Tikrit University

English Grammatical Morphemes ({-s pl.}, {-s ps}, and {-s 3d}) by Iraqi EFL Learners: A Case Study

Document Type : Original Article

Author

Department of English, College of Education for Humanities, University of Anbar

Abstract
Acquiring grammatical morphemes is the main part in language acquisition. Brown (1973), de Villiers and de Villiers (1973) and Larsen-Freeman (1975) mentioned that there is a natural order of acquisition of grammatical morphemes in English. This study investigates the development of acquisition of {-s pl.}, {-s ps}, and {-s 3d} by Iraqi EFL learners and to find out if Iraqi EFL learners follow the same order of acquisition. It is also to differentiate between male and female learners in their acquisition. The study was based on a grammaticality judgment test that was administered for 30 participants each academic year specifically in May 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016 respectively. The results of analysis present the average of the percentage of identification of grammatical morphemes concerned. The average displays that the acquisition of {-s 3d} more fulfilled, with an average (66.583%), than {-s pl.}, {-s ps} which are (58.083%) and (50.25%) respectively. Also the results show that Iraqi male and female learners have the same order of acquisition of grammatical morphemes but there is a difference in the averages obtained which reveals that Iraqi female EFL learners acquire these 1 {-s pl.}: noun plural, {-s ps}: noun possessive, {-s 3d}: present third-person (Stageberg, 1981:92) grammatical morphemes better than male.

Keywords


Volume 1, Issue 3
Spring 2018
Pages 17-31

  • Receive Date 17 April 2018
  • Accept Date 23 April 2018
  • Publish Date 01 May 2018