Investigating EFL Learners' Spelling Mistakes in Exams at the University of Halabja Department of English Language
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.32410/huj-10011Keywords:
Spelling mistakes, Writing exam sheets, Spelling rules, English spelling systemAbstract
Students commonly make spelling mistakes, especially in exams. The researcher perceived this phenomenon throughout his teaching experience for about four years. That is why he decided to conduct this research study to investigate these mistakes and analyze them. To achieve this aim, he has given a theoretical background about English spelling and some commonly misspelled words. Then, he has taken a sample of the students’ exam sheets from the module he teaches. In these exam sheets, he found out the total number of words each student used to answer the questions and the number of misspelled words to determine the percentage of misspelled ones. Finally, he has drawn conclusions and recommendations on the basis of this analysis. The major findings of the study show that no exam sheet is free of spelling mistakes. This means that making spelling mistakes is not related to the level of the students because even the students who got high marks made certain spelling mistakes.
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