The analysis of A1 level speaking exam in terms of syntax: The effect of general competence on syntax in A1 level speaking

Full text

Available online at www.jlls.org
JOURNAL OF LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTIC STUDIES
ISSN: 1305-578X
Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1), 27-40; 2017
The analysis of A1 level speaking exam in terms of syntax: The effect of general
competence on syntax in A1 level speaking
Hülya Mısır a *
a Hacettepe University, Beytepe, Ankara 06800, Turkey
APA Citation:
Mısır, H. (2017). The analysis of A1 level speaking exam in terms of syntax: The effect of general competence on syntax in A1 level
speaking. Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1), 27-40.
Submission Date: 18/04/2016
Abstract
This study aims at discovering the relevance of general competence of Turkish and Arab learners who have an
A1 level of English proficiency in preparatory school of University of Turkish Aeronautical Association
(UTAA) to their speaking skill in terms of syntax by analyzing the recordings of speaking exams in the first
semester. One can ask why learners could ever perform a great variety in syntactic structure in spoken
performance while the university ensures that all learners get a standardized language education based on the
same syllabus and course books to succeed their future academic studies. The answer may seem easy; however,
it is difficult to get out thoroughly. Therefore, the paper will try to explain this connection between better
performances in terms of syntactic structures in spoken performance comparing to Common European
Framework of Reference (CEFR) A1 level expectations and these learners’ attitudes, motivation, background of
education, and world knowledge. During the process, the information falling within the scope of general
competence (declarative knowledge and existential competence) is held by one-to-one interviews with 22
randomly chosen learners. The results mainly showed that the learners who invested in developing general
competence have their own independent wordrobe and a higher level and variety of syntactic structures in their
speaking whereas the rest and also the majority of the learners who are not as competent regarding declarative
knowledge and existential competence (attitude and motivation) show a standard level of syntax (commonly
used structures as defined in ALTE) in speaking.
© 2017 JLLS and the Authors - Published by JLLS.
Keywords: Syntax; A1 level speaking; speaking performance; general competence; existential competence;
declarative knowledge; CEFR; ALTE
1. Introduction
Speaking is a productive skill, and Common European Framework of Reference (CEFR) defines
the amount of production to different levels accordingly. According to Breakthrough Stage (A levels)
in CEFR, the expectation from an A1 level learner in productive skill namely speaking is limited to
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +09-538-924-1468
E-mail address: hulyamsr@hacettepe.edu.tr
Acceptance Date: 11/11/2017

28 Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017)27–40
delivering a very short, rehearsed statement (e.g. to introduce a speaker or propose a toast), and a brief
speech on a familiar topic to a sympathetic audience, using the specified language, recording a short
message on an answerphone or voicemail system and reading aloud a written text produced for them,
all in given time for preparation (Council of Europe, 2001). On that account, preparatory schools
assess and evaluate A1 level students in this limited context, and the nature of the exams develops
accordingly. In this study, A1 level students’ recordings of speaking exams are taken into
consideration within the framework of defined expectations in terms of syntax.
Oxford dictionary defines syntax as the arrangement of words and phrases to create well-formed
sentences in a language. Speakers must ensure that their utterance accords with the rules of their
language’s grammar (Branigan et al., 2006). Therefore, speakers apply the rules of a language when
speaking in order to reach the accurate syntactic structure. For an A1 level speaker, the expected
procedure is to combine a subject, main verb, and one or several objects. However, as the findings of
this study reveal, regarding that account, most of the speakers in the spoken exam did more than that.
The results demonstrated that some learners employ compound and complex sentences more than
expected; for example, “I see a lot of people who enjoy in a concert.” or “If we do exercise, we will be
fit, and we will have a nice body.”
In this learning process, they start over from the beginning and develop competences to carry on
learning sensibly. These competences either come with them or are mainly gained within the foreign
language learning process. What are the competences mentioned? Each unique person owns General
Competence and Communicative Language Competence in general term, though this study will only
address declarative knowledge (savoir) and existential competence (savoir-être); attitudes and
motivation in our case within the framework of ‘General Competence,’ which have a great role in
learning the target language. The two competences comprise many selfhood factors connected with
both the settled personal identity that learners could always rely on and the personal identity they
attempt to create for L2. Humanist conceptions of the individual presuppose that every person has an
essential, unique, fixed, and coherent core (Norton, 2013). The core is nurtured and meticulously
developed within motivation, interests, and social context. In these contexts, learners expectedly
become more competent in terms of declarative knowledge, which derives from the educational
background, experiences, or sources and facilities available to the person, and aware of existential
competence (savoir-être); attitudes and motivation in language learning.
In parallel with the way they have gone through in self-creation- the competences developed-
learners will inevitably show great variety in spoken performance in L2, particularly in A1 level in
which they highly depend on their teachers and course books as syntactic sources. In this paper, the
primary concern is to discover how these competences play an essential role in a higher level of
syntactic structures in spoken performance, and whether learners acquire an ability to discover
syntactic rules in target language or not.
1.1. Limitations of the study
The study includes 75 students’ recording of speaking. However, the interviews are completed with
only 15 students representatively to figure out whether these competences play an essential role in a
higher level of syntax in spoken performance, and learners acquire an ability to discover syntactic
rules in target language or not. It would be way better to have some tree diagrams of examples or
weight more on preferences or choices of word order and syntactic structures. However, since A1
level is rather limited in terms of syntactic choices, and learners highly depend on the course books or
what teachers present except for some who perform better for various reasons, I took well-formed

. Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017) 27–40 29
structures as an indicator of grammatical competence in speaking English instead of evaluating
various choices of syntax and word order and the reasons lying behind it.
1.2. Literature review
1.2.1. Assessment of Speaking Skill
CEFR is a framework that is based on can-do statements as a positive impact of the pedagogical
use in five skills (Reading, Writing, Listening, Spoken production and spoken interaction) for each
defined level. It is guidance with coherent and comprehensive CAN-DO statements addressed to
related levels. In A1 exams, assessment and evaluation of skills depend on whether learner CAN
manage these statements. To illustrate, ALTE (Association of Language Testers in Europe) defines the
content of A1 Speaking of assessment and evaluation as below.
Table 1. ALTE Breakthrough speaking skill
ALTE
Breakthrough
CAN ask simple questions of
a factual nature and
understand answers
expressed in simple language.
CAN understand simple notices
and information, for example in
airports, on store guides, and
on menus.
CAN understand simple
instructions on medicine and
simple directions to places.
CAN leave very simple
messages for a host
family or write short
simple ‘thank you’
notes.
ALTE
Breakthrough
CAN understand basic
instructions or take part in
CAN understand basic notices,
instructions, or information.
CAN complete basic
forms, and write notes
basic factual conversations
on a predictable topic.
including times, dates,
and places.
ALTE
Breakthrough
CAN take and pass on simple
messages of a routine kind,
such as ‘Friday meeting 10
a.m.'
CAN understand short reports
or product descriptions on
familiar matters, if these are
expressed in simple language
and the contents are
predictable.
CAN write a simple
routine request to a
colleague, such as ‘Can
I have X please?’
ALTE’s determined syntactic variety has not anticipated more than some simple, short, and basic
forms as seen in the chart above. If it was for ALTE, all the learners should have performed the same
variety of grammar in the very standardized education system. However, this has not always been the
case for speaking among students. At this point, Hui (2013) had a very pertinent remark by asking the
following questions. Why students‟ grammar levels are quite different even under the same learning
environment, and what kinds of individual differences mainly influence foreign language learners‟
grammar learning and grammatical output competence (Hui, 2013)? To answer these questions, first
of all, it will be significant to discuss the degree of variety of syntax in speaking and then research
underlying reasons for better syntax in spoken performance. Here the relationship between a higher
ALTE level CAN-DO statements

30 Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017)27–40
syntactic variety and learners’ declarative knowledge (savoir) and existential competence (savoir-être)
-attitudes and motivation- to learn a language in CEFR are to be concerned.
1.2.2. The variety of syntax in speaking
What is syntax? Syntax is the part of the grammar that represents a speaker’s knowledge of
sentences and their structures (Fromkin et al., 2003). Mostly when talking about syntax, it usually
means word order and sentence structure. Every sentence is a sequence of words, but not every
sequence of words is a sentence because syntactic structures make language speaking well-formed or
grammatical whereas violating them causes ill-formed and ungrammatical speaking (Fromkin et al.,
2003). Linguists are highly concerned with the analysis of English syntax. The father of syntax
studies, Chomsky (1965) with his book Aspects of the theory of syntax has been very helpful for the
scope of the base of syntax. Accordingly, Robert Freidin in his book Syntax in which he often refers to
Chomsky with a special bibliographical note has been a great help for comprehending basic concepts
and applications of syntax. Similarly, Radford (1997) studied syntax to introduce the recent
developments in syntactic studies and particularly Chomsky's Minimalist program with an overview of
theoretical concepts and descriptive devices. These concepts and devices at work, help CEFR and
ALTE categorize the required complexity of syntax in each defined level properly, which is a great
help for both teachers and learners in regards to objectives and expectations of each proficiency level.
The studies that investigate the syntactic variety in written language might have already been
abundant whereas syntactic variety in L2 speech has not received the same attention, though there is a
growing number of studies that examine syntactic variety via analysis of speech samples (Iwashita,
2010). For example, Skehan and Foster (1999) examined the variety through analyzing performance
on a narrative retelling task while Foster, Tonkyn, and Wigglesworth (2000) worked on variety by
transcribing data, which were various recordings of native and nonnative English speakers
comprehensibly. Furthermore, Iwashita (2010) investigated syntactic variety in learner language by
using storytelling tasks. The study has used a speech coding system using production units and
syntactic variety measures. Common to all of these kinds of studies, the variety measures such as
“length of production unit (e.g., T-units, clauses, verb phrases, and sentences), the amount of
embedding, subordination and coordination, the range of structural types, and structural
sophistication” are used (Iwashita, 2010). Clearly, researchers brought principled ways (or tools) of
syntactic parsing of learners’ speaking, which helps evaluation of speaking skill as much as grammar
teaching. In this regard, how do we evaluate the syntactic variety that will differentiate the learners’
grades and characterize the overall proficiency? The answer may be hidden in individuals’ general
competence in language learning.
1.2.3. Language learners’ general competence
Speaking exams include a part for grammar evaluation, usually worth 1/3 or 1/4 of the total grade.
By grammar, we mean students’ using appropriate grammatical structures and satisfactory level of
syntactic variety at a certain proficiency level. The ‘satisfactory’ level is defined in ALTE as we
mentioned earlier. However, some students not only achieve the target level but also go beyond it. The
degree of variety in syntax in speaking performance amongst students can result from general
competence of an individual. General competence includes the 5 savoirs introduced by Byram (1997).
The first savoir is knowledge. The relationship between knowledge and spoken performance should be
carefully considered because the knowledge a language learner has already acquired is directly
relevant to language learning (CEFR, 2001). The knowledge can be ‘empirical’ and ‘academic’. As
one’s knowledge (e.g. declarative knowledge- general knowledge, world knowledge, and sociocultural

. Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017) 27–40 31
knowledge) builds up, communicative competence improves correlatively (CEFR, 2001). One’s
communicative competence consists in particular of linguistic competences such as grammatical
competence and language awareness, that is, knowledge of language. Therefore, building on the
learners’ knowledge can be influential in improving spoken performance.
The second savoir which is even more relevant to spoken performance is savoir-être- existential
competence in CEFR. The most influential factors among existential competences are learners’
attitudes and motivation. Researchers generally attempt to link these two terms. Motivation is defined
in terms of learner’s goal, orientation, and attitudes to pursue learning a language, and attitudes are
defined as a social factor affected by various motivational factors (Schumann, 1978a; Gardner and
Lambert, 1972; Gardner, 1979). There is good number of research discussing that motivational and
attitude factors actually are the reasons for a better speaking proficiency. For example, Jindathai’s
study that presents the factors affecting English-speaking problems among engineering students
discusses motivational and attitude factors and suggests implications for achieving a higher level of
English speaking proficiency (Jindathai, 2015). Such factors are better indicators of the real effects of
individual factors on speaking performance.
CEFR actually defends a similar opinion about speaking performance and its relation to
individuals’ selfhood factors. The framework highlights interrelated factors with attitudes and
motivation as well as suggests various factors shaping learners’ communicative performance.
The communicative activity of users/learners is affected not only by their knowledge, understanding,
and skills, but also by selfhood factors connected with their individual personalities, characterized by
the attitudes, motivations, values, beliefs, cognitive styles and personality types which contribute to
their personal identity (Council of Europe, 2001).
Table 2. Selfhood factors
Socio-cultural
Psychological
Experiential
Beliefs and values
Cognitive styles
Education
Attitudes
Personality factors
Communication experience
Ritual behaviors
Memory
World Knowledge
Intercultural awareness
Emotions
Residency
Family
Motivation
Exam experience
Leisure
Technology use
(Adapted from CEFR, pp. 101-130)
Selfhood factors are too many to consider all at the same time as factors affecting communicative
activities, and one could only have a well-formed research if she manages to take the present context
into account and focus on the most related factors hindering or encouraging the learners’ speaking
performance. In our case, we figured that positive attitudes and high motivation, which account for
existential competence, and one’s interest in widening world knowledge in particular, are key factors
promoting the use of better grammatically constructed utterances in speaking despite the A1 level of
proficiency in English.
1.3. Research questions
The present study identifies the answers to the questions below to achieve a better understanding of
the variety of syntactic structure in students’ spoken performance and its relation to general
competences as in savoir and savoir-être.

32 Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017)27–40
1- What is the variety of syntactic structure in spoken performances of A1 level students at the
preparatory language school?
2- What is the effect of general competences of A1 level students at the preparatory language
school on the variety of syntactic structure in their spoken performances?
3- Do A1 level students at preparatory language school equipped with general competences
achieve a higher level of syntactic variety in their spoken performance?
2. Method
2.1. Participants
The study involves 75 students who enrolled in the preparatory school in University of Turkish
Aeronautical Association to get a proficiency exam required before they start their academic studies in
their departments. 59 of them are Turkish who will have English education for a year to start Bachelor
Degree while 16 of them are Arab students who are Bachelor degree holders and get English education
to be able to continue their master studies. Of 75 students, 18 are female and 57 are male. The average
age of Turkish students is 20, and 30 for Arab students. Both Turkish and Arab students are provided
the same syllabus and the resources namely Top Notch 1 and MyGrammarLab A1-A2, and expected
to achieve the determined level.
2.2. Instruments
The data required for the study was collected through the recordings of the A1 level speaking
exam, a part of the English language proficiency test, and semi-structured interview questions (see
Appendix A for the interview questions). The procedure of the use of the instruments is described in
detail in the following paragraph.
2.3. Data collection procedures and analysis
The speaking exam procedure is hereby considered important in order to describe how exam
recordings as data were collected in the first place. In the speaking exam in University of Turkish
Aeronautical Association, there is a 3 column-scale to assess and evaluate consisting of i) Grammar
and Vocabulary use (5 points), ii) Pronunciation (5 points), and iii) Interaction (5 points). The criterion
is shared with students earlier in the class.
The exam includes the following procedure. The jury includes 2 teachers: one of them listens and
takes notes and the other instructs for the whole process. Examinees are paired up earlier randomly
with a person from the same level (A1). Then they are expected to come at a scheduled time and sit on
the chair set up for them. The exam takes about 20 minutes in total. The speaking exam for A1
students in preparatory school consists of 3 parts. The first part is considered as a warm up. Students
are expected to introduce themselves in a free manner and answer a warm-up question addressed by
the teacher. These questions are either very general or personal such as “What do you think of the
traffic in your city or what is your favorite season and why?” Each student has 1.5 minutes to talk
about them. The second part includes “Picture Description.” Each student is given a picture on the
board and 1 minute to get ready to describe what s-he sees on the picture. Notepaper and pencil are
provided in case they want to take notes to organize their speech. After a minute of preparation, each
is asked to start talking about his/her own picture for about 1.5 to 2 minutes. The pair is also asked to
comment on his/her partner’s picture in a few sentences. The last part consists of a topic within a word

. Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017) 27–40 33
such as happiness or transportation. They are again given a minute to be prepared for the speech and 2
minutes to talk about it. They see a few questions on the board that they do not need to answer. They
are there to help or give some ideas in case the word does mean nothing to the student. The last part is
guided in this sense. After they share their ideas, the partner is also expected to add a few sentences to
interact. In the whole process, teachers are silent and do little or nothing to help or encourage, but give
the instructions. Therefore, students become independent and more responsible and productive about
their own spoken production. Spoken interaction is limited, though. The whole exam is recorded for
the sake of test takers and consists %5 of the overall evaluation for the semester.
After obtaining these recordings, 75 of the recordings are transcribed in detail. The syntactic
structures listed below are taken into consideration to evaluate the speakers’ syntactic knowledge:
1. Use of affirmative, negative, and question structures
2. Adjective and adverb use and their positions
3. Word order (preferences noted)
4. Sentences (simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex)
The data transcribed and categorized into a systematic chart of syntactic knowledge shows the
overall use of abovementioned structures by A1 level students in spoken performance.
22 of total subjects are interviewed with 19 questions and recorded to get detailed information
about their background in English language education, interests, and their social contexts, which
would inform us about their general competence. The transcribed exam result of a certain student’s
syntactic performance was matched with her answers to the interview questions. This matching
procedure was performed for each interviewee. The results are at most important since they will show
whether learners’ individual competences affect the overall performance of speaking in terms of more
advanced syntactic structure for an A1 learner. Since the interviews carry educational purpose, the
students are ensured that the information will never be shared under any circumstances.
3. Results
In this paper, all these factors given in Table 1 are considered to be interrelated; hence they are
assumed to establish a base for the use of various syntactic structures. As observed above in Table 1, a
great number of variables can be listed whereas the interviews for this study aim at establishing a
connection with few of them. In this regard, test takers are interviewed with some questions to
discover their background of their language education, world knowledge (including interest and
fondness of technology), attitudes, and motivation. I believe that these factors will help to dismantle
their preferences of syntactic structures in their spoken performance. The numbers given in order
replaces the participants’ names in Table 3.
Table 3. Syntax analysis of students’ spoken performance
Syntactic structure
Example utterances
Purpose of -to
This is one of the lessons that mothers teach their children to deal

34 Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017)27–40
with the life and to be ready. (59)
I went to study.
Wh-movement
I don’t understand what the meaning is. (55)
We don’t know what we are going to face. (59)
What I see is that they are having a good time. (59)
They learn how they can play. (48)
I don’t know why. (17)
I am telling what I understand. (39)
Sentences with ‘because’
I want to go to America because America is very special country.
(Compound sentence)
I think they are in Europe because the direction of traffic is on the
right. (29)
Those people should buy pets because pets are good friends. (32)
Sentences with ‘but’
(Compound sentence)
I don’t know their first names, but I know the last names.
I don’t like fish, but I like sushi.
I like pets, but I am afraid of dogs.
Sentences with ‘so’
(Compound sentence)
I like meat so I go to a restaurant.
Sentences with ‘and’
I read books and try to sing, and I think it improves my English.
When, While, Before, After
sentences
When it is sunny, I go bicycling. (26)
People are relaxing when they go on holiday. (49)
While people are driving, they make bad gestures. (23)
Before I came to Turkey, I didn’t know anything. (57)
Noun phrase complement
Some people think that holidays are very important and others
think that holidays are not important. (32)
I strongly believe that holidays are important.
I think they are both beautiful.
I can see the man is drinking tea. (67)
Compound-Complex sentences
When she doesn’t respect me, I get angry, and I don’t respect her.
(42)
I think it is a good idea, but I think it shouldn’t ……(48)
Modals
It might be a musical theater or play. (28)
They might be singing. (28)
I think they shouldn’t eat junk food.(16)
People can watch the movies with subtitles.
Weather can be clear and good.
Those people should buy pets because pets are good friends.
We should help people, but we must be careful. (23)
Relative clauses
I see 4 people who are on a picnic. (13)
I see a lot of people who enjoy in a concert. (13)
If clauses
(Only 9 learners:
2,4,5,6,7,43,44,47,57)
If we have a world without books, it will be so bad.(6)
If we do exercise, we will be fit, and we will have a nice body. (2)
If you are ill, you got to doctor’s, and they help you. (47)
Utterances to save time to think
(fillers)
Let me see.
Maybe…
I think…
In my opinion, …
I am not sure…
Of course.

. Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017) 27–40 35
Position of Maybe and I think by
many learners
Maybe the weather is cold.
They are together maybe 13 years. (15)
These people are going to different countries maybe.
I think these people are Arabs.
People can change their habits I think.
Frequently used transitions
However, But, And, Because, So, Then, In addition, For example,
Firstly, Also, In fact, First of all, Therefore.
4. Discussion
The underlying reason for the differences in variety of syntactic structures in spoken performances
is found to be students’ certain general competence: Existential Competence (savoir-être) and
Declarative Knowledge (savoir).
4.1. Existential Competence (savoir-être): Attitude and motivation
Considering the learners get the same language education, when we divide the learners’
performances in speaking exam in terms of syntactic variety into 3, the 1st group includes the ones that
have the expected performance, 2nd group below the expected performance, and 3rd group better
performance than expected. In accordance with the recorded interviews with the test takers, it is
observed that 3rd group learners who achieved a higher level of syntactic variety are with the highest
motivation. Gardner and Lambert (1972) proposed two different language learning motivation:
instrumental and integrative motivation. Teachers and researchers have recognized that motivation
plays an important role in language learning. In this study, I consider that formulation of syntactic
structure in speaking is to be more advanced than expected from A1 level when they have either
instrumental or integrative motivation from the beginning of English studies. It is a fact that they go
through the same language learning process, but ‘only by studying learners’ motivation to grammar
learning, can we give a more reasonable explanation of the gap among different learners under the
same learning environment’ (Hui, 2013). Also, Brown (2001) and Ellis’s (2003) research proves the
same point that non-intelligence factors (motivation and attitudes) have an important role in learners’
process and achievement. Learners with a higher level of syntactic performance in speaking stated that
they are highly interested in learning how to speak English with acceptable grammar for several
reasons such as;
“I watch a lot of English TV shows. I like English movies, especially thriller and war.” (2)
“ Actually, when I was a child, I read English books.” (6)
“ I like playing games on the Internet, and I get a lot of foreign friends from games. Also, I like
reading English forums, especially forums that include movie comments.” (7)
“I love watching English TV shows. In fact, I watch just English ones because I don’t like Turkish
TV shows.” (13)
“English music is really important for me.” (23)
“I listen to songs and watch movies with English subtitles. I enjoy it.” (2)
“I don’t like listening for the exam or in the class, but I love listening to foreign music.” (4)

36 Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017)27–40
“I have always been into English during my whole life. I watch and listen to English and study it. I
don’t even know why I like English so much, but I know that English is a part of me.” (16)
“When I was a child, I learnt Russian, French, and German a little bit.” (6)
“I am a professional e-sport player, so I spend time on the Internet in English very much.” (42)
It is seen that these students try to improve grammar via listening materials to make an
improvement in their speaking. They say that they have been into English for a long time and prefer to
improve speaking to other skills. They also stated that their priorities have always been grammar and
vocabulary to be able to speak better. The attitudes towards the English language are positive enough
to lead them success in the grammar of the language they want to speak. As we can deduce from Lui’s
research (2014), in contemporary ESL context among the non-intelligence factors, the value of
motivation and attitude in terms of success or failure cannot be undervalued and can also be applied to
syntactic improvement in speaking skill. Therefore, it is important for language educators to recognize
the value of these factors if quality outcomes in terms of English learning are to be delivered (Liu,
2014).
4.2. Declarative Knowledge (savoir)
Mature human beings have a highly developed and finely articulated model of the world and its
workings, closely correlated with the vocabulary and grammar of their mother tongue (CEFR, 2001).
Declarative knowledge has a major influence on syntax in spoken performance as this study proposes.
It highly depends on the social context in which one grows up and roots in time. In so-called global
village, people are expected to exceed the limits of declarative knowledge. There is no longer an ideal
amount of knowing since the technology spreads knowledge of other worlds and makes individuals’
job rather easy in terms of learning by traveling, reading or discovering the worlds individuals are
solely interested in. When it comes to language learning, learners unsurprisingly perform a much
better level of formation of grammatical sentences and phrases from words in target language. When a
learner starts to the journey of language learning, s-he seeks for every opportunity to use the
knowledge that s-he acquired from the past experiences. While learners are expected to produce only
isolated phrases about people, places, and basic topics for A1 level oral production, learners with
better declarative knowledge are observed to have a tendency of use of more complex syntactic
structures in the A1 speaking exam. For example, although nearly all students use technological
devices for social media, forums, movies etc., only the students with the better score of grammar and
vocabulary mentioned that they only seek for movies with English subtitles, always listen to English
music in certain genres, read news daily online, play computer games, read forums on the topic they
are personally into, and surf on chatting websites or games to find foreign friends. However, nearly
%80 of the students with whom I had interview said they do not like or enjoy reading English books or
reading at all as a source of learning.
As the interviews demonstrate, learners with different special talents or interests have a tendency to
perform better and various syntactic structures since they are also interested in the terminology of their
interest area and talents (music, sports, art etc.) in target language. They are willing to transfer their L1
personal identities to their L2 by having complex sentences and advanced word choice and making use
of technological sources in the English language. For example, according to the interviews, the
students who performed better grammar use in speaking exam have various talents such as making a
model airplane, professional basketball, volleyball, tennis, handball, and swimming, acting, painting,
playing musical instruments, aikido, and kickboxing. Seeing that these students have major talents
without exceptions, we can conclude their interests in different areas unlike their peers must have an

. Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017) 27–40 37
effect on their attitude and motivation of improving and learning. They have already been aware that
learning requires practicing and patience, and they could easily put this knowledge into practice in
language learning.
5. Conclusions
The major goal of this investigation was to begin to characterize the syntax in speaking by a
representative sample of preparatory school learners and find a connection between the performances
in terms of syntax in speaking with regard to CEFR A1 level expectations and these learners’ general
competence. The results suggest that when learners gain general competence, they have a better level
of speaking skill within a higher level of syntactic variety.
This line of study may help learners see better that investment on their competences will lead them
to develop better spoken performance in terms of syntax. Learners may need to understand pragmatic
aspects of owning competences to speak grammatically and freely to the extent permitted by the
syntax of English language. They also should be aware of the fact that in speaking mistakes or errors
of syntax does not hinder the learning process. On the contrary, they are welcomed to make
contributions to the process as “individual use of syntactic structures” in spoken performance.
Before all, parents should support their children to discover their interests and talents since it is
extremely advantageous to have one in terms of motivation and their psychological status. Students
usually feel stressed and nervous when they deal with getting into a world of another language,
namely a wholly different way of thinking and living. Therefore, it is utmost important to discharge
regularly with something they enjoy. Furthermore, L2 teachers may need to incorporate many
competences in order to give students more than what the books suggest, namely what they are more
interested in. Learners are like sponges when they are A1 level, so L2 teachers should avoid fixed
expressions that sound unnatural or make very little sense in speaking. They should let learners know
that they are free to own their favorite expressions that they acquire outside of the school and
encourage them to improve general competence and/or transfer them to their new language learning
experience. Learner autonomy has a vital role in this sense. Rather than depending solely on teachers
and course books, it is encouraging to see students put an effort to learn a language outside of the class
and create second language identities with high general knowledge and certain competences on their
own.
Acknowledgements
This research paper is made possible through the guidance from İsmail Fırat Altay at the
Department of English Language Teaching, Hacettepe University. Therefore, I would like to dedicate
my acknowledgment of gratitude toward his significant contribution to my work. Second, I would like
to thank my sister Fatoş Mısır for her most encouragement and support. She kindly discussed the
stages of organizing my ideas and offered invaluable advice on the organization and the consistency of
the paper.
References
Byram, M. (1997). Teaching and Assessing Intercultural Communicative Competence. Clevedon:
Multilingual Matters.

38 Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017)27–40
Branigan, H.P., Pickering, M.J, & McLean, J.F., & Stewart, A. (2006). The role of local and global
syntactic structure in language production: Evidence from syntactic priming. Language and
Cognitive Processes, 12, 974-1010.
Brown, H. D. (2001). Teaching by Principles: An Interactive Approach to Language Pedagogy (2nd
ed.). Pearson Education: 13-17.
Chomsky, N. (1965) Aspects of the Theory of Syntax. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
United States of America.
Common European Framework of Reference. (2001). Council of Europe. Cambridge University Press.
Retrieved on May 20, 2015 from http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/linguistic/Cadre1_en.asp
Council of Europe. (2001). Breakthrough Specification (unpublished). Council of Europe. Retrieved
on May 20, 2015 from http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/linguistic/DNR_EN.asp
Ellis, R. (2003). The Study of Second Language Acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Foster, Pauline, Tonkyn, Alan, & Wigglesworth, Gillian. (2000). Measuring spoken language: A unit
for all reasons. Applied Linguistics, 21(3), 354–374.
Freidin, R. (2012). Syntax: Basic Concepts and Applications. Cambridge University Press, New York.
Fromkin, V., Rodman, R., & Hyams, N. (2003). An Introduction to Language (7th ed.). Heinle, United
States of America.
Gardner, R. C. (1979). Social psychological aspects of second language acquisition. In Giles, H.& St.
Clair, R. (Eds.). Language and social psychology. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
Gardner, R.C. & Lambert, W.E. (1972). Attitudes and Motivation in Second Language Learning.
Rowley, MA.: Newbury House.
Hui, H. (2013) On FL Learners' Individual Differences in Grammar Learning and Their Grammatical
Competence Training. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, Finland, 3(8), 1369–1374.
Iwashita, N. (2010). Features of Oral Proficiency in Task Performance by EFL and JFL Learners. In
Selected Proceedings of the 2008 Second Language Research Forum, ed. Matthew T. Prior et al.,
32-47. Somerville, MA: Cascadilla Proceedings Project.
Jindathai, S. (2015). Factors Affecting English Speaking Problems among Engineering Students at
Thai-Nichi Institute of Technology. In Selected Proceedings of the 3rd National Interdisciplinary
Academic Conference, Thai-Nichi Institute of Technology, 344-8.
Liu, Y. (2014). Motivation and Attitude: Two Important Non-Intelligence Factors to Arouse Students’
Potentialities in Learning English. Creative Education, 5, 1249-1253.
Schumann, J. H. (1978a). The pidginization process: A model for second language acquisition.
Rowley, Mass: Newbury House.
Skehan, P. & Foster, P. (1999). The influence of task structure and processing conditions on narrative
retellings. Language Learning, 49(1), 93–120.
Radford, A. (1997). Syntax: A Minimalist Introduction. Cambridge University Press, United Kingdom.

. Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017) 27–40 39
Appendix A.
Interview Questions
1. What is your name?
2. How old are you?
3. Where did you grow up? Did you grow up in a big city?
4. What do your mother and father do?
5. What do you like to do in your free time?
6. Do you like watching English movies? What kind of movies do you enjoy watching?
7. Do you like reading English books? What kind of books do you enjoy reading?
8. Do you watch English TV shows? What kind of shows do you enjoy watching?
9. Do you like listening in English? What do you like to listen to in English?
10. Are you a fan of any kind of English music? What kind of music do you enjoy?
11. When did you start learning English? How old were you?
12. Did you like your English teacher when you first started to learn English? Why or why not?
13. Did you have a native (American, British, Canadian, Australian etc.) teacher during your
English language education? If yes, where was s-he from?
14. Have you ever been abroad? Which country or countries?
15. Do you read or watch daily news around the world? What do you read in particular?
16. Do you have a talent (in music, sports etc.) or any hobbies?
17. Do you know any other languages? If yes, which one?
18. How are you with technology; games, websites, forums, and similar sources on the Internet?
19. Do you want to tell more about yourself?
A1 seviyesi konuşma sınavının sözdizimi açısından analizi: Genel yeterliliğin
A1 seviyesi konuşmada sözdizimine etkisi
Öz
Bu çalışma, Türk Hava Kurumu Üniversitesi’nin (THK) Hazırlık Okulu’nda A1 düzeyinde İngilizce yeterliliğine
sahip Türk ve Arap öğrencilerin genel yeterliliklerinin, birinci dönem konuşma sınavlarının kayıtları analiz
edilerek, sözdizimi açısından konuşma becerileriyle olan ilgisini incelemeyi hedefler. Üniversitenin, öğrencilerin
gelecek akademik çalışmalarında başarılı olmaları için aynı müfredat ve ders kitaplarıyla standart bir dil eğitimi
almalarını sağlamasına rağmen, öğrencilerin konuşma performansları neden önemli derecede sözdizimsel
çeşitlilik göstersin diye sorulabilir. Cevabı basit görünebilir, fakat detaya girildiğinde işin içinden çıkmak zordur.
Bu sebeple bu çalışma, Ortak Avrupa Dil Referans Çerçevesinde A1 seviyesinden beklentilere kıyasla
öğrencilerin sözdizim açısından daha iyi konuşma performansları ile onların tutumları, motivasyonları, eğitim

40 Hülya Mısır / Journal of Language and Linguistic Studies, 13(1) (2017)27–40
geçmişleri ve dünya bilgileri arasındaki bağlantıyı açıklamaya çalışacaktır. Süreç boyunca, genel yeterlilik
(bildirimsel bilgi ve varoluşsal yeterlilik) kapsamına giren bilgiler, rastgele seçilen 22 öğrenciyle bire bir
görüşmelerle toplanmaktadır. Sonuçlar genel olarak, genel yeterliliğe yatırım yapan öğrencilerin konuşmalarında
kendi bağımsız kelime haznesine ve yüksek seviyede ve çeşitlilikte sözdizimine sahip olduğunu, ve çoğunluğu
oluşturan ve bildirimsel bilgi ve varoluşsal yeterlilik (tutum ve motivasyon) bakımından ayni derecede yetkin
olmayan diğer öğrencilerinse konuşmada standart bir sözdizimi düzeyine sahip olduğunu (ALTE' de tanımlanan
yaygın yapı kullanımları) ortaya koyuyor.
Anahtar sözcükler: Sözdizimi; A1 seviyesi konuşma; konuşma performansı; genel yeterlilik; varoluşsal
yeterlilik; bildirimsel bilgi; CEFR; ALTE
AUTHOR BIODATA
Hülya Mısır is a research assistant at Ufuk University, English Language Teaching Department
with an ongoing M.A. in English Language Teaching at Hacettepe University. Her interests include
syntax, cognitive grammar, online language learning environments, and digital literacies.
[hulyamsr@hacettepe.edu.tr]