International Journal of English Linguistics; Vol. 8, No. 3; 2018 ISSN 1923-869X E-ISSN 1923-8703 Published by Canadian Center of Science and Education 158 Arab EFL Learners’ Identification of English Sentence Patterns Aisha M. Alhussain 1 1 Princess Nourah bint Abdulrahman University, KSA Correspondence: Aisha M. Alhussain, Princes Nourah bint Abdulrahman University, Riyadh, KSA. E-mail: amalhusian@pnu.edu.sa Received: November 17, 2017 Accepted: January 31, 2018 Online Published: February 4, 2018 doi:10.5539/ijel.v8n3p158 URL: http://doi.org/10.5539/ijel.v8n3p158 Abstract The article investigated if a significant relationship existed between Arab EFL learners’ and the English sentence pattern identified. The participants were 64 third-year college students studying in the Department of Linguistics at Princess Nourah University, Saudi Arabia. They were assigned 28 literary texts and asked to derive examples for each of the nine sentence patterns listed in Stageberg (1981). An ANOVA test at alpha level P < 0.05 and a post hoc test were used to analyze data. The findings of the study showed a highly significant result at p < 0.05 between participants’ performance and the pattern identified. Seven levels of difficulty were identified, where Pattern 1 was the easiest and Pattern 8 was the most difficult. The main components of each English sentence pattern were also investigated to find possible sources of difficulty, such as the use of the copula; transitive, intransitive, and ditransitive verbs; dative case; and double object structure. The denoting of referents, dative case, and double object structures were found to be the main sources of difficulty. Keywords: EFL Arab learners, sentence pattern identification, EFL learners’ source of errors, dative case, and double object structure 1. Introduction 1.1 Arab EFL Learners’ Identification of English Sentence Patterns It is widely believed that most languages have similar sentence structures, but differ in their morphological structures (Haspelmath, 1993). Morphologically, languages are classified as either analytic or synthetic. An analytic language is one with little inflection whereas a synthetic one is inflectional. English is considered an analytic language while Arabic is synthetic (Al-Shujairi, 2015). Accordingly, many differences exist between the two languages. An important aspect of such differences can be found in the two languages’ sentence patterns. In English, words are arranged in patterns to give the correct meaning of the sentence. English sentence patterns are taught to EFL/ESL learners to improve their writing and speaking skills, and they are considered an important tool that students need to master for their reading and writing skills (Hostmeyer, 2016; Su, 2001). This knowledge is also crucial for precise translation production as well. Thus, not surprisingly, many books offer explanations and examples of how to form sentences in English following the main English sentence patterns to help develop flexibility and ease in written and reading work (Landon, 2013). Many studies have compared Arabic and English sentence patterns (e.g., Alduais, 2012; Al-Shujairi, 2015; Breedlove, 2017) to raise awareness about how to construct sentences into common patterns to avoid confusion and add clarity to sentences. Breedlove’s (2017) book helps English and Arabic students understand the differences between the two languages with respect to verb time, tense, aspect, mood, and transitive/intransitive structure. Alduais (2012) contrasted the simple sentence structure of English and Arabic to show that Arabic has four types of simple sentences (i.e., nominal, verbal, equational, and non-verbal) compared to English’s single type (i.e., nominal). Al-Shujairi (2015) investigated transitivity and intransitivity in English and Arabic, noting similarities and differences. Both languages have transitive and intransitive verbs, but Arabic uses inflection to change an intransitive verb to a transitive one. Yet few studies have focused on how well students identify English sentence patterns. Saif Al-Deen (2009) verified the hypothesis that “there is statistical significant differences among the Iraqi college students’ ability in identifying sentence patterns” (p. 11). She carried out an 18-item achievement test with 30 third-year college students in an English department in Iraq using the sentence patterns Stageberg (1981) identified. An analysis of