An Experimental Study On Cohesion In Senior High School Students' English Writing

As is known to all, it is significant for Chinese students to develop their abilities to write in English. English writing is one of the four fundamental skills in English learning. It is clearly demanded in the New Standard of English Curriculum (2001) that students should express their thoughts and opinions in English during the writing stage and lay good foundation for their development in the future and lifelong study. In the National Matriculation English Test writing takes up 30 points, which is one fifth of the full score. To some extent, it's the key to success in NMET. As a result, English writing has been drawn more and more attention by English teachers as well as students. How to improve English writing ability is important for both teachers and students.So far, many ways to improve students' writing ability have been investigated at home and abroad. Cohesion in English is one of them. In fact, cohesion has always been an important aspect of teaching in English writing. It is one of the yardsticks that judge unity, consistency and quality of writing and can reflect the writing skills grasped by the author. This thesis intends to make an experimental study on the functions and usage of cohesion in senior students' writing. By undertaking the study, the author aims to find theoretical and empirical foundation for cohesion in senior students' writing and draw students' attention to cohesion.This thesis consists of six chapters. Chapter One illustrates the significance and objects of the study and presents general problems in senior students' English compositions.Chapter Two begins with a brief introduction to Halliday & Hasan's cohesion theory. Then it looks back on the related researches on English writing at home and abroad, referring to different ways of developing writing skills, especially the application of cohesion theory.Chapter Three is about rational for study. The study is based on three theories. The first explains the difference and relationship between cohesion and coherence. The second concerns theory of information structure and the third is theory of thematic structure.Chapter Four covers details in the experiment, which consists of the hypothesis, subjects, instruments, procedures, methods and the model in writing training. The study includes these following procedures: 1) Pre-test was conducted to figure out cohesive items in the students' writing and t-test was performed to see whether controlled class and experimental class have similar proficiency in writing. 2) Two questionnaires were given out to both teachers and students to investigate how much they know about cohesion and whether they applied cohesion theory in teaching and learning writing. 3) Cohesion theory was taught to the students in the experimental class. The author selected materials from New Concept English Book 2 (2001) to train cohesion on the students' writing for four months. 4) Find the general problems in the students' writing, correct them and stress them to the students. 5) Post-test was conducted to check cohesive items in the students' writing and t-test was also performed. Then the author compared and analyzed the results between the pre-test and the post-test, concluding that it is beneficial to the students to apply cohesion theory in the students' writing.Chapter Five concerns data collection and analysis. In this chapter, the author presents some tables and figures in questionnaires and two tests in detail to show the procedures and results of the experiment.Chapter Six comes to conclusion, which indicates that training on cohesion is an effective way in enhancing students' writing skills. In addition, it covers the limitations of the study and implications in English teaching and learning in future.