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Do ESL Learners Use Conjunctions As ‘Cohesive Devices’ In

Writing? A Study

Kuncham Venkanna

A Senior Research Fellow in English Language Education

A Ph.D. Research Scholar

The English & Foreign Languages’ University, Hyderabad

India

Abstract

The study is an attempt to explore how extent the ESL students of class VIII recognize and

use conjunctions as cohesive devices in writing. This study is intended to know the quality of

the second language writing. The project shows that the ESL students of class VIII are able to

recognize conjunctions as cohesive devices irrespective of the task and age. It is found from

the Task-III that if the students know the number of categories of conjunctions, they are able

to use them randomly. i.e. There is no relationship between the categories of conjunctions

and the usage of the particular conjunction. It is found that conjunctions such as And, But,

So, That, Because, Or After, Who, When & If. were used in descriptive writing. And, the

most common conjunction, is used highest & the conjunctions Who & Or are used lowest. It

was found that there is no significance difference between the age groups in using

conjunctions as cohesive devices as far as the Task-I, Task-II and III are concerned apart

from at the overall level and as far as the Task-I, II and III are concerned. But, in Task-II, the

boys performed higher than girls. And at the overall level, the boys performed higher than the

girls. Hence, it is found that the ability to recognize/identify conjunctions as cohesive devices

is higher than the ability to use them in an essay.

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1. Introduction

Writing is a productive skill in which we produce a sequence of sentences arranged in a

particular order and linked together in certain ways. It is a complex activity which requires

orderly presentation of ideas, a planned movement from one idea to another, proportionate

emphasis on main and sub-ordinate ideas and thoroughness of treatment. We call this as

'coherence'. Every good piece of writing is also marked by the correct and appropriate

devices which make it a unified whole. We call this as 'cohesion', to say in simple words

Coherence is clarity of ideas expressed and Cohesion is use of connectives. Some of the

Sub - Skills of writing at the ESL classroom contexts are Linking sentences, using connecting

words, relatives etc; Using discourse markers appropriately to indicate main points,

developments in a theme, emphasizing a point, etc; Linking sentences with appropriate

sentence connectors and sequence signals; Expressing relations between parts of a text

through lexical cohesion device of repetition, synonymy, hyponymy, antithesis etc.

1.1. Writing-Types of Writing:

Writing will be done for various purposes like personal purpose (letters, diaries, invitations,

shopping list etc., official purpose (complaints enquiry, job applications, agenda, minutes,

review, speeches), creative purpose (poems, songs, stories, biography), and for study purpose

(note taking, note making, reporting, exams, summarizing, research papers etc.

There are four types of writing: they are

a) Narrative Writing: The term narrative is commonly used in fiction. It includes

stories, autobiography, science fiction etc. It covers the function of narration of events

over a period of time and is commonly used for writing reports. Narrative can be

factual or fictional. They are concerned with the sequence of events over a period of

time along with the "where' of the events. Teaching narrative in the class requires the

teacher to teach how to sequence the details by using appropriate linking devices.

b) Descriptive Writing:

This kind of writing provides information about events, people, concepts, things,

places etc. This is the most common form of writing. This descriptive writing can also

be attributed to writing diary and personal letters and also technical and scientific

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works. It is essential to have sufficient information about a thing or place or person

before writing descriptively. What to write, how to write, vocabulary needed to write,

organizing the material and focusing on the topic etc. are important aspects of

Descriptive writing.

c) Persuasive Writing:

Writing and planning -' advertisements, writing brochures, writing political

presentations are all the different aspects come under Persuasive writing. This kind of

writing requires good care, precision and logicality and is usually meant for the

advanced learners. Selection of refined, accurate and striking words should be there to

influence the readers.

d) Expository Writing:

It includes writing the facts, instructions, illustrations, classification, definitions etc. It

covers the function of showing cause and effect by explaining how the events are

linked. (It compares and contrasts the concepts or events).

1.2. Rationale of the study:

David Crystal (1997) explores “English may become first language for Indians. In the

present scientific and technological world, the significance of English is increasing widely.

All the research and updated knowledge it centered on us and is in English. The average

Indian students are very slow at reading and writing”. On one hand the number of English

medium schools is growing and on the other hand the standard of English is steadily

declining. English has been a part of our education system for more than a century. Yet

English is beyond the reach of most of our young people which make them highly unequal.

But National Knowledge Commission (NKC) (2007) believes that “the time has come for

us to teach our people, ordinary people, English as a language in schools. Early action in

this sphere would help us build an inclusive society and transform India into a knowledge

society (GOI 2007).

According to a BBC report (2012), the percentage of schools teaching English as a first

language doubled between 1993 and 2002 from 5% to 10% in primary schools and from 7%

to 13% in upper primary schools." By 2020 more than a quarter of all secondary schools were

offering English as a medium of instruction. But, the proficiency in language is yet to be

gained by majority of Indians.

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Hence, when we write about events that are closely related as causes and effects, we use

special words to show, their relationship. These words are called connectors or linkers.

Conjunctions, adverbs and prepositions serve as connectors. We also compare and contrasts

event or concepts. This is a difficult form as it needs co-ordination between thought and

expression with emphasis on linguistic organization through cohesion and coherence. As one

of the four basic language skills, writing is more complex in that it tests a person‟s ability to

use a language and the ability to express ideas. As a result a person needs to write not only

coherently but also correctly. This is very important in second/foreign language writing (M.

Liu & G Braine, 2005).

1.3. Objectives of the study

1. To know whether the students are aware of using conjunctions as cohesive devices in

ESL writing

2. To know the frequency levels of students in using conjunctions as cohesive devices in

ESL writing

3. To know the differences in performance of boys and girls in terms of using

conjunctions as cohesive devices in the descriptive writing

4. To assess the quality of students‟ writing in the ESL contexts based on the number of

cohesive devices they use.

1.4. Research questions:

It aims to answer the following questions:

a) To what extent do ESL Learners use conjunctions as „cohesive devices’ in writing?

b) Is there any significance difference in using conjunctions as „cohesive devices‟

between the Descriptive writing and the Recognition task in ESL learners‟ writing?

c) How does the performance of boys and girls differ in terms of using conjunctions as

cohesive devices in the two different tasks?

d) What is the relationship between the number of cohesive devices used and the quality

of writing?

2. Concepts and theories

2.1. Defining coherence:

In Cohesion in English, M.A.K. Halliday and Ruqaiya Hasan identify five categories of

cohesive devices that create coherence in texts: reference, ellipsis, substitution, lexical

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cohesion and conjunction. A Conjunction, which is a part of Grammatical cohesion, sets up

a relationship between two words, phrases, or two clauses. The most basic but least cohesive

is the conjunction and. Words used in this way include and, but, because, however, thus,

although, etc ((Halliday & Hasan, 1976). There are four types of conjunctions such as

Additive, Adversative, Causal, and Temporal conjunctions.

“To coherence” means to stick together, to be connected naturally or logically, by a common

principle; to be consistent; and to become or stay united in action; to be in accord. It is the

grammatical and lexical linking within a text or sentence that holds a text together and gives

it meaning. It is related to the broader concept of coherence (Halliday & Hasan, 1976).

There are mainly two types of cohesion the Grammatical cohesion, which is based on

structural content; and the Lexical cohesion which is based on lexical content and

background knowledge.

Coherence is traditionally described as the relationships that link the ideas in a text to create

meaning for the readers and to comprehend a text. It is an important quality of effective

writing (Bamberg, 1984; Richards, 1990). Howeever,it is often considered an abstract and

fuzzy concept (Connor, 1990; Roberts & Kreuz, 1993) which is difficult to teach and diffiult

to learn:

Although most teachers consider coherence an essential element of good writing, it remains

difficult to teach. Teachers acclaim its benefits, demonstrates its effects, and exemplify good

models, but students do not know how to write coherently. (Cerniglia, Medsker, & Connor,

1990, p.229)”

More recently, Grabbe and Kaplan (1996) have pointed out the controversial nature of

coherence: “there is little consensus on the matter of an overall definition of coherence”. In

writing classroom, ESL teachers tend to refer to “coherence” in abstract terms without

making a systematic attempt to explain and to teach it.

2.2. Common Cohesive devices

1. Use transitional expressions.

2. Use pronouns.

3. Use deliberate repetition.

4. Use parallelism.

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2.3.Transitional Expressions

Transitional expressions are conjunctions and prepositional phrases that indicate

connections among ideas. Their use is crucial in writing. Particularly in argumentative

writing, the writer should consider issues related to critical thinking (such as soundness of

arguments, fallacies, and flaws in premises). Try not to use the same expressions in the

same piece of writing (especially if the text is short). A thesaurus may be helpful in

coming up with relevant transitional expressions (but avoid weird ones). Elegant use of

transitions takes practice, but inelegant use is better than no use.

Common transitional expressions:

Relationship Expressions

Addition also, in addition, too, moreover, and, besides, furthermore, equally important,

then, finally, as well, further, indeed, in fact, ; [semicolon]

Alternative either…or, if only, instead, instead of, in that case, neither…nor, otherwise,

rather than, unless, whether…or, or, in other words

Causation as a result of, because, due to, for, on account of, since

Comparison similarly, likewise, in the same way, not only…but also, as…as [e.g., as big as

a house]

Concession of course, to be sure, certainly, granted

Contrast but, yet, however, on the other hand, nevertheless, nonetheless, conversely, in

contrast, by contrast, still, at the same time, although, despite, even if, whereas,

by comparison

Degree or

Extent

for the most part, so…that [e.g., she is so loud that she doesn't need a

microphone], to some extent, to some degree, to a certain extent, such…that

[e.g., it is such a long way that I can't walk], in part, partly

Example for example, for instance, thus, as an illustration, namely, specifically, such as, :

[colon], in that

Place in the front, in the foreground, in the back, in the background, at the side,

adjacent, nearby, in the distance, here, there

Purpose so that, to, so as to, in order to, in such a way as to

Result therefore, thus, as a result, so, accordingly, as a result, it follows that,

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consequently

Summary hence, in short, in brief, in summary, in conclusion, to sum up

Time

Sequence

first, second, third, next, then, finally, afterwards, before, soon, later,

meanwhile, subsequently, immediately, eventually, currently

2.4. Frameworks:

1. Halliday and Hasan (1976)’s framework:

To provide a framework for studying and judging the cohesion and coherence of writing,

Halliday and Hasan (1976) introduced five different types of CDs: (a) reference (i.e., the

indication of information from elsewhere such as personals, demonstratives, and

comparatives), (b) substitution (i.e., the replacement of one component by another), (c)

ellipsis (i.e., the omission of a component), (d) conjunction (i.e., the indication of specific

meaning which presupposes present items in the discourse, such as additive, adversative,

casual, and temporal), and finally (e) lexical cohesion (i.e., the repetition of the same or

relative lexical items). They contended that through analyzing the use of cohesive device, one

could evaluate or assess writing quality from the perspective of coherence.

2. Fraser (1999)’s frame work:

He defined Discourse Markers as a pragmatic class, lexical expressions drawn primarily from

the syntactic classes of conjunctions, adverbials, and prepositional phrases. In accordance

with the proposed model, there are two types of Discourse Markers: (a) Those that relate

aspects of the explicit message conveyed by S2 with aspects of a message, direct or indirect,

associated with S1, and (b) Those that relate the topic of S2 to that of S1. Fraser‟s (1999)

taxonomy includes six main subclasses. These subcategories are presented below: (a)

conclusive Discourse Markers: in sum, in conclusion, to sum up, etc., (b) reason Discourse

Markers: because, since, due to, etc., (c) elaborative Discourse Markers: and, also, moreover,

in addition, etc., (d) contrastive Discourse Markers: but, however, although, etc., (e)

inferential Discourse Markers: thus, hence, so, therefore, etc., and finally (f) exemplifiers:

for example, such as, for instance, etc.

3. Literature review

This part of the project deals with the presentation of some of the studies done in the area of

writing and especially in using connectors.

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Study: 1

Khalil & Kuo (1995) showed in their study that the Arab students overused reiteration of the

same lexical item as cohesive device, but underused other lexical and other grammatical

cohesive devices. The case was the same with the writing composed by Spanish-speaking

students (Palmer, 1999) and by Chinese undergraduates‟ english majors (Zhang, 2000). The

issue tested in the study was “Cohesion and Coherence in ESL/EFL writing” and the subjects

were the Arab students in the study. In Wikborg‟s (1990) study, it was found that Swedish

students often showed cohesion problems in their wrting from missing or misleading sentence

connections to malfunctioning cohesive devices to too great a distance between the cohesive

items in a cohesive chain. Consequently, the misuse of these cohesive devices affected or

even broke the coherence of the text.

Study: 2

A study titled “Two Accounts of Discourse Markers in English” by Miri Hussein explores a

scrutiny of the semantics and pragmatics of discourse markers in English. It discusses two

accounts in the analysis of discourse markers, namely the Coherence account and the

Relevance account. The study investigates the similarities and differences between the two

accounts and concludes by arguing that the Relevance account is an ideal account and more

appropriate for analysing discourse markers than the Coherence one. In this paper, two

approaches for studying DMs have been investigated.

The first approach maintains that DMs are linguistic expressions that relate discourse units.

Proponents of this approach analyse DMs as cohesive devices that contribute to the

coherence of well-formed discourse by encoding cohesive (semantic) relationships between

discourse units. The second approach treats DMs as pragmatic devices that contribute to the

interpretation and comprehension of utterance by encoding procedural information that

control the choice of contextual information. In other words, such devices encode relevance

relations between propositions (thoughts) and the cognitive environment of an individual. It

seems that there is something in common between the two approaches. At the end of the

study it gives an evaluation of the two accounts and favours the relevance account which

considers discourse as a cognitive rather than linguistic entity. Section 5 is a conclusion

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Study: 3

The study “An Investigation into the Use of Cohesive Devices in Second Language Writings”

, Mohsen Ghasemi found that as far as the communicative nature of writing is concerned,

cohesion is regarded as an essential textual component both in creating organized texts and

rendering the content comprehensible to the reader. The analysis of collected data from

different EFL/ESL researchers showed that the learners were able to use various CDs in their

writings. Additionally, the study highlighted some of the cohesive problems in writing and

the possible pedagogical implications for teachers. The findings also provide insight into the

abilities of native and nonnative writers to convey their ideas into written forms. The results

of this research will provide us with insights into the general pattern of CDs in EFL/ESL

learners‟ academic and nonacademic writing. This would help to identify students‟ problems

in using CDs, for instance, overuse or underuse of certain categories, and, thereby, modify

teaching writing and incorporate a more precise plan for teaching the appropriate use of CDs.

4. Methodology

4.1. Target group and sub-sampling:

As a part of the study, I visited a school at Badichoudi. The name of the school is

Government High School NayaBazar, Badichoudi, SulthanBazar, Hyderabad. It is one of the

government schools in Hyderabad. The sample for this project includes sixteen (16) students

of class VIII of Govt. High School NayaBazar, Badichoudi, Sulthan Bazar, Hyderabad. The

ESL students are from various multi-cultural and multi-lingual backgrounds and their mother

tongues include Telugu, Marathi, Kannada, Nepali and Hindi. All these students are taught

with the help of a single textbook but they have specific proficiency levels in English.

4.2. Procedures for data collection:

I have selected school randomly from that selected VII class ESL students from that I

considered the sample size according to whoever attempts task III. Under The Simple

Random Sampling, the data from sixteen students were collected for the study.

4.3.Task used for the study:

As a part of this project, three tasks such as Task-I (a) and (b), Task-II (a) and (b) & Task-III

were designed on in order to find out to what extent the ESL students of class-VIII use

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conjunctions as cohesive devices in their writing. There are three tasks which are designed to

elicit the recognition and production of conjunctions. The Task-I ((a) & (b)) focuses on the

recognizing ability of the students. Task: I (a) & (b) focus on recognizing the use of

conjunctions in a paragraph and a matching. These tasks are used to know whether the

students are able to recognize a few conjunctions which are essential at the secondary level.

Task: II (a) & (b) focus on the cognitive aspects of the students. Here, the students are asked

to frame sentences and fill the blacks with suitable conjunctions. Task-II (a) and (b) is

intended to measure the ability to use right conjunctions in order to combine two sentences

and to fill the passages. And, Task-III is intended to assess the ability to use conjunctions as

cohesive devices used through essay writing.

4.4. Method of Data Analysis:

The method of analysis of learners‟ individual written data was analysed based on the

following scales of measurement. Here, I have used the descriptive statistics Mean, Standard

Deviation, and students‟t-test for significance difference between the mean scores of two

groups.

5. Data Interpretation and Analysis:

6. Findings and discussion:

1. There is no difference between mean scores of task1 and task2 that is the usage of

connecters in task1 and task2 is same.

2. The students of Class-VIII showed cohesion problems in their writing from missing or

misleading sentence connections to malfunctioning cohesive devices to too great a

distance between the cohesive items in a cohesive chain

3. the misuse of a few cohesive devices of Task-III affected or even broke the

coherence of the text

4. The students of Class-VIII showed difficulty in recognizing the given conjunctions in

Task-I a & b.

5. The students of Class-VIII showed considerable difficulty in using conjunctions as

cohesive devices in Task-III

6. It is found from the Task-III that if the students know the number of categories of

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conjunctions, they are able to use them randomly. i.e. There is no relationship

between the categories of conjunctions and the usage of the particular conjunction.

7. It is found that the students used in their essays conjunctions such as And, But, So,

That, Because, Or After, Who, When & If. Out of these conjunctions, the

conjunctions And, which is the most common conjunction, is used highest & the

conjunctions Who & Or are used lowest.

8. It was found that there is no significance difference between the age groups in using

conjunctions as cohesive devices as far as the Task-I, Task-II and III are concerned

apart from at the overall level.

9. It was found that there is no significance difference between the boys and girls in

using conjunctions as cohesive devices as far as the Task-I and III are concerned. But,

in Task-II, the boys performed higher than girls. And at the overall level, the boys

performed higher than the girls.

10. In the above bar diagram,

11. a) shows that the mean scores are decreasing by task wise that is the mean score in

task-I(a) is higher (3.94) than the task-II (a) (3.5) and task –III (No of conjunctions

used) (3.19) individually and overall.

12. (b) shows that the mean scores are decreasing by task wise that is the mean score in

task-I(b) is higher (5.81) than the task-II (b) (4.75) and task –III (No of right

conjunctions used) (4) individually and overall.

13. (c) shows that the mean scores are decreasing by task wise that is the mean score in

task-I(a+b) is higher (9.75) than the task-II (a+b) (8.25) and task –III (No of

categories of conjunctions + no of right conjunctions used) (7.19) individually and

overall.

14. It is found that the ability to perform in task-II and task-III is the same i.e. they were

able to use conjunctions as cohesive devices in the both the tasks almost equally.

15. Hence, it is found that the ability to recognize/identify conjunctions as cohesive

devices is higher than the ability to use them in an essay.

7. Conclusion

Based on the findings, it can be concluded that the ESL students of Class VIII use

conjunctions as cohesive devices when they are asked to recognize and to use in an essay.

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Based on the findings, It was found that there is no significance difference between the age

groups in using conjunctions as cohesive devices as far as the Task-I, Task-II and III are

concerned apart from at the overall level. It was found that there is no significance difference

between the boys and girls in using conjunctions as cohesive devices as far as the Task-I and

III are concerned. But, in Task-II, the boys performed higher than girls. And at the overall

level, the boys performed higher than the girls.

LIMITATIONS:

1. This study was based on the collected data from the written discourse of class VIII

students of in ESL contexts.

2. It is confined to only conjunctions as cohesive devices though there are other forms of

cohesive devices (pronouns, adverbs. Etc).

8. Appendices:

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8.1. Reference:

1. Mitchell, R., Myles, F., and Marsden, E. (2013). Second Language Learning Theories

(3rdEdn.). London: Routledge. (All 10 chapters)

2. Brown, H. D. (2006). Principles of Language Learning and Teaching. Prentice-Hall,

INC, Englewood Cliffs: New Jersey

3. Doughty, C., and Long, M. (2005). The Handbook of SLA. Blackwell Publishing.

4. Fraser, B. (1988). Types of English discourse markers. Acta Linguistica Hungarica 38

(1-4), 19-33.

5. Halliday, M. A. K. and R. Hasan (1976). Cohesion in English. London: Longman.

Iten, C. (1998).

6. Gass, S. M. and Selinker, L. (2008). Second Language Acquisition: An introductory

course. (2ndEdn.) Lawrence Earlbaum Associates: Mahwah, NJ.

7. Meisel, J. (2011). First and Second Language Acquisition: Parallels and Differences.

Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

8. Ritchie, W. C., and Bhatia, T. K. (1996). Handbook of Second Language Acquisition.

San Diego: Academic Press

9. Robinson, P., and Ellis, N. (2008). Handbook of Cognitive Linguistics and SLA. New

York: Routledge

10. Johnson, P. (1992). Cohesion and coherence in compositions in Malay and English.

RELC Journal, 23 (2), 1-17.

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13. http://ojs.academypublisher.com/index.php/tpls/article/view/tpls030916151623

14. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.490.8498