. v V +?dl V -ed2 blow blew blown take took taken give gave given see saw seen draw drew drawn fall fell fallen slay slew slain eat ate eaten
(c) All three parts have different vowel sounds v v +?dl V -ed2 ride rode ridden fly flew flown d0 did done
(d) All three parts have the same vowel. v V +dl V +d2 beat beat beaten ie) V -ed, and V- ed2 have different vowels in special alternative
forms w w +dl thrive thrived thrived (Also found throve
Table 6
Class 5
All three parts V, V-edl and V-ed2 are identical. No suffix or change of the base vowel
V V-ed, W - ed2 hit hit hit hurt hurt hurt burst burst burst cut cut cut
Put Put Put shed shed shed split split split
Table 7
Class 6
V - edl is identical with V - ed2, no suffixation, no change in base vowel. V V-edl V - ed2 breed bred bred cling clung clung find found found sit sat sat slide slid slid get got got stand stood stood heave hove hove
Table 8
Class 7
V - ed, and V-ed2 are different; there is no suffixation, but there is always some vowel change
V V-edl V - ed2 drink drank drunk ring rang rung sing sang sung sink sank sunk come come come run ran run
90 went gone The Lexical Verbal System of AnaaA
The verb in Anaaii follows the subject syntactically, where the
latter occurs overtly, and is in turn followed by the object in normal or
neutral constituent structure order (Essien, 1990). In other words,
AnaaA is a subject lverblobject (SVO) language.
Morphologically, according to Essien, the Anaati verb may consist
of just the root and one or more affixes indicating the following: concord,
number, tense, aspect, mood and negative. These affixes are attached
to the root of the verb in agglutinative manner, such that a whole
sentence can just consist of only one word as in the following example:
K-kpaa - ke-se - Aka - I would have been going (from time $0time):
The example above consists of a concord marker ti
(phonologically, (q) a modal marker kpaa, a tense marker ke, an aspect
marker se, and the root ka. So one of the syntactic properties of verbs,
or any verbal element for that matter, is that they must agree in number
and person, with the subject of the sentence.
The Lexical Verbal System in AnaaA
Full or lexical verbs in Anaati are derived through the processes
of:
1. Monosyllabic base verbs.
2. Double-word verbs, Monosyllabic Base Verbs
Monosyllabic base verbs constitute majority of Anaaii verbs.
Most of them begin and end in consonants, e.g. kbp - hear, fuk - cover, j6d - wash. A few begin with consonants and end in vowels, e.g. ki- go. Kpa- cut, kdi - fetch. In their transformation to the present simple
and perfective forms, they take the prefix me in the first person. But in
their transformation to present progressive, they take either 6suk or
asuk, akesuk, ekesuk, depending on the person.
To transform to the past, especially the indefinite past, which is
prominent in Anaaii, it is marked by two allomorphs maa or ke. The
occurrence of mBa or ke depends on the presence or absence of some
syntactic categories which are themselves based on sentence types,
e.g. (Ami) m - maa - kop - I heard it. The verb mmaakop: as
segmented above consits of a concord marker m -, a past tense marker
maa - and the root of the verb kop hear. As both the concord marker
and the past tense marker precede the root kop, they are both prefixes.
The perfect tenses are non- existent in Anaaii. Consider the following.
Table 9a
Present simple
M-me - kop (I hear)
A - kop (He /She/ It hears)
A - kop (you hear)
j - mi - kop (we hear)
E - kdp (they hear) Table 9b
Present Progressive m-suk n"-kop (I am hearing)
A - suk a-kop (HeIShellt is hearing)
A-suk - a kbp (you are hearing)
1- suk i- kop (we are hearing),
E - suk &- kop (they are hearing)
Present Perfect
M-me - kop - I hear II have heard)
A - kbp (HeIShelit hearlHelShe1it has heard)
A - kop (You hearNou have heard)
I - mi - kop (we hearlwe have heard)
E-kop (they hearlthey have heard).
In the above table, me a, i 6, are prefixes used with the lexical
verb kop - hear. They agree with the subjects of their respective
sentence. It can equally be seen that there is no distinction between the
present simple and the present perfect in Anaaii.
Consequently, the future tense distinguishes formally between the
proximate future and the non-proximate future as the following examples
show:
Table 9c
1-ra i-ri - We will come
E-ra 8-ri - You (plural) will come
E -ra 64-they will come (shortly). As in the case of ma6 - the,vowel eraa is reduced when the latter affix occurs with plural concord affixes repeated on the root of the verb, as the following examples show:
i-ra I-ri -we will come
E-ra- e-ri -they will come (shortly).
Secondly, like the past tense, the form of the morpheme varies,
depending on sentence type, as the following examples show:
tG-ra-ka - I will go
fi-raa-ka- I will go (shortly)
fi-ka-ha - I will not go.
Double Word Verbs
Generally speaking, the semantic context of Anaaii verb suggests
a certain action or state which by its nature implies the co-existence of
noun phrase. It generally requires a following noun phrase even in free
combination. Consider the following:
Wok ewok - swim a swim
KWO ikw& sing a song
Tua ajed - cry a cry.
Together with the nouns, they form what is referred to in this
description as "double word verbs". They are verbs consisting of two
words. They together act as single words lexically and syntactically.
Native speakers perceive them as single grammatical units. As a rule,
they consist of lexical verbs followed by nouns with which they are
semantically and lor syntactically associated. Consider the following Table 10
Simple Present Present progressive Present Perfect
M- me wok ewok N-suk &wok - ewok M- me wok ewok
I swim swim I am swimming swim I swimlhave swim
A- wok ewok A -suk a- wok ewok A- wok ewok HeIShelit swim swim HeIShelit is swimming Swimlhelshelit swim have swim swim
E- wok ewok E - suk 6- wok ewok E- wok ewok They swim swim They are swimming swim They have swim swim i - wok ewok i - suk i -wok ewok i- wok ewok We swim swim We are swimming swim We swim swimlwe have swim swim
The persons here agree with their subjects. There is the
obligatory complementation of the noun and the verb in Anaafi. This
practice is obviously strange in English.
A Contrastive Analysis of English and Anaail Lexical Verbs
The contrastive Analysis was made in three modalities of
declarative, negative and interrogative.
The Simple Present (Declarative)
The simple present form of the verb expresses the simple present
tense in both English and Anaafi. Table 11
English: I call
Anaaii: M - me kod'
Direct Transl. I call
Eng.: You call
Anaaii A- kod-
Direct Transl. You call
Eng.: Helshelit calls
Anaaii A-KO~-
Direct Transl. Helshelit call
Eng.: We call
Anaaii: i-mi kod-
Direct Transl. We call
Eng. They call
Anaaii: E-~od-
Direct Transl: They call
Observation
In English, the present forms are the same for all persons, except
--he, she and it, third persons singular. With these persons, the tense forms are inflected with - s. On the other hand, in Anaaii, the formation of the present tense form is through the process of prefixation of me, a, i,
-e, on the personal pronouns. There is no distinction between the 2"d and 3rd persons singular, except in tone. Finally, while English , distinguishes three basic types of present (state, habitual and
instantaneous), Anaaii distinguishes only two (state and habitual).
115 Table 12
The Simple Present Tense (Interrogative)
English: Do I call him?
Anaaii fi-kod anye?
Direct Transl: I call him?
Eng. Do you call him?
Anaaii A-kod a anye?
Direct Transl: You call him?
Eng. Does heishelit call him?
Anaah A-kod anye?
Direct Transl: Heishelit call him?
Eng. Do we call him?
Anaa A: i-kod anye?
Direct Transl: We call him?
Eng. Do they call him?
Anaaii E-kod anye?
Direct Transl: They call him?
Observation
English makes use of the do - support in interrogative. This practice is non- existent in Anaaii because interrogation is tonal and the persons are implied. Table 13
The Simple Present Tense (Negative)
Eng : I do not call him
Anaafi m- si - kod - do anye
Direct Transl: I do call not him
Eng. You do not call him
Anaa;? u-s~\kod do anye
Direct Transl: You do call not him
Eng. Helshelit does not call him
Anaaii: ~jidi - si kod do anye
Direct Transl: We do call not him
Eng. They do not call him
Anaaii: A mmo I-si kod do anye
Direct Transl: They do call not him.
Observation
In English the negative marker not is placed before the verb, but
in Anaaii it is placed after the verb. Some of the persons are implied
while others are spelt out. Table 14
The Simple Past Tense (Declarative)
Eng. I bought a goat.
AnaaA M-ma dep ebot.
Direct Transl: I bought goat.
Eng. You bought a goat.
Anaafi: A - ma dep ebot.
Direct transl. You bought goat.
Eng . HeIShe bought a goat.
Anaafi: A - ma dep ebot.
Direct transl: HeIShe bought goat.
Eng. We bought a goat.
AnaaA: i ma idep ebot.
Direct transl: We bought goat.
Eng. They bought a goat.
Anaaii: E-ma 6dep eb6t.
Direct Transl: They bought goat.
Observation
In English, the verb is inflected regularly or irregularly in its transformation to the simple past, while in Anaafi it is through the prefixation of mah to the verb. In inflectional distribution in English patterns, the past form of regular verbs is formed by adding -ed to the base, while the irregular past form is formed through vowel change or vowel reduction and 't' ending or a hybrid form (vowel reduction and final 'd') or uninflected form. While English uses the simple past to express habitual past, Anaaii does not
Table 15
The Simple Past Tense (Interrogative)
Eng. Did I buy a goat?
Anaaii M-ma- dep ebbt?
Direct transl: I bought goat?
Eng. Did you buy a goat?
Anaati A-ma-dep ebot?
Direct transl: You bought goat?
Eng. Did Helshe buy a goat?
Anaafi: A-ma-dep ebbt?
Direct transl: HelShe bought goat?
Eng. Did we buy a goat?
Anaaii: i-ma-idep ebbt?
Direct Transl: We bought goat?
Eng . Did they buy a goat?
Anaaii: E-ma-edep ebot?
Direct Transl: They bought goat?.
Observation
Question forms in English are marked by the use of auxiliary & in the past, with changes in word order. In Anaati, there is no set word
order for questions, and auxiliaries play no part. AnaaA simply uses
tone to signify questions. In English also, the dummy auxiliary in the
past is used to support the constructions i.e. where there is no auxiliary in the statement. Wh-questions also need the support of the dummy auxiliary & in the past, e.g.
I. Where did you go?
ii. Why did you do it?
However, wh-questions and questions with modal auxiliary verbs simply use question words at the beginning or at the end.
Table 16
The Simple Past Tense (Negative)
Eng. I did not buy a goat.
Anaa A: fl-ki- dep-be ebbt.
Direct Transl: I not bought not goat.
Eng. You did not buy a goat.
Anaafi: U-ku dep-be ebot.
Direct Transl: You not bought not goat.
Eng. Helshe did not buy a goat.
Anaafi: i-k i - dep-be ebbt.
Direct Transl: Helshe not bought not goat.
Eng. We did not buy a goat.
Anaati: ~jidi -k i - dep-be ebot.
Direct Transl: We not bought not goat.
Eng. They did not buy a goat.
Anaati: A -mmo i -k i - dep-be ebbt.
Direct Transl: They not bought not goat. Observation
English uses one negative word while Anaaii uses double. In
English, the auxiliary is placed before the negative word, while the main verb comes after the negative word. In Anaaii the first negative word is placed before the lexical1 main verb, while the second negative word forms the suffix of the main verb. In English, the auxiliary verb takes the past form, but the main verb takes the base form. In Anaaii, the main and only verb in the verb phrase, takes the base form. While do- support is required in English negation process, its use does not apply in
Anaaii. In English, the negative word may be contracted and attached to the auxiliary. The contraction is not applicable in Anaaii. The Present Perfectives
The present perfectives in English is expressed by the use of have or has, depending on the subject, followed by the past participle form of the main verb. The present perfectives indicate an action that has been completed, the results of which are still relevant to the present time orientation. In Anaaii, there is no difference between the simple
present and the present perfect. The present perfect tense is non- existent in Anaaii, for example:
English Anaaii
Simple Present Present perfect Simple present Present Perfect
I eat I have eaten M-me dia M-m6 dia
You jump You have jumped A-a- t ama A-a- t ama
HelShe runs HeIShe has run b, a - fehge A- a - fehge
We wash We have washed I- mi- j6d I- mi- jed
They cook They havecooked E- e- tem E- e- tem The Past Perfectives
The situational meaning of the past perfective in English is past in the past. It denotes any event or state coming earlier than the simple past. Like the present perfectives, the past perfectives are not expressed in Anaaii. The simple past functions as the past perfective.
The Present Progressive
In English, the present progressive aspect is expressed by the use of ar~, or are, depending on the subject, followed by the in^ form of the verb. The present progressive aspect means that the action referred to is going on at the present time. In Anaati, the present progressive is expressed by prefixing huk, asuk, isuk and esuk to the verb (See table 9b).
The Past Progressive (Declarative)
In English, the past progressive aspect is expressed by the use of was and were, depending on the subject, followed by the in^ form of the verb. The past progressive aspect means that the action referred to was going on at a particular time in the past. In Anaafi, only the progressive aspect in the past, is expressed. For example:
Eng.: I was reading a book.
Anaaii: a-ke su k I?-kod- figwed.
Direct Transl: I was read book.
Eng. You were reading a book.
Anaaii:' A-ke sljk a -kod- 6gwed. Direct Trasnsl: You were read book.
Eng. HeIShe was reading a book.
Anaaii: A-ke suk a -kod- figwed.
Direct Transl: HeIShe was read book.
Eng. We were reading a book.
AnaaA i-k i-suk i - kod- figwed.
Direct Transl: We were read book.
Eng. They were reading a book.
Anaa A: E-k e - suk 6- kod- figwed.
Direct Transl: They were read book.
Observation
While English uses the -m form Anaaii does not.
The Past Progressive (Interrogative) English: Was I reading a book? Anaa A: n-ke suk 6-kod- figwed? Direct Transl: I was read book? Eng. Were you reading a book? Anaa A: A- ke suk fi-kod- figwed? Direct Transl: You were read book? Eng. Was he /She reading a book? Anaati: A- ke suk i!-kod- figwed? Direct Transl HeIShe was read book? Eng. Were we reading a book? Anaa A: i-k i suk fi-kod- 6gwed? Direct Transl: We were read book? Eng.: Were they reading a book? Anaaii: E-k e - suk e-kod- figxed? Direct Transl: They were read book? Observation
While English uses the auxiliary verbs to express interrogation,
Anaaii does not, and interrogation is tonal. English also expresses the past progressive (negative) and Anaati does not.
Expressing Future Time
Broadly speaking, English and Anaaii express the future. In
English, it is rendered by means of auxiliaries, while in Anaaii, it is through prefixation of auxiliary verbs as they agree with the persons.
The simple present or progressive forms equally express the future in
English. In the following sections, five most important methods of referring to future time is described and analysed.
WillIShall + infinitive
The modal auxiliary construction with will/shall is the most
common way of expressing futurity in English (Quirk et al, 1985:213).
They are mainly used to express neutral future. The modal verb wiJ (or
the contracted form '11) is used with future meaning with subjects of all
three persons. "A strong teaching tradition, especially in British English,
has upheld the use of as the correct form, in preference to w, with
a first person subject in a formal style" (Quirk et al, 1985:214).
In Anaaii, a future tense indicates that a situation will hold after
the moment of speaking about it. It distinguishes formally between the
proximate future and the non-proximate future as the following examples
show: English: I shall come.
AnaaA: fl- ra di.
Direct Transl.: I will come.
English: You (plural) will come.
Anaati: E-ra edi.
Direct Transl.: You people will come.
English: They will come (shortly).
Anaati: €-r4 edi.
Direct Transl.: They will come shortly. Interrogative
English: Shall l come?
Anaati: Maa n-dl?
Direct Transl.: I will come?
English: Will you come?
Anaati: A-ra di?
Direct Transl.: You wil! some?
English: Will helshe come?
Anaati: A-ra di?
Direct Transl: Helshe will come?
English: Shall they come?
Anaati: E-ra edi?
Direct Transl.: They will come? Observation
While English uses willlshall + infinitive to express the neutral
future, Anaati adopts maa as an auxiliary to express the future, but distinguishes formally between the proximate futurity (mas) and non- proximate futurity (maa). With reference to meaning, the willlshall construction does express social colouring, from prediction to volition.
For the simple future - negative, see Table 9C.
Be Going to + Infinitive
Be qoing to followed by the infinitive means 'future fulfillment of the present.' It has no equivalent in Anaafi.
English: I am going to tell him.
Anaaii: fi-ra doko anye.
Direct Tansl: I will tell him.
English: You are going to tell him.
Anaaii: A-ra doko anye.
Direct Transl: You will tell him.
Observation
The construction in English indicates future fulfilment of present intention, (usually linked with personal subjects and agentive verbs, e.g.
He is going to break the news. Anaafi does not express this but is rather stereotype in expressing the future with usually the auxiliary ara.
Future Use of the Present Progressive English makes use of the present progressive in referring to future actions. The construction means future arising from present arrangement, plan or programme. Anaaii does not express this, for example: English: I am (I'm) taking the children to Calabar on Monday.
Anaafi: &ra ben 6tdkajen 6-ka Calabar akud Monday.
Direct Transl: I will take the children to Calabar on Monday. Observation
While English uses both auxiliaries and main verbs in its use of the future present progressive, Anaaii expresses it as the simple future.
The main verbs in English is inflected, English expresses contracted forms, and while the present progressive is expressed in a distinct way, in Anaaii, it is expressed as a simple future.
Future Use sf the Simple Present
The future use of the simple present applies only to English, e.g.
English: I go to Enugu on Friday.
Anaaii: tha-ka Enugu akud Friday.
Direct Transl:l will go to Enugu on Friday.
Observation
The verb in English agrees with its subject, with regard to person and number. English uses the simple present to refer to future events, while Anaaii expresses only the simple future with the ara auxiliary verb.
WWilllShall + Progressive Infinitive
English uses willlshall followed by a progressive infinitive to add the temporary meaning of the progressive to the willlshall construction.
Anaaii does not express it. For example:
English: I shall be dancing at one o'clock.
Anaaii: a-ra nek-unek ke fikanika keed.
Direct Transl: I will dance - dance at one o'clock.
English: You will be dancing at one o'clock.
Anaaii: A-ra nek-unek ke hkanika keed.
Direct Transl: You will dance -dance at one o'clock. English: We shall be dancing at one o'clock.
Anaaii: i-ra nek-unek ke ikanika keed.
Direct 'i'ransl: We will dance - dance at one o'clock.
Observation
English uses 3for first persons, and yiJ for the rest of the persons. This practice is alien in Anaaii. While English uses the willlshall followed by progressive construction to denote the future as a matter of course e.g. He will be paying back the money tomorrow.
AnaaA does not express it.
Summary of Predicted Areas of Learning Difficulty
Following the structural differences realized from the contrastive analysis, the following predictions were made:
1. Anaaii speakers may have problems learning to put the -s
morpheme on :he third person singular or present tense verbs.
This is because while English verbs are inflected according to
person and number, Anaaii verbs are not.
2. Since Anaaii uses the same construction for the present
simple and present perfect, it follows that the Anaafi speaker
learning English may confuse the two concepts in English.
Typically, the present perfect may be used inappropriately by
analogy with the Anaaii simple present or vice-versa.
3. The English instantaneous present may pose problem to the
AnaaA native speaker learning English because it is not
expressed in Anaaii. 4. In English, the verb is inflected regularly or irregularly in its
transformation to the simple past, while in Anaaii, the base
form of the verb remains unchanged. In consequence, this
may result in error when the Anaaii usage is carried over into
English.
5. Anaati distinguishes the past habitual by the same approach
for the past progressive. Because of this position, the Anaaii
speaker learning English may use the past progressive in
place of used to or vice-versa.
6. The use of the verbs has have and in perfective
construction may present learning difficulties to the Anaati
native speaker. Specifically, they may be used inappropriately
because equivalent words for them in Anaaii to signal number,
person and tense are not in existence.
7. Anaai native speakers may fail to comply with the English
convention of distinguishing between and a1 in future
expressions.
8. The use of will/shall + progressive infinitive to denote future as
a matter of course (e.g. He will be paying the money
tomorrow) may constitute a learning problem to the AnaaA
native speakers because the construction is not expressed in
Anaaii.
9. Because Anaati uses the same expression for the present
perfective and the simple present, Anaaii learners of English
may confuse their use in future constructions. Since English uses auxiliary verbs to express interrogative
constructions, the Anaari learner may have difficulty in its
expression because interrogation in Anaaii is tonal.
The use of do - sup~ort in interrogative and negative
constructions has no equivalence in Anaati and may therefore
cause conceptual difficulties which may result in errors.
The Anaati convention is to answer yeslno questions by
signalling assent or dissent. Assenting or dissenting to
negative questions by the Anaari speaker learning English
may constitute a hurdle because it is the opposite of what is in
English, e.g. "You did not eat." Answer: Yes (i.e. Yes, what
you have said is right: I did not eat) or answer: No (i.e. no,
what you have said is wrong). English speakers would expect
'no' in the first instance and 'yes' in the second.
Negative forms may also pose problems to Anaaii speakers
learning English, because in English, the negative marker
precedes the lexical verbs or follows the auxiliary verb,
whereas in Anaari, the negative marker follows the subject
and closes the sentence in a present simple construction.
Research Question 2
To what extent does the grade level of Anaaii secondary school learners of English constitute interference in the use of
English lexical verbs? Data obtained with the English Lexical Verbs Achievement Test
(ELVAT) were used to answer the research question above. Summary of result of data analysis is presented below:
Table 17
Mean scores of the interference of Anaaii learners based on their grade levels in English lexical verbs achievement test
Grade Level n Mean SD
JSI 5 1 36.10 16.39
JSlll 50 47.30 14.69
SSlll 49 59.80 13.88
The results in Table 17 above show a mean score of 36.10 and a
standard deviation of 16.39 for JS I; a mean score of 47.30 and a
standard deviation of 14.69 for JS Ill, and mean score of 59.80 and a
standard deviation of 13.88 for SS Ill. It means that with a low mean
score and a high standard deviation for JS I, a high mean score and a
low standard deviation for JS Ill, and a higher mean score and a lower
standard deviation for SS Ill, mother tongue interference is reduced at a
higher proficiency level, and prominent at the lowest proficiency level. It
shows that SS Ill resisted mother tongue interference more than JS Ill,
who consequently resisted the interference more than JS I.
Research Question 3
How does the frequency of errors by females compare with
those of males on the interference of English lexical verbs among
Anaaii secondary schoo! !earners? The researcher separated the scores of males and females who took part in the ELVAT. The summary of result is shown in Table 18 below:
Table 18
Mean scores of males and females in the English lexical verbs achievement test
Gender Categories n Mean SD
Males 75 48.67 17.12
Females 75 46.48 18.54
The results of data analysis summarised in Table 18 above show that the males had the mean score of 48.67 and a standard deviation of
17.12, while the females had a mean score of 46.48 and a standard deviation of 18.54. Both groups had high mean scores and low standard deviat~on. It means that there was no difference in the exhibition of
mother tongue interference in both male and female Anaaii secondary
school learners.
Research Question 4
To what extent does location lead to fewer or greater level
interference in English lexical verbs among AnaaA learners?
Data on students' interference in English lexical verbs were separated in terms of rural and urban locations. Summary of the result
of the data analysis is presented in Table 19 below: Table q9
Mean interference scores of urban and rural-based students in English lexical verbs
Location N Mean SD
Urban schools 7 5 57.19 13.68
Rural scho~lls 7 5 37.96 16.27
Results of data analysis summarised in Table 19 indicate that school location appears to have a pronounced influence on students' mean interference scores in English lexical verbs. The mean interference scores from urban schools were 57.19, with a standard deviation of 13.68, while the rural school had a mean score of 37.96, with a standard deviation of 16.27. It means that learners from urban schools with the high mean score and a low standard deviation resisted interference more than rural based students with a low mean score and a high standard deviation.
Hypotheses
Ho,: There is no significant difference between Anaan and
English lexical verbs.
From the analytic/contrastive analysis carried out in answer to research question one, it was discovered that English and Anaati lexical verbs have a number of insignificant resemblances, and in spite of these, there are many peculiar differences in both systems. English verbs are inflected according to person and number, and Anaati verbs are not, and while Anaati uses the same construction for the simple present, present progressive and the present perfect, English expresses these aspects distinctly. In English, the verb is inflected regularly or irregularly in its transformation to the simple past, while in Anaaii, the base form of the verb remains unchanged with a past tense marker.
The use of auxiliary verbs has, have and had in perfective constructions is clearly spelt out in English, while in Anaati, it is non-existent.
In interrogative construction, English uses the word order signal
(i.e. subject-verb inversion), while in Anaaii, it is alien because interrogative is tonal. In English, the negative marker precedes the lexical verbs or follows the auxiliary verb, while in Anaaii the negative marker follows the subject, and closes the sentence in a present simple or simple past construction. In English also, the persons determine the use of shall/will future expression, whereas in Anaati, there is no such distinction. The use of will/shall + progressive infinitive to denote future is found only in English.
Therefore, from the above distinction of apparent differences in
Anaaii and English lexical verbal systems, the researcher rejects the null
hypothesis and concludes that there is a significant difference between
Anaaii and English lexical verbs.
Ho2: There is no significant difference in the grade level mean
interference scores of Anaaii secondary school learners of
English lexical verbs.
This hypothesis was tested using the Analysis of Variance
(ANOVA). Summary of results is shown in Table 20. Table 20
Analysis of variance (ANOVA) of studentsy interference based on their grade level
Sources of Variation SS dl f MS F
Between Groups 14039.72 2 7019.86 31.02*
Within Groups 33262.97 147 226.28
Total 47602.69 149
*Pc.05; df 2 &147; critical f = 8.24
The summary of the analysis of variance test presented in table
20 reveals that for hypothesis 2, an F - ratio of 31.02, which when
compared to critical or table F - value of 8.24, with 2 and 147 df at 0.05
level of significance was found to be a lot higher. This means that
students in different classeslgrades differ in their resistance to
interference. The decision rule is to reject the null hypothesis, when the
calculated value exceeds the critical value at a given alpha level. In this
case, since the calculated value is higher than the critical value, the
researcher rejects the null hypothesis and concludes that there is a
significant difference in the mean interference scores of AnaaA
secondary school students' based on their grade level.
Ho3: There is no significant difference between the mean
interference scores of male and female Anaaii secondary
school learners of English lexical verbs.
This hypothesis was tested using independent t-test analysis. Summary of the result is shown in Table 21.
Table 21 : lndependent t-test analysis of males and females in English lexical verbs interference test.
Gender n Mean SD t
Males 75 48.67 17.12
Females 75 46.48 18.54
ns at .05 alpha level; df = 148, critical t = 1.96
lndependent t-test analysis was used to test for the significant difference in the mean interference scores of male and female Anaaii
learners of English lexical verbs achievement test. The analysis in Table
21 resulted in a t-value of .75, which when compared to the critical or
table t-value of 1.96 with 148 df at 0.05 level of significance was found to
be very low. This means that there is no significant difference in the
mean interference scores of male and female Anaafi learners of ELVAT.
Based on the decision rule, the researcher upheld the null hypothesis,
and concludes that there is no significance difference in the mean
interference scores of male and female Anaafi learners of English lexical
verbs achievement test.
Hod, There is no significant difference in the mean interference
scores of urban and rural Anaafi secondary school students
in English lexical verbs.
This hypothesis was tested using independent t-test analysis.
Summary of the result is shown in Table 22.
I36 Table 22
Independent t-test analysis of the difference in English lexical verbs interference test between urban and rural-based Anaaii secondary school students.
Location n Mean SD T
Urban 75 57.19 13.68
7.83*
Rural 75 37.96 16.27
*P<.05; df = 148; critical t = 1.96
The independent t-test analysis was used to test for the significant difference in the interference scores of urban and rural-based
Anaail secondary school students in ELVAT and the result is presented in Table 22 above. The result shows that there is a significant clifference in the interference test of urbanlrural learners in the use of English lexical verbs. The analysis resulted in a t-value of 7.83,which when compared to the critical or table t-value of I .96with 148 df at .05 level of significance was found to be higher. This means that students in urban and rural locations differ in their resistance to interference. Students from urban schools resist interference more than those from rural schools. Following the decision rule, the researcher rejects the null hypothesis and concludes that there is a significant difference in the mean interference scores of urban and rural Anaail students in English lexical verbs achievement test.
Summary of Major Findings
The results of analyticlcontrastive analysis and data analysis presented in Table 1 - 22 reveal that:
137 English and Anaati lexical verbs have a number of resemblances,
but surprisingly, in spite of these apparent similarities, there are
many peculiar differences in both systems.
English verbs are inflected according to person and number, and
Anaafi verbs are not.
AnaaA uses the same construction for the simple present, present progressive and the present perfect (they are distinguished by
tone and affixation process) whereas English expresses these aspects distinctly. English clearly states the instantaneous present, whereas AnaaA does not. In English, the verb is inflected regularly or irregularly in its transformation to the simple past, while in AnaaA, the base form
of the verb remains unchanged w~tna past tense marker prefixed. In AnaaA, the simple past, past progressive and past perfect are
expressed alike, while English distinguishes them. The use of the auxiliary verbs has, have and had in perfective constructions is clearly spelt out in English, while in Anaati, it is non-existent.
In interrogative construction, English uses the word order signal
(i.e. subject-verb inversion), while in Anaafi, it is alien because
interrogative is tonal.
The use of English do - support in interrogative and negative
constructions has no equivalence in Anaaii.
(10) In English, the negative marker precedes the lexical verb or
follows the auxiliary verb, while in Anaati, the negative marker follows the subject and closes the sentence in a present simple or
simple past construction.
(11) In English, the persons determine the use of shallMill future
expression, whereas in Anaaii, there is no such distinction.
(12) The use of will/shall + progressive infinitive to denote future as a
matter of course (e.g. He will be paying back the money next
year) is found in English, whereas this construction is not
expressed in Anaaii.
(13) There is therefore a significant difference between English and
Anaaii lexical verbs.
(14) There is a significant difference in the interference of the different
grade levels of AnaaA learners of English lexic& verbs
achievement test.
(15) There is no significant difference in the interference of male and
female Anaai'i learners of English lexical verbs achievement test.
(16) Anaaii students in urban schools resisted interference more than
their counterparts in rural schools in English lexical verbs
achievement test. CHAPTER FIVE
DISCUSSION OF RESULTS
This chapter is concerned with the major findings of the study, interpretation of the research findings, their educational implications on the curriculum and recommendations. In this chapter also, conclusion about the study are drawn, suggestions for further study made, and the summary of the study presented.
Discussion of Results
For convenience, the results are discussed under four major sub- headings:
1. Analyticlcontrastive analysis of English and Anaaii lexical
verbs.
2. The mean interference scores of the different grade levels
of secondary school Anaafi learners in English lexical
verbs achievement tests.
3. The mean interference scores of male and female AnaaA
secondary school learners in English lexical verbs
achievement tests.
4. The mean interference scores of urban and rural Anaafi
secondary school learners in English lexical verbs
achievement tests.
AnalyticlContrastive Analysis of English and Anaaii Lexical Verbs
In anticipation of responses to research question I and hypothesis
I which explored the similarities as well as the differences in the lexical verbal systems of Anaaii (source language) and English (target language), both systems were described. The descriptions of the two
languages were based on Quirk et al (1985), which is esteemed to be the most definitive grammar of modern English ever published.
Therefore, a contrastive analysis was carried out: descriptions of Anaaii and English were juxtaposed in contrast. Contrastive Analysis (CA)
according to Jackson (1981) involves a systematic comparison of
selected linguistic features of two or more languages, the intent of which
is to provide teachers and textbook writers with a body of information
which can be of service in the preparation of instructional materials, the
planning of courses, and the development of class-room techniques.
The CA revealed negligible similarities and more differences between
the systems of English and AnaaA lexical verbs.
Broadly speaking, similarities relate largely to the concepts of
time (past, present and future), tense and aspect. This phenomenon as
viewed by Ellis (1985) tends to confirm the concept of the Universal
Hypothesis (UH) that language acquisition and learning is based on
rules that are universally applicable to all natural languages and these
rules are in-built in every normal child, in what is known as the Language
Acquisition Device (LAD).
Consequently, AnaaA shares more of differences than similarities
in English lexical verbal system. These differences between the two
languages could be described in terms of form, meaning and distribution
of the various categories. These differences further constitute potential
hurdles in the way of the AnaaA secondary school learners of English. The differences corroborate an observation by Halliday et a1 (1964) that apparent differences provide a common background for learners' negative transfers. Banathy (1969) points out that contrastive data outside error analysis do not provide us with a measure of the intensity of the problem, or with a quantification of the difficulty of the task. By extension therefore, the error analysis carried out furnishes us with information about the intensity of the predicted problems. Indeed, the
error analysis is in line with the principle that contrastive analysis might
be profitably supplemented by the result of error-based analysis,
particularly in the preparation of teaching materials.
The Mean Interference Scores of the Different Grade Levels of Secondary School Anaaii Learners in English Lexical Verbs Achievement Tests
Results of data analysis summarized in tables 17 and 20
(research question 2 & hypothesis 2) explained the resistance to
interference of the different grade levels of Secondary School Anaaii
learners of English lexical verbs achievement test (ELVAT). The mean
result on table 17 shows that SSlll students with a mean score of 59.80
and a standard deviation of 13.88 resisted interference more than JSIII,
with a mean score of 47.30, and a standard deviation of 14.69, who
consequently resisted the interference more than JSI, with a mean
score of 36.39 and a standard deviation of 16.39. This shows that
SSll I resisted the interference more than JSIII, who equally resisted
more than JS1 .
Table 20 which bore the Analysis of variance (ANOVA) of
students' resistance to interference based on their grade level revealed that an F-rah of 31.02 which when compared to critical or table F value of 8. 24, with 2 and 147 df at 0.05 level of significance was found to be a lot higher. This means that students in different grade levels differ in their resistance to the interference. Based on the decision rule, the researcher rejected the null hypothesis and concluded that there is a significant difference in the mean interference scores of the different grade levels of Anaafi Secondary School learners of ELVAT.
A comparison of the levels of means of the three grade levels
(36.39, 47.30 and 59.80 for JSI, JSlll and SSIII) showed that the highest error frequency was recorded in JS1 and the least error in SSIII. An F- ratio of 31.02 against the F-value of 8.24 when compared showed a marked difference in their resistance to interference. It could be stated that learners at a higher proficiency level tend to produce qualitatively more instances of verb structures than those at the lower proficiency level (Schacter and Hart, 1979). Specifically, the -s morpheme, the present simplelpresent progressive, the instantaneous present, the perfectives, the simple past, past habitual, time relationship carriers, willlshall + progressive at grade levels I and II, and past perfective negative and willlshall + progressive in grade level Ill proved very difficult in the structure test. It can the be observed that most of the verbal categories maintained high error frequencies in grade levels I and
II, but dropped rapidly to moderate level of difficulty in grade level Ill.
Also, the same problematic verbal categories noticeable in the structure test recorded high error frequency in the translation test in all the grade levels. The do-support proved problematic too, across the three grade levels. Furthermore, the longer an error persists, the more of a problem it will appear to be (Benathy 1969). In point of fact, this claim has been manifested in the results analysed. It is therefore appropriate to state that the learners' production of qualitatively more instances of verb structures at a higher proficiency level, than that at a lower proficiency is due largely to the fact that resistance to first language interference increases with time and effort (cf Lado1957 and Postman 1963). This suggests that time and effort improve learning. By and large, the claim made above about resistance to first language interference increases does not in any way suggest that the present writer discountenances the issues of developmental, intra-lingual and extra-linguistic factors in language learning. Rather, the writer endorses Selinker's (1974) assertion that language communication and overgeneralization are processes central to second language learning. But with time and effort, error frequencies are minimized.
Furthermore, the researcher confirmed Corder's (1974) assertion that different kinds of written materials produce different distributions of errors or sets of errors. Broadly speaking, the students tended to make more error in the translation and structure tests, and fewer errors in the essay test. The reason for this tendency, at least based on the students' written production could be explained as follows: the translation test elicited the highest verb error frequencies, perhaps because the
students were well disposed to transfer since the test required them to
translate sentences from Anaail (the source language) into English (the target language). Specifically, with regard to the instantaneous present, Anaafi has not such a concept where the verb refers to a single action begun and completed approximately at the moment of speech. With the perfectives, Anaaii does not have it and has never combined the perfectives and progressive aspects in the same verb phrase. The willlshall +progressive construction to denote future as a matter of course is also non- existent in Anaafi. In consequence, translating these verbal items into Anaafi resulted into long explanation, which yielded
arbitrary or ambiguous responses from the students in their attempt to translate the Anaafi renderings into English. This ran contrary to the
requirement of the translation test, which calls for translation
equivalence at the sentence level. In their explanation, Dulay et al
(1982) state that translation tasks artificially increase the second
language learner's reliance on first language structures, masking
processes the learner otherwise uses for neutral communication. The
structure test which came next in eliciting high error frequencies has
explanations in the fact that it is highly controlled. In this kind of test,
there is no room for avoidance. Harris (1969) lends an explanation as
he contends that because of the highly structured nature of these items,
the test writer could get directly at many of the specific skills and
learning he wishes to measure, and the examinee cannot evade difficult
problems as he often can with compositions. The essay test elicited
relatively less error percentages than either the structure test or the
translation test. This may be attributed to the fact that the essay test
required students to organize their own answers, and to express them in their own words. Without doubt, this,development gave the students the opportunity to cover up their weakness by avoiding the use of certain grammatical patterns, which could have earned them more errors.
On the whole, what is to be noted from the discussions so far is that error analysis employing only one test may fail to account for the variations in error frequencies resulting from the variations in the test instruments (cf) Corder 1974, Olaofe 1982. The researcher endorses
Olaofe's call for error analysis to recognize the limitation of a one-test based error analysis.
The Mean interference scores of Male and Female Anaaii Secondary School Learners of English Lexical Verbs Achievement Tests
Research question 3 and hypothesis 3 explored the mean interference scores and t-test analysis of male and female Anaafi secondary school learners of ELVAT. Summary of results in table 18 revealed that the mean interference scores for the males was 48.67 and a standard deviation of 17.12, while the females had a mean score of
46.48 and a standard deviation of 18.54. This indicates that there is no remarkable difference in the mean interference scores of males and females in ELVAT. It is therefore apparent that gender does not constitute interference.
Table 21 summarized the independent t-test analysis of the interference of male and female secondary school Anaafi learners in
ELVAT. The analysis resulted in a t- value of .75, which when compared to the critical or table t- value of 1.96 with 148 df at 0.05 level of significance was found to be very low. This means that there is no significant difference in their resistance to interference. On the tests of significance of difference in the mean interference scores of male and female secondary school Anaafi learners of ELVAT, the researcher upheld the null hypothesis that there is no significant difference in the mean interference scores of male and female Anaafi secondary school learners of ELVAT.
This has failed to agree with Wolman (1973) and lttelson (1990) who observed that language interference going by its psychological orientation or manipulation might exert differential impact on males and females. Their argument is that mother tongue interference has to do with mental dispositional mechanism, and since there are pronounced differences in the psycho-cognitive status of males and females, then ability to rely on the source language, and transfer structures to the target language is expected to favour one gender category more than the other.
The findings of this study contradict their argument. On the other
hand, it lends support to the recent findings of Okwo (2004). Evidence from the study showed that gender has no significant influence on the
achievement of students in lgbo tones. Okwo pointed out that both male
and female NCE 1 lgbo students performed equally from instruction.
The Mean Interference Scores of Urban and Rural Anaaii Secondary School Learners in English lexical Verbs
Research question 4 and hypothesis 4 explored the influence of
school location on the mean interference scores of students from urban
and rural schools on ELVAT. Summary of results in table 19 reveals
that the mean interference scores from urban schools was 57.19 with a
147 standard deviation of 13.68, while those from rural schools were 37.96, with a standard deviation of 16.27. This indicates a pronounced difference in mean interference scores for urban and rural schools, which resisted interference better than those from rural schools. On the test of significance in the resistance to interference by urban and rural
Anaaii secondary school learners of ELVAT, table 22 revealed a t-value of 7.83, which when compared to the critical or table t-value of 1.96 with
148 df, at 0.05 level of significance was found to be higher. This means that students in their different locations differ in their resistance to interference. The researcher following the decision rule rejects the null hypothesis and concludes that there is a significant difference in the mean interference of urban and rural Anaaii students in English lexical verbs achievement test.
Research evidence on influence of school location on students' achievement in school is quite numerous, for example Guthrie, Seiger,
Burham and Kaplan (1974) and Nelson (1974) presented an argument that perceptions are environmentally dependent. This implies that the ability to transfer structures from the source language to the target language can be marginally influenced by school location. Nelson
(1974) also presented convincing evidence in favour of school location as determinant of achievement in schools. His argument is tied to exposure and psycho-cognitive development. According to Nelson, students in urban settings are more exposed to modern day life, and as such acquire more knowledge and experience than rural students. As such, it is likely that they minimize mother-tongue interference as a result of interaction with exposed teachers and friends, than their colleagues in rural settings.
Conclusion
From the results obtained in the study on interference of AnaaA with English verb tenses among different categories of secondary school students, the researcher concludes as follows:
1. That through the process of contrastive analysis (CA) and error
analysis (EA) English and AnaaA lexical verbs have been
discovered to possess insignificant resemblances, and many
peculiar differences in their systems. That in spite of these
apparent similarities, there are some peculiar and subtle
differences, which constitute mother-tongue interference among
secondary school learners of English lexical verbs. The study
has therefore lent support to the fact that differences in distinctive
linguistic features used by two or more different languages
account for interference in second language learning.
2. There is a significant difference in the interference of the different
grade levels of AnaaA secondary school learners of English
lexical verbs. A comparison of the levels of means of the three
grade levels showed that the highest error frequency was
recorded in JSI, and the least in SSIII. The interference further
revealed an F-ratio which when compared to critical value at 0.05
level of significance was found to be a lot higher. The observed
difference confirmed that there is a significant difference in the interference of the different grade levels of Anaafi secondary
school learners of ELVAT.
3. There is no significant difference in the interference scores of
male and female AnaaA learners of English lexical verbs
achievement test. The observed difference in the mean
interference scores of male and female secondary school Anaaii
learners of English lexical verbs is very minute and statistically
insignificant at an alpha level of 0.05.
4. School location influences the mean interference scores of Anaaii
. secondary school learners of English lexical verbs. Students from
urban setting resisted interference significantly more than their
rural-based counterparts in English lexical verbs as revealed in
their mean interference scores in table 19. The difference is also
statistically significant at an alpha level of 0.05.
Implications of the Study
The findings of this study have some implications for the English
language curriculum development. The curriculum implications will
serve as guidelines which teachers, administrators, textbook writers and
curriculum developers will further develop on.
1. The study revealed that error analysis is indeed a down-to-earth
method of validating contrastive predictions. The curriculum
implications for these findings point to the need for teachers to
realize that contrastive predictions are validated through EA, in
order to determine the extent or type of problem (whether
interlingual, intralingual, developmental or extralingual). The difficult verbal categories will readily provide the required information about the extent or size of problems anticipated.
Therefore, the relatively easy verbal categories should be presented before the difficult ones. This implies that the most difficult verbal categories should come last. For example, the verbal categories which are absent in Anaaii, like the simple present, the present progressive, the perfectives as well as willlshall + progressive are contrastively difficult for Anaaii native speakers learning English. Therefore, their teaching and learning should follow the simple cognitive law of simple to complex.
Furthermore, a common factor among the Anaaii native speakers tested in this study is that they have not displayed proper mastery of the English lexical verb structures, and their proficiency in using the language is disappointing. Yet, these students are a representative sample of Anaaii native speakers learning English at the secondary school level. The students at this level therefore need the eclectic method of language teaching in which grammatical structures are systematically taught and related to meanings, uses and situations. For instance, the eclectic approach involves: language study + drill + situationallcommunicative practice or drill + situationallcommunicative practice, etc. By implication, the above strategies involve the teaching of the structure through conscious study of rules and through drills and situationallcommunicative practice. This will invariably arrest the current poor performance in SSCE English Language. For
example, 1998 SSCE English, which was traced to mechanical
accuracy and mother- tongue interference resulting in un-English
expressions, can be corrected. These expressions were direct
translations of the mother tongue, e.g. My father can't see money
to pay my school fees. There is no market nowadays (Business
is dull).
2. Secondly, the findings confirmed that there is a significant
difference in the interference scores of the different grade levels
of Anaaii secondary school learners in English lexical verbs.
There was a drop in error frequencies, which ran from JS1 to
SS111. This shows that learners at a higher proficiency level
tend to produce qualitatively more instances of verb structures
than those at a lower proficiency level. The findings confirmed
the claim that resistance to first language interference increased
with time and effort. In other words, learners can overcome
mother tongue induced problems through effective teaching, if
they are not fossilized already. Furthermore, since the higher the
proficiency level, the nigher the resistance to interference by the
students, curriculum adaptation should therefore differ from one
proficiency level to the other. Specifically, teaching methodology,
sequencing of verbal categories, vocabulary used, intensity and
duration of teaching should vary from one proficiency level to the
other. The findings lend support to existence of developmental
problems in second language learning since the longer the exposure of students to the target language, the better their
performance. Consequent on this claim, teachers should
endeavor to expose students to the target language as much as
possible.
3. The analysis of the nature and pattern of errors committed by the
respondents in the various test items revealed two major sources
of errors-the peculiarities inherent in the English language, and
the interference of the mother tongue. Most of the English
language rules abound with exceptions, some of which seem to
contradict the rules and introduce confusion in the mind of the
learner. This often leads to over generalization and misapplication
of the rules resulting in ungrammatical constructions and other
developmental errors. Other errors could be traced to the
influence caused by the conscious or unconscious transfer of the
structures and systems of the mother tongue to the English
language. Language is a set of habits, therefore, the acquisition
and use of it is therefore a process of habit formation. Since the
learner has imbibed the structures and systems of the mother
tongue from birth, these have become fixed and permanent in his
mind. In the process of acquiring a different sets of habits in
another language, the habits of the first language in which he
thinks, readily come up. They get in the way and the learner
either transfers some elements from the L1 to replace those that
are different or non-existent in the Lpor ignores completely those features of the L2 that he is not familiar with. This leads to the
omission of the vital elements and the wrong application of rules.
The results of the above findings have certain curriculum
implications, which are related to the psychological problems of
first language interference, in the learning of a second one. It is
important that teachers, textbook writers, school inspectors,
administrators, curriculum designers, and indeed all those who are
interested in improving the teaching and learning of English in
Akwa lbom State recognize the influence of the first language on
the learning of the second one. Therefore, there should exist a
conscious or deliberate government effort or policy, through the
state ministry of education to encourage teachers of English, and
especially, school inspectors and supervisors to carry out
systematic descriptions of the languages spoken in Akwa lbom
State. Such descriptions will prove as valuable information for
textbook winters and classroom teachers in the provision of added
materials and exercises to cater for local needs.
4. This study has implications for the consideration of learner's
environmental background in English Lexical Verbs Achievement
Test (ELVAT), signifying for example, the need for a greater
attention to be given to rural based students.
Recommendations
Based on the findings of this study, and their educational implications, the following recommendations are made: ?. The language teacher should highlight and stress points of
differences in the mother tongue and target language in English
lexical verbs so that learners can distinguish between them and
take necessary measures against confusing their uses.
2. To minimize confusion, and facilitate recognition and recall,
identical elements and features of the rules of the target language
(English language) should be grouped and taught together, then
the points of differences should be highlighted and emphasized
so that the Anaaii learner can differentiate between them in their
usage.
3. Generally, counting on the overall experiences of the problems of
Anaaii speaking secondary school students learning English,
teachers are to adopt communicative competence approach
where grammatical structures are systematically taught and
related to meanings, uses and situations. For example, Anaail
secondary school learners are to communicate as far as possible
with all available resources.
4. Furthermore, the researcher supports advocates of modern
methods of language teaching which strongly recommend
language teachingllearning through drills for effectiveness and for
the overcoming of interference problems encountered by Anaaii
learners. Drills help learners to practice the construction of
sentences, while retaining the basic structural patterns.
Therefore, language teachers of especially Anaaii secondary
school learners of English lexical verbs should through substitutior, tables enumerate the verbal categories absent in
Anaaii and take them under declarative, negative and
interrogative, with various personal pronouns and teach them
extensively. The teacher can proceed to use dialogues or games
to teach further.
5. Specifically, the Akwa lbom State government should use the
findings of this study to improve on learning materials to the
secondary schools in the Anaaii community in order to curb
interference problems.
6. Also, Akwa lbom State Ministry of Education and/or relevant
professional associations interested in the problems of learning in
schools should organize seminarshvorkshops and conferences on
the dangers of mother tongue interference on second language
learning in the Anaaii community. This is necessary because
many of the practising teachers of Anaafi secondary school
learners should be familiar with the concept or learn from it.
7. Textbook writers should where possible make use of works on
Anaaii language in developing English language course books. It
is of great importance that in addition to emphasizing the
contrasts between English and Anaafi language; textbook writers
should also make provision for meeting the language needs of
AnaaA learners. This should be done in the way they design their
comprehension passages where articles or items which are
relevant to child's/student's environment are included. The books
should begin with the known to the unknown, while items in textbooks should be laid out in a systematic way so that the
learners will not be confused.
8. English language curriculum for the secondary school Anaaii
learners should be structured by experts to include elements
discovered to be different in the mother-tongue and the target
language.
9. Extra time should be allotted to AnaaA learners by the school
authority at the rural settings. That is to say extra-curricular
activities such as school quiz, drama presentations or schools'
challenge and competitions in English should be emphasized so
that the Anaaii rural learners could have the opporturiity to better
their communicative competence. This will bring the AnaaA
students in the rural settings close to current developments in the
world, which will in turn widen their horizon and provide them with
better opportunity to minimize mother tongue interference in their
speeches.
10. Male and female AnaaA students should be exposed to all the
strategies employed to de-emphasize mother tongue interference
in verbs without discrimination, since the result of the study has
not shown any significant difference in their mean interference
scores.
Limitation of the study
The generalisability of the findings of this study and the
conclusions drawn may have been influenced by this limitation: During the process of the administration of the test items, the students were delayed from morning till late in the afternoon. This got them exhausted, and this could have affected their responses.
Suggestions for Further Research
The following suggestions based on the findings of the study are made for further research:
1. It is suggested that a replication of this study, using other subjects
and areas of study to find out the interference of Oron (a dialet in
Akwa lbom State) with English verb tenses among secondary
school learners be conducted.
2. It is suggested that a similar study be carried out on either the
modal auxiliary verbs or the primary verbs.
3. The study can be replicated using age of students and
educational status of parents as variables.
4. influence of Anaaii verbal structure on the oral and written
English production of AnaaA students should be conducted.
5. A contrastive study could also be done in other linguistic systems,
e.g. nominal, adjectival and adverbial systems.
Summary of the Study
The present study set out to investigate the interference of AnaaA with English verb tenses among different categories of secondary school students. The intention was to compare and contrast the lexical verbs of
Anaaii and English by highlighting the similarities and differences,
determine how the differences constituted interference of the different grade levels, on gender and school location of Anaaii learners of English lexical verbs.
To guide the study, the following research questions were posed:
What are the similarities and differences between Anaaii and
English lexical verbs?
To what extent does the grade level of Anaaii secondary school
learners of English constitute interference in the use of English
lexical verbs?
How does the frequency of errors by females compare with those
of males on the interference of English lexical verbs among
Anaa4 secondary school learners?
To what extent does location lead to fewer or greater level of
interference in of English lexical verbs among Anaaii learners?
To further help in answering the research questions, the following hypotheses were tested:
1. There is no significant difference between Anaaii and English
lexical verbs.
2. There is no significant difference in the mean interference scores
of the different class levels of Anaaii secondary school learners of
English lexical verbs.
3. There is no significant difference between the mean scores of
male afid female Anaafi learners in English lexical verbs
achievement tests. 4. There is no significant difference in the mean interference scores
of urban and rural Anaati secondary school students in English
lexical verbs achievement tests.
Review of related literature indicates that although contrastive
studies play a vital role in second language curriculum development, theoretical predictions stemming from contrastive analysis (CA) are both
adequate and powerful on their own, it is more effective when validated
by actual field work and subsequent error analysis (EA).
The study employed two research designs: survey (analytic1
contrastive analysis) and causal comparative. One hundred and fifty
secondary school Anaaii learners in Abak and Oruk Anam education
zones of Akwa lbom State were used. The population was sourced from
two co-educational schools, one girls' school and one boys' school by a
non-proportionate stratified random sampling technique. In each school,
respondents, research assistants and regular teachers in the sampled
schools were used.
The English Lexical Verbs Achievement Test (ELVAT) was the
instrument used for data collection, which comprised structure,
translation and essay. A reliability index of 0.83 (multiplelstructure test),
0.91 (translation tesi) and 0.70 (essay test) were obtained.
The data collected from the study were analysed by
analyticlcontrastive analysis, through the use of means, standard
deviation, t-test statistics and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). The results of the study showed that:
English and AnaaA lexical verbs have a negligible number of
resemblances and many peculiar differences, which constitute
mother tongue interference to learners of English verbs. There is
a significant difference between the lexical verbal systems of
AnaaA and English, which constitute mother tongue interference
to learners of English verbs.
There is a significant difference in the mean interference scores
of the different grade levels of Anaati learners of English lexical
verbs achievement test.
There is no significant difference in the mean interference scores
of male and female Ariaati learners of English lexical verbs
achievement test.
Students in urban schools resisted interference more than their
counterparts in rural schools in English lexical verbs achievement
test.
Conclusion
Based on the findings of this study, the following conclusions are drawn:
1. That since Anaati and English share more differences which
constitute interference, the English language teacher should
highlight and stress points of differences in the mother-tongue
and target language and teach on them extensively so that
learners can take necessary measures against confusing their
uses.
161 2. That learners at a higher proficiency level tend to produce
qualitatively more instances of verb structures than those at the
lower proficiency level because resistance to first language
interference increases with time and effort. The language teacher
should start early to teach all aspects of verbs to Anaaii learners
of English.
3. That gender was not a significant factor in the interference of the
students in English lexical verbs. Therefore, effort should be
channelled towards co- educational institutions as it may foster
stiffer competition rather than spend resources on sustaining
separate schools.'
4. That location was a significant factor in the interference of Anaaii
secondary school students in English lexical verbs. This may be
because more qualified and skilled teachers prefer to work in
urban areas. It may also be due to the fact that urban students
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Section A: Background Information
Dear Interviewee,
I am a Ph.D. student of the sub-Department of Arts Education of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. I intend to carry out a research on the interference of Anaaii on the use of English verb tenses among secondary school students of Anaaii origin. To achieve this objective, and in view of your position in government, I need your assistance to get adequate imformation on the true meaning and origin of the AnaaA people. Your maximum co-operation is needed to assist in making the research authentic, hence the information will not be used against you.
Section B: Personal Information of Respondents. Please fill in the correct information.
Name of Respondent:......
Sex: M...... F...:......
Age:......
State of Origin: ......
Establishment:......
Status:......
L.G A.: ......
Home Town:......
First Language: ......
Section C: The Interview Questions.
Please provide answers to the following questions.
1. Where do you come from?
2. How long have you been in your present employment?
3. How many ethnic groups are in Akwa lbom State?
4. What is the meaning of Anaaii? 5. When and where did the AnaaA people migrate from?
6. How did the Anaaiis find themselves in their present location?
7. Who are their neighbours and how do they relate with them?
8. What sort of a people are the Anaaiis? l1l111 I ILII 1 I 1 Interf erenca-~f,Anaa with______
BngIlish- Verb Tenses mwg. Dif-f erent C ategsrie~-@f Sec.nd-wxScheol. APPENDIX 3
ENGLISH LEXICAL VERBS ACHIEVEMENT TEST (ELVAT)
Part One
Section A: Background lnformation and Instructions.
I am a Ph.D. Student of the sub-Department of Arts Education, of the Universty of Nigeria, Nsukka. I intend to carry out a research on the interference of Anaafi on the use of English verb tenses among secondary school students of Anaafi origin. In pursuance of this research objective, your maximum co-operation is needed to make this research worthwhile. The information is for the consumption of the researcher, and hence, the result will not in anyway, be used against you.
Read each question carefully, before you answer it. Do not waste time on any question, if you find it difficult, go on to the others and finish them before you come back to complete the difficult ones. Please work independently, and do not discuss any thing with anybody.
Part Two
Section B
Personal Information of Respondents. Please tick (J) or fill in the correct information.
Name of Student ......
Name of School ......
Sex: M ...... F......
Level...... JSI...... JSIII...... SSIII......
Local Government Area......
Home Town: Abak Oruk Anam
Location: Urban Rural
First Language: Anaaii lbibio
Other Languages Spoken: ...... Part Three: The Instrument
This instrument is made up of three tests. Please attempt the three.
Section C: Instruction
Fill in the gap in each of the following numbers by choosing the best alternatives from A - E. Indicate your choice by putting a circle round the appropriate letter.
Example: He ...... very often.
A. fight B. .fighting C. fights D. will fighting
The correct answer is 'C' thus (c)
Edima and Eno ...... to school every week.
A. go B. going C. will goes D. gone E. went
John and James ...... the grasses weekly.
A. cut B. cuts C. cutting D. has cut. E. had cut .
We ...... Okoye's family always.
A. visited B. visit C. visiting D. will visit E. have visit Mary's children ...... milk and honey. A. like B. liking C. likes D. is liking E. will liking "They live in Uyo". He said they ...... in Uyo. A. live B. lives C. will live D. lived E. is live They ...... every Thursday on the 5th floor. A. meet B. met C. meets D. meeting E. will meet Mrs Jones and Larra ...... at a private school. A. teaching B. teaches C. teach D. is teaching Jehu ...... vegetables to meat. A. preferring B. prefers C. has prefer D. will referring. We ...... to Florida every summer for shopping.
A. travelled B. travels C. travel D. will travelling.
John as well as Israel ...... plenty of water.
A. drinks B. drink C. drinking D. drunk
She ...... her children's clothes daily.
A. washed B. washing C. has washed D. washes
The cat and not the dog ...... here every Monday.
A. comes B. came C. has come D. come
Mallam Aliyu ...... his bills on time.
A. paying B. pays C. Pay D. paid
lmaobong has failed her semester examination, because she ...... weekly and does not concentrate on her work.
A. travelling B. travels C. travel D. will travel E. has travel
Segun ...... on the telephone.
A. is speaking B. was speak C. speak D. speaking
The class ...... outside every Thursday
A. works B. working C. worked D. is work E. has worked.
Udo ...... on the bench every night.
A. slept B. sleep C. sleeping D. sleeps E. was sleep.
She ...... with management on every issue.
A. agreed B. agreeing C. agree D. agrees
Ethel ...... The Director now.
A. is begged B. is begs C. begging D. is begging
The children were ...... French fluently when they lived in Cameroon.
A. speaking B. spoke C. speak D. spoken. Do I ...... the rumour?
A. spread B. speading C. spreaded D. spreads
She ...... ever since her father died.
A. has been crying B. is being crying C. will be crying D. crying
Doris ...... with her parents now.
A. isspoke B. isspeak C. is spoken D. is speaking
After Samuel answered the Lord, he went back and ......
down.
A. lie B. lain C. laid D. lay E. lying
Aliyu ...... his mother's water pot on his way back from the stream.
A. break B. broke C. broken D. breaking
He ...... that house in a haste.
A. built B. build C. is builded D. building
The woman ...... her chicken here last week.
A. freeze B. freezed C. froze D. frozen
The bird has ...... away.
A. fly B. fled C. flown D. flying
The hunters had ...... the lion.
A. killed B. killing C. kill D. kills
Has he ...... his luggage?
A. pack B. packed C. packing D. packs
Is it true she ...... the dress?
A. has tear B. had torn C.. has tore D. has teared.
Mary told me her elder sister had ...... a special number in church
A. sing B. sings C. sang D. sung.
177 Has lbrahim ...... the wine?
A.drunk B.drink C. drank D. drunken
Afam ...... in that school last year.
A. has taught B. has teach C. had taught D. is taught.
I ...... out of the burning house last night.
A. jumping B. will jump C. jumped D. jumps
We ...... to travel on Thursday.
A. will agreed B. agreed C. are agreed D. agreeing
We ...... the motherless Babies' Home two weeks ago.
A. will visit B. visited C. visit D. visits
He ...... the little boy into the gutter.
A. push B. pushed C. pushing D. is pushed
Eteyen ...... the last Jamb examination at Makurdi.
A. try B. tried C. trying D. will try.
Obi and Ify ...... last Saturday.
A. wed B. wedding C. had wed D. wedded.
Ekaette ...... to Jos with her mother last year.
A. travel B. travels C. travelled D. had travel.
Did you ...... on the dead snake?
A. tread B. treads C. trod D. trodden
Roy had ...... the answer to the question.
A. forget B. forgotten C. forgot D. forgetting.
Has Udo ...... the bowl?
A. broke B. broken C. breaking D. breaks 45. Raymond ...... , all the mangoes.
A. was eat B. have eaten C. will eaten D. has eaten E. eaten.
46. Had Edikan ...... the wood yesterday?
A. splits B. split C. splitted D. splitting
47. "1 saw Ime yesterday." He said he ...... Ime the day before.
A. had seen B. saws C. had see D. must see.
48. Have you ...... here before?
A. came B. come C. coming D. comes.
49. The cat ...... under the table the day before yesterday.
A. sleeps B. sleeped C. slept D. sleeping E. sleep.
50. He ...... in River Niger when he was younger.
A. had swim B. had swim C. had swam D. had swum E. swimming. Part Four
Translation
English to Anaaii
Joy and Hope go to school every week.
They cut the grass daily.
She visits her parents monthly.
Eno's baby loves fresh milk.
He lives in Uyo.
They are meeting there now.
Mrs Ukuut is teaching in a public school.
Ekaette and her husband are fighting now.
She travelled overseas last vacation.
He drank plenty of water last night
The housekeeper washed the children's clothes yesterday.
The dog has come here today.
Prof Brooks has paid all his bills to the cashier.
lmaobong had fought with her nanny last year.
Okoye speaks on the telephone.
The association meets here every Sunday.
You insult people a lot.
Have you eaten your dinner yet?
Daddy has split the wood.
Have the thieves stolen all the money? Translation from Anaaii to English
Joy ne Hope ese eka dgwed kwa ura.
~sekpeke figwub kwa usen.
Ase ke se ete ne eka amo kwa afion.
~jen no ase Ama mmod eba. Arufi k'u yo.
~nyenembono de idaha - m.
Mrs ~kuutakp8b- 6gwed k-ufok figwed a- kofmen.
~kaettene 6be amo 6suk ewana
Ama aka abio mbakara nduok adudu isua afiko.
Ama awon" mmofi ne aneke agwak ubi mkpod
~jenufokAma ajed afofi ntokajen mkpofi.
~waaade adi mi mfin -em
Prof Brooks akpe uked isud am0 ano aboo akuk.
imabong ama anwana anwan n e areb am0 isua Aiiko.
Okoye atah iko ke phone
~bohoade 6se eboho mi kwa Sunday.
Ade ase asoiio awo ayen
~diannidia ubi nron
~teami asiak eto.
ino ad6 ejib uked akuk? Part Five
Essay
Instruction
Write a paragraph of ten sentences on one of the following in
English:
I. A teacher at your school whom you lie. Mention some
of the things the teacher does, and say why you like
him.
2. An important event that happened in your school last
year.
3. What you like to do after leaving school. APPENDIX 4: MODEL ANSWERS TO THE ENGLISH LEXICAL VERBS ACHIEVEMENT TEST (ELVAT)
Section C, part 3
APPENDIX 5: MARKING SCHEME OF THE ENGLISH LEXICAL VERBS ACHIEVEMENT TEST
Structure (50 marks).
One mark per question
Translation (50 marks)
AnaaA to English (20 marks)
One mark per question.
English to AnaaA (20 marks)
One mark per question
(1 0 marks)
Total - 100% APPENDIX 6: TABLE OF SPECIFICATION FOR MULTIPLE
CHOICE OR STRUCTURE
Verbal Categories % Memory Application Higher Total 50% 30% order 20% 100%
The base form The - S form The -ing participle The past form The -ed participle The regular form The irregular form Total
Translation
Verbal categories English to Anaafi to Total Anaaii English The base form 2 2 4 The - s form 3 3 6 The - ing participle 3 3 6 The past form 3 3 6 The - ed participle 3 3 6 The regular form 3 3 6 The irregular form 3 3 6 Total 20 20 40 APPENDIX 7: SECTION A- STRUCTURE: COMPUTATION OF RELIABILITY COEFFICIENT ON MULTIPLE OBJECTIVE TEST
Table Showing Computation of Students Trial Tests Scores
X
7
10
12
13
9
8
8
10
10
8
10
10
15
15
12
12
13
10
9
8 Formula for computing the Pearson product
Moment correlation coefficient (r) Using Reliability Index Formula APPENDIX 7, SECTION B - TRANSLATION: COMPUTATION ON RELIABILITY COEFFICIENT ON TRANSLATION TEST
Table Showing Computatisn of Students Trial Test Scores X
9
8
7
8
10
8
8
9
7
6
7
6
7
6
8
9
11
12
10
10
166 Formula for Computing the Pearson Product Moment
Correlation Coefficient
Cjsing Reliability lndex Formula
Using Reliability lndex Formula APPENDIX 8: INTER - RATER RELIABILIN TEST OF ENGLISH LEXICAL VERBS ACHIEVEMENT TEST USING COEFFICIENT OF CONCORDANCE (W) Structure Test D = Deviation of all scores from the combined mean m - Population mean n - Number of Items Translation Test
Essay Test
X
6
3
9
3
8
7
8
8
6
6
5
6
9
8
10
7
8
7
7
8
7
8
5
APPENDIX 9: LIST OF SCHOOLS AND POPULATION OF STUDENTS IN ABAK AND ORUK ANAM EDUCATION ZONES
Abak Education zone
Sln Schools JSI JSlll
Holy Family College, Oku Abak Boys 150 165
Loreto Girls Juniorate, Eriam, Afaha Obong Girls 90 220
Church of Jesus Christ Comprehensive Secondary School, Atai Otoro Co-ed 110 120
Nigeria's Christian Secondary School, Ukpom Co-ed 170 210
Comprehensive Secondary School, lkot Oku Mfang Co-ed 100 120
Mclntire Secondary Commercial School, Utu Abak Co-ed 140 100
St. Mary's Senior Science Secondary, ~choollEdiene Abak Boys 110 120
Comprehensive Secondary School, , Ediene Abak Co-ed 140 220
Community High School, Afaha Obong Co-ed 170 150
Secondary Commercial School, lkot Etukudo Co-ed 176 150
Army Day Secondary School, lbagwa Co-ed 100 90
Comprehensive Secondary School, Midim Co-ed 95 8 0
Total Oruk Anam Education Zone
Sln Schools TYpe JSI
Community Secondary School, Co-ed 100
Community Secondary School, Mbiakot Co-ed 181
Community Secondary Commercial School, lkot Osute 150
Community Secondary Commercial School, lkot Afaha I80
Community High School, Ekparakwa I63
Community Secondary School, Nung Ita 170
Southern Annang Secondary School, lkot Okoro I60
Comprehensive Secondary School, lkot Esenam 131
10. Qic Secondary School, Ika Annang 120
3. Otop Christian High School, lkot Ukpong Eren 200
4. Madonna Community Girls' Secondary School, Obo Ntonya 131
13. Qic Secondary School, lbesit 141
14. Eastern Midim Secondary School, lkot Owobo 120
15. Community Secondary Commercial School, lkot lnuen 120
Total