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THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIAL SCIENCE AND EDUCATION INNOVATIONS (ISSN- 2689-100X)
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PUBLISHED DATE: - 28-06-2024
DOI: -
https://doi.org/10.37547/tajssei/Volume06Issue06-30
PAGE NO.: - 240-244
THE DIFFICULTY OF USING IRREGULAR
SENTENCE BY IRAQI EFL STUDENTS AT
UNIVERSITY OF BABYLON
Wid Wajdi Alazzawi
Asst. Lect., College of Dentistry, Babylon, Iraq
INTRODUCTION
1.1 The Problem
Irregular Sentence is a type of sentences
which doesn’t match the regular patterns of clause
structure, that have a full meaning. The problem is
that irregular sentences are difficult to understand
and use by Iraqi EFL students at Babylon
University because it is always used in non-formal
colloquial language, and it is semantically correct
but syntactically odd, so we talk about the history
of the rules of sentences of this type.
1.2 Aims
The study aims to clarify the importance of
irregular sentences in the language where the
sentence consists of noun, verb ( the verb is either
regular or irregular) , subject , auxiliary verb and
complement to the sentence where the study and
knowledge of irregular verb is important to know
the type of sentence if it is regular or irregular , as
RESEARCH ARTICLE
Open Access
Abstract
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the verbs in general are important in all sentence,
whether in English or Arabic because they simply
give a clear and understandable meaning to the
sentence. There for, the presence of anomalous
verb in the irregular sentence makes them know
the type of sentence.
1.3 Hypothesis
It is hypothesized that the difficulty of
understanding and using the irregular sentence for
the Iraqi EFL students is one of the biggest
problems that can be faced by them.
1.4 Procedures
The following steps will be followed:
1.
Presenting a comprehensive study about
irregular sentences.
2.
Selecting a random sample of students to
have a test in irregular sentences.
3.
Analyzing encounter in using irregular
sentences in English.
1.5 Limits
The paper is limited to irregular sentences in
English and the test will be applied to a random
sample from the fourth-year students in the
Department of English/ College of Education for
Human Science/University of Babylon during the
academic year (20122-2023).
1.6 Value
This paper will be value for further research in this
regard.
LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Irregular Sentences
Irregular sentence is any sentences that
doesn’t have at least one in dependent clause,
doesn’t follow predictable grammatical patterns
and often are ‘frozen ‘forms which cannot be
altered to show changes in time tense or number.
Idiomatic, expressions proverbial sayings and
interjections are examples of irregular sentences.
There are a lot of Irregular Verbs in English. We
can divide them into four groups:
1.
Verbs which have the same base form, past
simple and participle. For example: -
Cast
–
cast
–
cast
Hurt
–
hurt
–
hurt.
2.
Verbs which have the same past simple and
past participle. For example:
breed
–
bred
–
bred
feel
–
felt
–
felt
3.Verbs which have the same base form and past
participle. For example:
Come - came -come
4.
Verbs which have a different base form, past
simple, and past participle. For example:
Choose
–
chose
–
chosen
eat
–
ate
–
eaten
Irregular verbs are those whose shape
completely changes with changing times , for
example , from present tense to
past we don’t put (
ed ) at the end of the verb and They are limited
verbs , whereas the standard is its difference only
by adding ( d-ed ) at the end of the word where if
the verb ends with ( e) add (d) only to get past and
third conjugation if it ends with letters other than
( e ) we add (ed ). Quirk (1973:30)
For example:
Like
–
liked
–
liked
Irregular sentences can consist of single words,
sentences parts, objections, or a group of
expressions (such as expression and proverbs,
including single phrase.
In English language of conversation, we often use
single words to obtain the required information in
response to another person, these words are
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known by the phrase “one –
word sentences “
or
“on
ly
sentences “ , for example:
A-Where did you meet again?
B-Moscow
C- I think it is better not to get involved
B- agreed
A-When do you need to complete these reports?
B - Tomorrow.
We find in this conversation, although the
response of the second speaker consists only of
one word in each of this convention, but it contains
all the conversation.
2.2 Fragments of the sentence:
We also use parts of the sentences (phrases,
incomplete phrases, or dependent phrases) as
separate sentences, again these are usually used in
English language for conversation when we are
calling someone else. Murphy (1985:292), for
example:
A-Will you have lunch soon?
B- In about an hour (preposition)
A-Do you want to come to a movie with me later?
C-It looks good (incomplete item)?
B-When did you realize that you wanted to pursue
the police?
A-When I was in college (dependent item)
2.3 Interventions
Single words and short phrases are also
commonly used as interjections (also known as
exclamation points) to express strong emotions
such as surprise, attention, excitement, dread, etc.
These are divided into primary and secondary
interventions:
2.1.3 Initial interventions
The main interventions are single words
that are derived from sounds instead of existing
word categories, and with that they still have a
widely recognized meaning.
Some of the common initial interventions are:
(expression of frustration)
… argh
(
expression of cold) … brr
(expression of anger)
… grr
Interventions are often associated with the
primary key with a comma sentences, but it can
also standalone secondary camel, and in this case
punctuated by an exclamation mark in general, for
example:
“ooh this is a beautiful dress “
“brr it’s freezing here “
2.2.3 Secondary Interventions
They are single words or short phrases that
belong to other word categories. some common
secondary provinces are:
(god bless you)
(congratulations)
(good sorrow)
(hell)
(hey)
(hello)
(my country)
(oh my god)
Usually permeate secondary interventions
exclamation marks.
“Oh
my god! we won the lottery!
“
“
Gorgeous! what a great achievement!
“
However, we can have weaker secondary
entrances, interrupted by periods or interrogation
that use question marks, for example: -
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“Good sorrow. I didn’t see this coming “
“Okay? Are we going to watch a movie? “
“What? Don’t you like coconut? “
2.4 Expressions, proverbs, and set expressions
The English language contains a large number
of expressions that have a fixed and specific
understanding, even if they aren’t grammatically
complete or literally meaningful, many of these
terms are (expressions that have a non-literal
meaning) or proverbs (short sayings that love a
fact or basic principle) , although other expressions
with specific meanings are used frequently and
also broadly . Quirk (1973:205).
2.5 Idioms
Idiomatic expressions are phrases whose
meaning cannot be extracted from the literal
words that compose them and often have a unique
grammatical structure and because of this they are
used repeatedly in ways that conflict with the rules
of traditional rules and among them are often used
as sentences for themselves in the conversation.
Quirk (1985:846), for example:
Hello, How are you?
Hi Jeff ! Long time no see !
How can you expel us from such a house ?
Requests are orders
When is this report ready for me ?
B-Any minute now !
2.6 Proverbs
Proverbs are stand
–
alone sentences that
express the truth based on common sense or
shared experience, many of whom have become
divided into simple sentences over time. For
example: ( you should try and shape better habits
than your daily routine). Quirk (1990:244).
METHODOLOGY
The design of this study is quantitative research.
A random sample of 25 students is taken from the
fourth-year level in the Department of English/
College of Education/University of Babylon during
the academic year (2022-2023) to apply a
diagnostic test in order to investigate their
performance in using irregular sentences. They are
all similar in terms of their age, social background,
gender, and speak. Arabic as their first language. In
this research, the researcher collected the data
through a test as the research instrument. The test
includes 20 items distributed over two questions.
The first question consists of 10 items, this
question i
s designed to test the student’s ability at
the recognition level. Students are given some
sentences and ask to tick the simple past form of
some verbs. The second one also consists of 10
items designed to test the student’s ability at the
production level in which they are asked to fill the
blanks with the appropriate past simple form of
the verb in parentheses. The total number of
questions given in the test is 20 questions. The
Participants were given one hour time to complete
the test which is the normal timing of a classroom.
According to the findings of the test, the number
and percentage of incorrect responses for the
whole test are more than those of the correct
responses which indicates that the students
encounter difficulty in using and understanding
irregular sentences.
CONCLUSION
In English language the forms of sentences fall
in one of the patterns of sentence structure but
there is another type which does not match the
regular patterns of clause structure, called
irregular sentences that have a full meaning.
This study recommends students should be
well-trained on how to use irregular verbs in the
past tense case or changing the form of the
irregular adjective and must be memorized by the
learners/students because of the difficulty to
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distinguish the irregular verbs among the
sentences.
There for 70% of Iraqi EFL Babylon University
students find difficulty in using irregular verbs in
writing their essays because irregular sentences
are more complicated and often need to study
individually because they don’t follow one pattern.
So that, Center of attention was given to the
students to develop their skills and knowledge to
use the irregular verbs correctly by identifying
these verbs, focusing on who use them to refer to
the past and putting them within a table to
facilitate studying them.
REFERENCES
1.
Murphy, R. 1985. English Grammar in Use.
London: Cambridge University Press.
2.
Quirk, R; Greenbaum, s.1973. A University
Grammar of English. London: Longman.
3.
----------------------------------
.1990. A student’s
Grammar of the English Language. London:
Longman Group.
4.
Quirk, R; Greenbaum, s; leech, G; and Svartvik,
J. 1985. A Comprehensive Grammar of the
English Language. London: Longman.
