Logical Relations and Noun Phrase Complexity of EFL Students’ Academic Writing to Promote Literacy Development Cycle Teaching Model

Abstract

Academic writing has become more important, especially for academicians who are required to publish articles in a reputable journal. However, meeting journals’ quality standards is not an easy task. Graduate students as prospective academicians need to improve their writing style to be competent academic writers because previous studies revealed that writing style covering clause simplex, clause complex, and complex noun phrase are problematic for them. This qualitative case study explored the logical relations of clause complexes and complex noun phrases of clause simplexes found in graduate students' unpublished academic writing. It employed genre analysis for examining 20 graduate students' unpublished research papers collected using purposive sampling technique. The findings revealed that the students mostly produced choppy texts. They utilized parataxis (47.3%) and hypotaxis (52.7%). Concerning logico-semantic relation, the expansion relation is dominant (76.8%). In terms of complex noun phrase, 20.7% occurrences were found in clause simplexes, in which attributive adjective pre-modifiers and prepositional phrase post modifiers were dominant. Furthermore, the interviews revealed that the students' writing problems derived from their lack of awareness and low literacy of academic writing characteristics. Based on the research findings, a teaching model of the literacy development cycle is recommended to enhance students’ skills in academic writing.