Miswriting in the Teaching of Turkish as a Foreign Language - The Tunisian Case

Oct 15, 2026

Evaluating and classifying mistakes made by Tunisian A1-level learners of Turkish as a foreign language, this descriptive study applies document and content analysis methods. Forty Tunisian university students wrote about their emotions, ideas, and plans after receiving a classroom topic at a set time. Miswriting incidences were identified and grouped into spelling, morphemic, phonetic, syntactic, and semantic categories, then re-evaluated with more focused subheadings. A total of 517 errors were found, dominated by spelling errors (206; 39.84%), followed by morphemic (119; 23.01%), phonetic (95; 18.37%), syntactic (52; 10.05%), and semantic (45; 8.70%). The study links most errors to negative transfer, Turkish’s distinctive structure, and students’ limited knowledge and experience, and calls for expanded error analysis research at all levels.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages19

Reading Time48 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

Introduction

Language teaching context and multilingual needs

Role of native-language education and foreign-language teaching

Writing skill challenges and learner influences

Miswriting in the Teaching of Turkish as a Foreign Language: The Tunisian Case Musa KAYA1 Bayburt University Abstract This research was undertaken with the aim of evaluating, classifying, and detecting mistakes made by Tunisian students learning Turkish as a foreign language at the A1 level. The study is descriptive and was performed using document and content analysis methods. Forty Tunisian university students participating in the study were asked to write about their emotions, ideas, and plans after being given a topic in the classroom at a specific time. Afterwards, their incidences of miswriting were determined while analyzing the texts. Their mistakes were classified under the headings of spelling mistakes, morphemic mistakes, phonetic mistakes, syntactic mistakes, and semantic mistakes. The writing errors grouped within these categories were subsequently re-evaluated according to their specific features and presented again under more narrow subheadings. It was determined that the students made 206 spelling mistakes, equaling 39.84% of the total, followed by 119 morphemic mistakes equaling 23.01%, 95 phonetic mistakes equaling 18.37%, 52 syntactic mistakes equaling 10.05%, and 45 semantic mistakes equaling 8.70%, for a total of 517 writing errors. The majority of these incidences of miswriting happened due to factors such as negative transfer, the distinctive structure of the Turkish language, and the students’ lack of knowledge and experience. It is emphasized that writing-oriented error analysis studies in the teaching of Turkish as a foreign language should be increased and continued at all levels. Keywords: Teaching Turkish as a Foreign Language, Miswriting, Misspelling DOI: 10.29329/epasr.2022.478.2 Submitted: 29 June 2022 Accepted: 09 October 2022 Published: 05 December 2022 1 Musa Kaya, Assit. Prof. Dr., Bayburt University, Faculty of Education, Turkish Languages Education, Bayburt, Turkey, ORCID: 0000-0001-6600-6753 [Correspodence:](Correspodence: musakaya@bayburt.edu.tr)[ musakaya@bayburt.edu.tr](Correspodence: musakaya@bayburt.edu.tr) Introduction The growth in contemporary communication and education opportunities has allowed individuals to improve themselves in multifaceted ways and makes people more competitive, both locally and internationally, in all fields. People are now more open to collaborating with people from other countries and enriching their accumulated knowledge and experiences by following new trends in technology. Educational processes and conditions expose learners and teachers of all disciplines to new challenges according to the interests, needs, and expectations of the individual (Tutkun, 2010) . Language is the most common and strongest tool for understanding among humans. It not only facilitates communication with other individuals in immediate and distant areas; it is also the most effective way of ensuring more comprehensive, strong, multidimensional, and broader relationships. Due to its effectiveness in communication and its multidimensional structures that allow interaction and the transfer of cultural and national values, education in the native language is a core factor of all countries’ educational systems. At the same time, changing global conditions necessitate the ability to communicate in more than one language; in some cases, to satisfy both individual and social needs, it is necessary to learn one or more foreign languages. As millions of people annually leave their homelands for various reasons, whether voluntarily or involuntarily, and begin to live together with people of other nationalities, the necessity of communicating in non-native languages grows, and this requires a re-evaluation of foreign language teaching. While foreign languages used tobe taught for commercial and political reasons, changing global conditions now require foreign language teaching to ensure coexistence, understanding, and communication in multilingual and multicultur

FAQs

What was the aim of the study on Tunisian learners of Turkish?

To evaluate, classify, and detect miswriting mistakes made by Tunisian students learning Turkish as a foreign language at the A1 level.

How were the students’ writing errors identified and categorized?

After students wrote about emotions, ideas, and plans following a classroom topic at a specific time, their texts were analyzed and errors were classified into spelling, morphemic, phonetic, syntactic, and semantic mistakes.

What categories of miswriting occurred most often?

Spelling mistakes were most frequent (206; 39.84%), followed by morphemic (119; 23.01%), phonetic (95; 18.37%), syntactic (52; 10.05%), and semantic mistakes (45; 8.70%).

What factors were emphasized as causes of the miswriting?

The study emphasizes negative transfer, the distinctive structure of Turkish, and students’ lack of knowledge and experience.

Oct 15, 2026

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