Psych Educ, Document ID: PEMJ0, doi: 10.6084/m9.figshare.19407500.

v1
Research Article

Writing Competence and Grammatical Errors of the Written Discourses of HUMSS 11

Students
Richmond Romar S. Rivera*
For affiliations and correspondence, see the last page.
Abstract
Writing is one of the macro- skills that needed to be mastered by the students because it is an avenue
for them to express their feelings. Some believed that there are students who are good at writing, but
they are not good speakers. In the Senior High School Curriculum, the Humanities and Social
Sciences need to write effectively because there are writing subjects that would enhance their skills
such as Reading and Writing in the core subject, Creative Writing, and Creative Non-Fiction in their
specialized subjects. In spite of the good intention of the HUMSS curriculum, there are students who
could not write effectively. This paper can be instrumental as it sought to determine how competent
are the HUMSS students with regards to writing. It could also help the teachers to identify the
necessary steps in order to improve the writing competency of the HUMSS student. The study used
the descriptive- correlational design was used to determine grammatical errors and writing
competence of the HUMSS 11 students. Sixty (60) eulogies that serve as the written discourses were
analyzed in the study. It found out that the respondents have a mean score of 2.37 (Fair to Poor) in
their level of writing competence. The respondents committed grammatical errors on their written
discourses wherein their inconsistent use of verb tenses was their common error. There is no
significant relationship between gender and level of writing competence as gender is not a significant
factor that affects the writing competence of the students. There is a significant difference between
the scores of the respondents as female students tend to perform better than males.

Keywords: Curriculum, Writing Competence, Senior High School Students, Grammatical Errors,
Written Discourses

Introduction mastering writing skills, the writers can elaborate their

ideas in a systematic arrangement. Before writing, the
writers need to think about how the ideas of the writers
Writing is one of the macro- skills that needed to be can be understood by the reader. The writers have to
mastered by the students because it is an avenue for use the correct written language, so the reader can
them to express their feelings. Some believed that understand the ideas of the writer.
there are students who are good at writing, but they are
not good speakers. This is supported by Graham It was found out that the study of Pratiwi (2012),
(2012), who argued that speaking is very hard because shows that language use and vocabulary were the most
it is performance wherein it means that there is no difficult aspect for the students. In their composition in
undo and no revision. In an article by FullEducation, language use aspect, there was still a major problem in
they said that developing written skills will enable arrangement, tense, number, word order/ of fragments,
students to learn how to compose ideas, organize their deletion and meaning confused or obscured. In
thoughts and arguments, support key points, and share vocabulary aspect, the students' composition still
information. Acquiring these skills will also prepare limited range, frequent error in choice of words and
students for their future academic and professional the meaning confuse obscured. In the content aspect,
endeavors. most students have the criteria Good to Average. It
could be inferred that most students did not have
Pratiwi (2012), argued that in writing, students need to problems or difficulties in the content aspect.
practice and counseling from the teachers. In writing, Organization and Mechanic aspects were easy for the
the students try to use English in oral form as well. students. The students have Good to Average criteria
Writing can be satisfying if we master vocabulary, in this aspect, even though several students have Fair
grammar, punctuation, and idiom. Zulfani (2001) as to Poor criteria. The fact told us that students’
cited by Pratiwi (2012), writing can help students to composition is loosely organizes but main ideas stand
make it stronger by adding more grammatical out, limited support, logical but incomplete
structures, idioms, and vocabulary, as the important sequencing.
thing in learning a language. Furthermore, Asmuti
(2002) as cited again by Pratiwi (2012), said that by Myles (2002), argued that the ability to write well is

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not a naturally acquired skill; it is usually learned or negotiation of meaning, peer responses can be very
culturally transmitted as a set of practices in formal useful. In short, because learners are less familiar and
instructional settings or other environments. Writing less confident with structural elements of a new
skills must be practiced and learned through language, rhetorical and cultural conventions and even
experience. Writing also involves composing, which new uses of writing, writing in an L2 can have errors
implies the ability either to tell or retell pieces of and be less effective than writing in L1.
information in the form of narratives or description, or
to transform information into new texts, as in This is true as students spend their academic life in
expository or argumentative writing. He also added writng endeavours, because they are made to do
that Compared to students writing in their native written homeworks, written outputs in all their
language (L1), however, students writing in their L2 activities and many more. Despite of the fact that they
have to also acquire proficiency in the use of the are made to write early in the elementary years there
language as well as writing strategies, techniques and are students who could not write or express their ideas
skills. Moreover, in the article of Myles (2002), he said effectively.
that there are two factors that affect errors in L2
writing: cognitive and social. In the social factors it On 2012, the RA 10533 also known as the Enhance
influence the quality of contact that learners will Basice Education Act of 2013 was signed into law by
experience. Certainly, instructors recommend that then President Benigno Simeon Aquino III it has a
students studying English for academic purposes noble intention to improve competencies and
should read academic texts, attend academic lectures, competitiveness of the Filipino learners. It also aims
and even work with students who are native speakers on the development of the 21st centruy skills namely:
in order to become more acquainted with the critical thinking, creativity, collaboration,
discourse. However, if they do not engage in the texts, communication, information literacy, media literacy,
understand the talks, or actively contribute to the study technology literacy and flexibility. Along these skills
sessions, these activities will have little effect on is the communication skills which means that seniro
student progress. Interaction is key. learners may high school students need to be fluent and competent
continue to exhibit errors in their writing for the both in the oral and the written form.
following social reasons: negative attitudes toward the
target language, continued lack of progress in the L2 a In the Senior High School Curriculum, the Humanities
wide social and psychological distance between them and Social Sciences is one of the strand under the
and the target culture, and, a lack of integrative and Academic track which requires that students need to be
instrumental motivation for learning. The other factor aware on the social issues and they are also required to
is cognitive factor wherein writing is believed to be write effectively because there are writing subjects that
cognitively complex. Acquisition of academic would enhance their skills such as Reading and
vocabulary and discourse style is particularly difficult. Writing in the core subject, Creative Writing and
According to cognitive theory, communicating orally Creative Non- Fiction in their specialized subjects.
or in writing is an active process of skill development Inspite of the good intention of the HUMSS
and gradual elimination of errors as the learner curriculum there are students who could not write
internalizes the language. Indeed, acquisition is a effectively. Thus, it is the purpose of this paper to
product of the complex interaction of the linguistic determine the writing competence level and the
environment and the learner’s internal mechanisms. grammatical errors committed by the HUMSS 12
With practice, there is continual restructuring as students in writing.
learners shift these internal representations in order to
achieve increasing degrees of mastery in L2. Writers Writing competence would refer to how a student
need to receive adequate L2 input in order to form new writes wherein he is able to express his ideas clearly,
hypotheses about syntactic and rhetorical forms in the mastering the grammatical and technical structure of a
target language. If students are not exposed to native- written discourse. Despite of the dream of the
like models of written texts, their errors in writing are Department of Education for the students to become
more likely to persist. Errors abound in peer review proficient in their writing skills; there are still
classes or in computer-mediated exchanges where difficulties that they encounter and one these is the
learners read and respond to each other’s grammatical errors that they oftenly committed.
compositions. Indeed, in many of my own classes,
interlanguage talk or discourse is often the primary In the study conducted by Fareed (2016), he found out
source of input for many learners. However, if the that the common problems of ESL learners to write
interaction, oral or written, allows for adequate effectively are: they lack knowledge of appropriate

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vocabulary, difficulties in grammar and syntax, they students who made errors were 15 students. And then
make mistakes in subject- verb agreement, pronouns, they went on Future Simple. It was 41.7%. The
tenses, articles, prepositions and basic sentence number of students who made errors were 13 students.
structures. Moreover, he found out he analysis of ESL This indicated that most of students have known how
learners writing samples revealed a total of 1217 to use this tense, but some were not. Finally the last
problems in grammar, syntax, vocabulary, spelling, error was Present Continuous. It was 32.3%. This
punctuation, word form and word order, spoken indicated that students have acquired this quite well
expressions, contracted forms, cohesion, repetition of and the numbers of the students who made errors were
ideas and L1 influence. The highest number of errors 10 students.
was made in grammar. Grammatical errors included
errors of different word classes, subject-verb Moreover, on a study conducted by Singh et al. (2017)
agreement, and forms of singular and plural, for it found out that there are nine types of grammatical
example, ‘these applications gives a proper protocol to errors made by the ESL students, including errors in
communicate others’, ‘these channels provide Subject-Verb Agreement, Verb Tense, Noun,
numerous number of information’, ‘every day the Preposition, Adjective, Article, Pronoun, Adverbs and
situation goes bad to bad’ and ‘their personality Conjunctions. The analysis of the students’
impress by everyone’. Grammar was followed by grammatical errors revealed that these students have
syntax. Syntactical errors show learners’ lack of poor command of the English language. Errors are
command over structure of a sentence. They wrote expected in the process of learning and it is very
sentences like, ‘I am going in weekend and moreenjoy important to identify the cause behind their
our family and see previous struggle.’ The third- occurrence.
highest number of errors belonged to vocabulary, for
example, ‘Using the connection between the student On the study of Abushihab (2014), he found out that
and teacher, this(psychological) error from our society there were 179 grammatical errors of which 27 errors
can evaporate’.Spelling and punctuation errors were are in tenses, 50 errors in the use of prepositions,52
also found in abundance. Some spelling errors were errors in the use of articles, 17 errors in the use of
‘invension’ (invention), ‘indivisually’ (individually) passive and active voice and 33 were morphological
and ‘fascility’ (facility), where punctuation errors errors committed by Turkish learners. The errors
included capitalization, use of comma and apostrophe, committed in the article maybe attributed to L1
as in the follow-ing examples: ‘I see more school interference because English has both definite and
students.’; ‘In this Era we cannot even imagine’; and ‘I indefinite articles, whereas Turkish has no word for
had with my friends family and cousin.’ the definite article. The grammatical errors made by
the respondents is due to the language structure of
Sukasame et al. (2013), argued that Thais commit their native- tongue. With the pedagogical implication
errors on the tenses of the verbs. They found out that of the study Teachers of English as a foreign language
Among all these seven tenses, error on Past Perfect should take the analysis of interlingual or transfer
was the most error that the students produced: it was errors as an important strategy in learning process.
87.1%. This indicated that the students still have not That is to say, they should make use of the native
acquired this tense. From each item that elicites, the language in order to facilitate their students’ learning
error of tense showed that the students did not process. The learners of English as a foreign language
understand how to use this tense appropriately so when tend to rely on their previous linguistic knowledge to
they have to use Past Perfect in their answer, they were acquire L2. The best way to benefit from the mother
unable to do correctly and the numbers of the students tongue is to contrast it with the target language; i.e. , to
who made errors were 27 students. The second most make a contrastive comparison. Accordingly, the
error was Past Simple. It was 74.2%, the numbers of learners have enough knowledge about the differences
students who made errors were 23 students. The writer and similarities between them. Bialystok (1990) as
considered that they had a lack of knowledge about cited by Abushihab (2014), points out that when a
Past Simple, in which of the numbers of the errors native language and a foreign language are very
were constant. Meanwhile, the third most error that different from each other, there will be more learning
made by the students was Present Perfect. It was difficulties for the learner as well as for the teacher.
67.7%. The students who made errors were 21 The role of the teacher is to fill in this gap by building
students. Past Continuous was in the fourth rank with remedial exercises which help the learner acquire
54.8% The students who were unable to answer the adequate knowledge in the target language. Self-
items correctly were 17 students. Present Simple, it correction is a good technique for learners to correct
was the fifth rank. It reached about 48.4% of the grammatical structures. Teachers provide different

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contexts for the learners to practice correcting errors

respondents, there were three raters: the researcher
on their own since correction is for teaching not just
himself, a Junior High School teacher from Sinait
for evaluation. National High School, and an SHS teacher from
This paper can be instrumental as it sought to Lyceum de Ylocos. The raters used a 4-point rubric
determine how competent are the HUMSS students adopted from the master's thesis of Pablo (2015).
with regards to writing. It could also help the teachers
to identify the necessary steps in order to improve the
writing competency of the HUMSS student. Result

Research Questions This section presents the discussion and analysis of

data of the written discourses of the HUMSS 11
This study aimed to determine the writing proficiency
students.
level and the grammatical errors in the written
discourses of HUMSS 11 students. Specifically, it Table 1. Writing Competence of the HUMSS 11 Students
sought to answer the following questions:
1. What is the extent of the writing competence of the
HUMSS 11 students?
2. What are the grammatical errors committed by the
respondents?
3. Is there a relationship between the gender of the
respondents and their writing competence?
4. Is there a significant difference between the writing
competence of the male and female students?

Methodology

This part addresses the research design, procedure,

participants, instruments, and data collection
procedure. The descriptive- correlational design was
used to determine the relationship of gender and the
writing competence of the HUMSS 11 students. The
Pearson Product Moment of Correlation was used to
test the significant relationship between gender and
writing competence, and a t-test to assess the
significant difference between the scores of the male
and female students. Furthermore, the researcher
employed discourse analysis to determine the
grammatical errors made by the respondents.

The data to be analyzed was the eulogy- essay of the Table 1 shows the mean scores together with the mean
HUMSS 11 students of a certain school in the Ilocos scores of each student which they have received from
region. The eulogy was randomly chosen by the the three raters.
researcher wherein he get 60 eulogies: 30 from the
males and 30 from females. The descriptive type of Based on the table above, it shows the writing
research design was used to know the grammatical competence of the respondents wherein it shows that
errors committed by the respondents as the researcher the writing competence of the students is Poor to Fair
is going to describe the errors committed and the test
as it could be seen by their over-all mean score 2.37.
of correlation was used in determining the relationship
between gender and writing competency. In
This implies that the respondents still have difficulties
determining the writing competency of the in writing as it could be seen on the grammatical errors
that they have committed during the writing stage.

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which form of the verb they would use in their written

discourse and there is no consistency on the tenses
they used.

A. Subject- Verb Agreement

Based on the table above, it could be seen that the
errors in subject- verb agreement had 39 or 3.26%.
Students made errors on this aspect as they are
confused sometimes on the verb that they will used
alongside to a singular or plural noun.
1. The amount of people who have shown up to pay
for their last respects is only a testimony to the lives
she personally touched. (are)
2. I say that death will comes without any preparation
and it is unexpected. (come)
3. It really hurts to know that you are already gone.
(hurt)
4. But how can I tell you this words again if you are
already dead…(these)
5. If you still here me, I have this 3 words with
you…(these)
Continuation of Table 1. Writing Competence of the HUMSS 11 On the sentences above it could be seen that the
Students respondents are often confused on what form of verb
they should use especially on the singular and plural
Furthermore, it could be attested that to have good
form of nouns. The rule states that if the noun is
writing skills, one needs to have a good command
singular the verb is also singular so in sentence 1 it
especially in the grammatical rules of the target
should be are since the subject is plural. In sentences 4
language. To be competent in writing, one needs to
and 5 the correct form of the verb is these because the
have a good command of the language to transmit the
pronoun is referring to a plural noun as the rule states
message clearly.
that a plural noun must take up a plural verb also. But
Table 2. Grammatical Errors in the Written Discourses of the in sentences 2 and 3 these has a different case; in
Respondents sentence 2 since the verb has the future form of the
verb will, the verb should only be come as this is
already in the future state; while sentence 3 it should
be hurt since it is referring to you which is requires a
plural verb.

B. Verb Tenses
Among the errors made by the students; it is the verb
tense which got the highest frequency with 573 or
47.83%. The respondents usually made a mistake on
what they should use or they are not consistent on
what they will use.
Table 2 shows the frequency and percentage of
1. Almost everything I had done, all the sacrifices and
grammatical errors committed by the students in their
hard- working were meant for them. (have)
written discourses.
2. As time passes by, and (when) the day (will) come
that I’m not yet fully prepared. (passed)
On the written discourses of the respondents it was
3. Do people will miss me when I’m gone? (Will)
found out that they havw committed 1198 grammatical
4. I feel so down when your tears felt down…(felt,
errors wherein they commit errors in verb tenses with
rolled)
573 or 47.83%, followed by preposition with 166 or
5. This is a great privilege for them because their
13.86%, pronoun with 125 or 10.43%,conjunction with
grandfather is a US veteran pensioner. (was)
85 or 7.10%, noun with 67 or 5.59%, followed by
Based on the sentences above, it could be seen that the
article, adverb, subject-verb agreement and adjective.
respondents are confused on what tense they would
This implies that the respondents have a problem
use in their essay. Since the output of the respondents
among verb tenses wherein they are confused on
is a eulogy it is expected for them to used the past

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tense. In sentences 2,4 and 5 verb must in a past tense was get by self accident.
since the speaker is already talking or referring to a 5. The moments and memories you had shared for
past event so the verb form should be in the past form. your friend will always be treasured.
Meanwhile in sentence 1 since the verb had is On the sentences above it shows already the errors
referring to the pronoun I, the verb should be have done by the students in their written discourses. In
because the pronoun I requires a plural verb; while sentences 1 and 2, the errors there are the presence of
sentence 3, the verb do should be replace by will and preposition, because in these sentences preposition is
the verb will should be omitted since it doesn’t make not needed as it would make the thought of the
sense anymore. Since the thought of sentence 3 is in sentence erroneous. On sentences 3-5, the errors there
future form then the verb will should be used in the are the wrong use of preposition and the verb form.On
beginning of the sentence. sentence 3, the preposition in should be replaced by to
and the preposition must be removed. Another error in
C. Noun this sentence is the verb pray should be in progressive
The respondent also committed errors in the form praying and verb phrase “that the day he took
pluralization of nouns and the wrong choice of words you home” that should be removed and also with home
especially nouns in the sentence. so it would become “I was praying to God the day he
1. I love him more than everything else he mean the took you. Sentence 4, in should be replaced by to; and
world to me. the verb go should be in past tense and “was get by
2. First of all I want to gratitude all my beloved self accident” should be he met an accident and the
relatives in my life, my friends and all the people… pronoun mu should be our. Thus the sentence
3. Grandparent was there for all for all the highs and becomes, I didn’t expect that when he went up to our
lows of her child lives… house he met an accident. On this sentence, the author
4. I definitely miss our laughs, cries, jokes, non-sense is narrating on what happened to his grandfather. And
stories, prank late night talks… on sentence 5, had should be have because the pronoun
5. I’m your greatest distraction since then I pursue you requires a plural verb and for should be to since
everything just to get your single notice.. the author is referring to friend. For is used to denote
On the sentences above, the errors here are the nouns reason or connecting it with the preceding statement or
itself. In sentence 1, the noun world should not be put phrase.
anymore since it will make the sentence unclear. On
sentence 2, the word gratitude should be replaced by E. Adjective
“say thank you” because the speaker is speaking here Another grammatical error is on adjective wherein the
so instead of using a noun the speaker should use a respondents often commit mistake in the wrong choice
verb. In sentence 3, the author is referring to Nana of adjective or its use in the sentence and error in the
Piling who is her grandmother, so instead of using degrees of comparison.
grandparent it should be grandmother. In sentences 4 1. Your joyful youngest son.
and 5, the noun laughs and notice are not the proper 2. Our eldest cousin was her dependable child.
word it should be laughters and attention respectively. 3. I am the the cheeriest person in the world…
The errors made here under this category is the wrong 4. To my eldest sister and little sister.
choice of words because some authors would used a 5. You better know her as Mae Angel…
noun instead of a verb. On the other hand, it could be On the sentences above, the error here is on the wrong
pluralization or the noun should be omitted in the choice of adjective that will be used in the sentence.
sentence. On sentence 1, joyful should should be removed as in
a formal letter especially on the complimentary close,
D. Preposition and adjective should not be used already. On number
Another aspect of grammar is along the use of 2, dependable should be most independent child since
prepositions. On this paper, the researcher saw that the the author is talking about her cousin; while on
respondents were confused on the use of prepositions number 3, in the degrees of comparison there is no
in a given context. Each preposition has a definite rule such term as cheeriest instead it should be luckiest
when it should be used in the written discourses. since the author is telling about himself/herself. On 4,
1. I was not able now to talk (to) you guys, hug you, at first glance the sentence is correct but looking
making you laugh, and I was not able to feel my love closely the adjective little should be replaced by
anymore. youngest since it is the most appropriate in the
2. I will pray (for) you. sentence as it sthought refers to the order of child birth
3. I was pray in God to that the day he took you home. as it is evidenced by the use of eldest before the world
4. I didn’t expect that when he go up in my house he little. On 5, it looks corret on the first glance but

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lookin closely, the error occurs on the presence of usage. On 1 the pronoun which should be who since it
better in the sentence; instead better should not be used refers to Love Lhea who is a person, on 2 since the
as the sentence does not require to have an adjective as word friend is a noun who is a person it should not be
the author do not need to describe in this statement. “that” instead it should be “who are” and the pronoun
that is a 2nd person pronoun but the thought of the
F. Article sentence is on 3rd person pronoun and on 5 “from
Based on the written discourses of the respondents it anyone” should be “to anyone” since when you used
has been found out that another error they committed from it refers to that your love will come from another
is on article usage. The common errors there is the person. On sentence 3, that should be omitted since it
wrong use of article and the placement of article when doesn’t have to do in the sentence, and on 4 the
it should not be put there in a sentence. pronoun your should be you since the sentence is
1. Tomorrow I find myself in (the) paradise. referring to the person who is just near to the speaker.
2. Yes, you were able to meet (a) different persons but
manage to be the real you. H. Adverb
3. First of all I want to gratitude all my beloved The errors committed on the adverb usage is the
relatives in my life, my friends and all(the) people improper use of adverb in the sentence. Based on the
who help to become a great man in this world. analysis of the written discourses of the respondents it
4. His backhead was fall in the floor so he was take (to obtained 45 or 3.76%.
the) in hospital. 1. And always remember that I’m happy now that I’m
5. People thought that he was a type of person that gone because my heart and mind will rest in peace
always wearing that poker face… now.
On sentences 1 and 2, the articles the and a should be 2. It’s a huge grief for me knowing you’ve gone so fast
omitted since it does not make sense in the sentence at this kind of age.
because in sentence 1 and 2 it does not refer to a 3. I know that she is too young to die and she’s really
specific thing and person, thus, it does not require an gone too soon.
article. On sentences 3-4 the sentences are erroneous 4. We will miss you already, your love, your joke,
because it lacks an article because the sentence is your smile, it’s gone already…
referring to a specific person and place. “The”’ is used 5. My physical time with you is over now.
to make a point of reference specific. While on The errors committed by the respondents in the adverb
sentence 5, the article “a” should be replaced by the usage is on the improper use of adverbs. On sentence
article “the” since the author here is making an 1, “now” should be “already” since the author is
emphasis on the type of person he was. referring to his present condition right now. On 2,
since the author is referring to the sudden demise of
G. Pronoun the person she is referring “so” should be replaced by
The errors in pronoun got 10.23% wherein the “too”. By the use of too it will make the idea of the
common errors here are wrong use of pronouns and sentence that the death of the person is unexpected
omission of pronouns. The respondents tend to commit death. On 3, the adverb “really” should be removed as
errors in pronoun usage wherein they tend to use it does not have a place on the sentence. By putting
masculine pronouns to a feminine subject and this adverb in the sentence it will make the sentence
feminine pronouns for a masculine subject, erroneous as there is already an adverb “too” which
pluralization of pronouns even the subject is singular modifies the act of leaving by the person. The same
and another error is the omission of pronouns that error also occured on 4, because the thought of the
should be placed in the sentence. sentence doesn’t require an adverb since the action is
1. But no matter which Love Lhea it is, it’s never the referring to the present state. Same also in sentence 5,
one I thought it wouldbe… the adverb “now” should be removed since the verb
2. My friends that always there helping each other, over does not require an adverb.
talking about Korean dramas.
3. But I just want to hear the things that they will say I. Conjunction
to me, I want to know that even I am gone they will be On this aspect of grammar it got 85 occurences or
going to just fine. 7.10%. The common errors under this aspect is that
4. So we have to accept that your are now gone and improper use of conjunction wherein the conjunction
you may now rest in peace. is not appropriate in the thought of the sentence.
5. I love him, I will never replace his love from 1. It’s a form of depression, anxiety, (and) insomnia.
anyone. 2. I don’t want to cry because that’s what you’ve said
On sentences 1, 2 and 5 there is a wrong pronoun to me before you passed, and you want us to to be

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happy even if you’re not here.

3. I have created a tons of memories with you and with
Table 4 presents the significant difference in scores of
that, I will treasure it in my whole life through.
the respondents.
4. She was only an only child so that her family was
hurting so much…
The table shows that there is a significant difference
5. In additional, I also taught you more important
between the scores of the respondents as the female
things like the value of friendship… students performed better than the male as it could be
On sentences 1, it lacks conjunction and there should shown the mean scores they have obtained 2.62 and
be the word “and” between the words anxiety and 2.12 respectively. This has been supported by
insominia. The conjunction and is used when numerous studies which found out that tend to score
enumerating things in a sentence. On sentences 2 and higher in writing essays as girls tend to obtained
3, the conjunction that are used in those sentences higher scores, composed more fluently, used words
should be omitted; instead a semicolon would be that are appropriate to the writing activity since they
enough already to join two independent clauses. master those skills early in their age as compared to
Moreover, the thought of the sentence doesn’t require boys.
a conjunction. Meanwhile, sentence 4, the error there
is the use of so as a conjunction and the proper
conjunction is “and”.By the use of and as a Conclusion
conjunction it establishes already a conjunction on the
two clauses. Lastly, on 5 the proper conjunction is
Based on the findings obtained the following
“furthermore” as it shows addition and connection on
conclusions were made:
the preceding statement.
1. The writing competence of the respondents falls on
Aside from the grammatical errors based on the nine
2.37 which is on the Poor to Fair level.
aspects another errors that could be found on the
2. From the level of their writing competence; it could
written discourses are: the use of punctuation marks
be seen that they committed grammatical errors in
that leads to run-on sentences. Another problem is
their written discourse specifically on the verb tense as
their paragraph structure specifically on organization,
their common error is the inconsistent use of tenses of
coherence and unity. They also have errors in
verbs in their written discourse.
capitalization and spelling sometimes. 3. There is no significant relationship between gender
and level of writing competence as gender is not a
Table 3. Correlation between Gender and Writing Competence
significant factor that explains why females performed
better than male students.
4. There is a significant difference between the scores
and gender of the students.

Recommendations
Table 3 presents the correlation of gender and writing
competence of the students. Based on the co n clu si o n s, the fo llo wing
reco mm endation s were made:
Based on the table above it shows that there is no
1. SHS language teachers must focus on teaching the
significant relationship between writing competence
students about the verb tenses, especially on the
and the gender of the students. It implies gender is not
consistency of their uses in their written discourse.
a significant factor that affects the writing competence 2. A writing program must be developed to help the
of the students. Furthermore, it means that a student students in their written discourse to improve their
needs to be competent in writing regardless of their grammatical knowledge.
gender as they aim to become competent in their
communication skills.
References
Table 4. Difference between the scores of the respondents
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