Building Coherence: Utilizing a Writing Prompt in Fostering a Reflective Paper
Theme 4: Lack of Peer Cooperation
• “Late submissions of assigned parts in reflection papers”
• “Wrong answers submitted such as “yes” “no” answers on questions that require expounded answers”
41 ISSN 2651-7787 EACC Journal of Multidisciplinary Research Theme 5: The link in between the sentences
• “Used to draw connections between sentences”
• “Used to link the sentences and ideas that are composed by my groupmates to make it look coherently connected in a paragraph”
• “It helped us to stitch sentences and texts together”
• “Used to show relationship between the sentences and paragraphs”
• “Adding words that are related to the sentences to make it clear”
Table 2. Horizonalization from Focus Group Discussion for the submitted Reflection Paper
The Focus Group Discussion disclosed that the challenges encountered upon composing a reflective paper revolved on lack of peer cooperation and construction of a precise grammar particularly the Cohesive devices. As the reflection paper was instructed as a collaborative activity, students are expected to be involved upon creating the written output by which some students have failed to do. This has led the members of their group to experience difficulty in both consolidation of the answers for each question assigned to a student and gathering a set of closed question answers on the items that require an expounded answer. As a result, the challenge in grammar construction took place for the students in which the absence of connection between the sentences and paragraphs that explain their sentiments occurred. This problem included answers that were not relevantly connected to the question, appropriate adding of information and explanation in between the sentences and paragraphs, and structuring a concise sentence. However, the participants were able to acknowledge the purpose of cohesive devices in a reflective paper as a tool to draw the link in between the sentences. Despite this, the consolidated perspectives of the participants still showed the content analysis of their reflective papers which depicted an incoherent presentation of ideas and disagreeing usage of pronouns. Moreover, the participants confessed that the reason behind this dilemma was that they were not always aiming to construct their paper with a correct grammar as they were after the subjective expression of ideas as long as they perceived it as comprehensible for readers. Although, some
42 ISSN 2651-7787 EACC Journal of Multidisciplinary Research
students disagreed with this perspective as they preferred to compose a reflective paper with correct grammar constructions and mostly focused on adhering a perfect grammar on their paper. Nevertheless, these factors encountered have still resulted in failure to compose a coherent reflective paper.
The affirmed statements of the participants clearly explained the reason behind the encountered challenges upon the composition of their reflective paper in a collaborative manner.
One of the students stated “The problem that I had was late submissions of assigned parts in reflection papers” which another student added, “There are also wrong answers submitted such as
“yes” “no” answers on questions that require explanations” by which the students have recognized as the cause of encountering difficulties in constructing a coherent expression of their ideas along with relevantly expounded answers. Although, a student had recalled his knowledge regarding the usage of cohesive devices in writing as “the words used to show relationship between the sentences and paragraphs” incoherence and grammatical lapses were still seen on their reflective papers. In line with this, a student admitted “For me, it is acceptable as long as the grammar presented was understandable” which explained their subjectivity on composing a reflective paper with the advantage of collaboration as an avenue to correct grammatical errors that the other students commit, “grammatical lapses could still be acceptable as it can still be corrected with the help of my peers”. On the other hand, one of the students has expressed a contradiction, “it should have a perfect grammar to make the ideas clear and understandable for the readers” as the essence of the reflection paper was to develop their competence in coherent writing.
2. How did the writing prompt develop students’ skills in writing a coherent Reflection Paper?
Problem in Coherence Writing No. of
times
Incoherent presentation of ideas and information. 1
1. Failure to use repetition to link ideas, sentences, and paragraphs.
43 ISSN 2651-7787 EACC Journal of Multidisciplinary Research 2. Not utilizing synonyms to link ideas and create
variety.
/ 3. Non appearance of parallel structures to link
ideas, sentences, and paragraphs.
4. Exclusion of well-executed logical progression of ideas.
5. Unsatisfactory control over organizational features.
Absence of Cohesive devices 11
6. Not using transitional expressions to link ideas, sentences, and paragraphs.
6.1 Addition (furthermore, in addition, and, besides, etc.)
/////
6.2 Comparison (similarly, likewise, again, in comparison, etc.)
6.3 Contrast (in contrast, on the other hand, on the contrary, etc.)
/ 6.4 Concession (although it is, regardless, granted that, etc.)
6.5 Exemplification (for example, for instance, such as, etc.)
6.6 Inference (if not, in that case, that implies, then, etc.)
6.7 Summary (therefore, in a nutshell, in conclusion, to sum up, etc.)
//
6.8 Result (as a result, consequently, hence, thus, etc.)
///
6.9 Reformulation (in other words, put simply, basically, etc.)
6.10 Miscellaneous (Adverbs)
7. Absence of time connectives. (first, second, finally)
Inconsistent utilization of Pronouns
44 ISSN 2651-7787 EACC Journal of Multidisciplinary Research 8. Disagreeing usage of pronouns to link
sentences.
9. Unparallel singular and plural pronouns.
10. Incorrect usage and construction of reflexive pronouns (himself, herself, themselves)
Table 3. Coding Sheet for the submitted Intervened Reflection Paper
One of the ways in increasing the writing quality is through a Writing Prompt, the submitted intervened paper of the participants reflected an improvement in writing skills as the presence of Cohesive devices became evident. In comparison to the first submitted outputs of the participants where numerous lapses were documented, the documentation analysis now indicated selected instances where a Cohesive device should have been used specifically in addition, contrast, summary and result. Other than that, there was no error nor oversight in terms of coherent presentation of ideas and utilization of pronouns.
Textural Theme