IRANIAN EFL LEARNERS’ PROBLEMS IN USING ENGLISH SINGULAR AND PLURAL NOUNS

This study intended to cultivate 1) the similarities and the differences between English and Persian in terms of singular and plural nouns and their contextual use 2) the extent to which the strong version of contrastive analysis can predict Iranian students’ problems in learning how to form and where to use English plural nouns and 3) the relationship between learners’ proficiency level and the types of errors that they made. In order to achieve these objectives, a contrastive analysis of English and Persian singular and plural nouns was carried out and some predictions of the probable errors were made. To test the predictions, 180 learners of English at Iran Language Institute were given a composition writing task. They were told to describe their houses and enumerate the items available there so that they produce a large number of singular and plural nouns. These compositions were gathered and the errors were detected, analyzed and counted by two raters. The results of the study showed that our learners of English made more developmental errors than interlingual ones. However, the ambiguity of a large number of errors encountered, in addition to the “descriptive” nature of the error categories used in the study justify the need for more sophisticated studies before making any sound claims about the reasons that are likely to account for the errors.such findings clearly depict that either total abandement or adherence to translation technique is illigitemate so teachers need to make judicious use of translation inside the classrooms.