Challenges Encountered by Algerian EFL Students when Using the English Prepositions "in, on, at"

Abstract

This study is an analysis of EFL Algerian students' errors when using the English prepositions "in", "on" and "at". The aim of the current work is to find out the kinds of errors they make in the use of those prepositions and to check if they are influenced by their mother tongue (Arabic) in using the stated prepositions. Data was derived from a diagnostic test which included the use of "in", "on" and "at" adminitered to those students by a stratified random sample of 50 students of Second year LMD English, Biskra University. The main aim of this research is to shed light on the reasons that lie behind the failure in using English prepositions by Arab EFL students, in particular the case of: "at" "on" and "in". This reaserch also attempts to investigate whether the mother language has a negative influence on the students’ performance when using English prepositions in particular the case of "in", "on" and "at". It attemts also to investigate wether the difficulty of the English language grammatical rules lead students to encounter difficulties in using English prepositions "in", "on" and "at".