This study investigated the types of grammatical errors in writing recount
text and its causes to the tenth grade students of SMA N 5 Purwoketo in academic
year 2014/2015. To meet the purposes of this research, a descriptive survey was
employed. The data were obtained from writing test in the form of essay. The
samples of this research were 46 students from the total number, 300 students.
The sampling method applied in this research was random sampling using the
lottery technique. The basic frameworks of the types of grammatical errors were
relied on surface strategy taxonomies (Dulay, Burt, and Kreshen, 1981 as quoted
in Tarigan, 1981, 154). The data results showed that the types of students‟
grammatical errors in writing recount text were misformation errors (60.89%),
omission errors (30.14%), addition errors (8.65%), and misordering errors
(0.29%) from the total number, 335 frequency of errors. Based on the test result
analysis, it was found that the main cause of students‟ grammatical errors was the
interference of their first language.