Factors That Hinder Grade 10 English Second Language Learners’ Efficiency in the Use of Grammatical Cohesive Devices, A Case Study of 6 Selected Schools in the Eastern Cape Province – South Africa

Grammatical cohesion plays a crucial role in the construction of coherent and effective written communication. It refers to the way linguistic elements within a text are interconnected to create a sense of unity and flow, facilitating the readers’ understanding of the text. In essence, it encompasses various linguistic devices and techniques that establish a relationship between sentences and paragraphs, guiding readers through the text. Halliday and Hassan’s Theory of Cohesion, which proposes that effective use of cohesive devices allows writers to construct logical connections between propositions, thus contributing to the text’s overall cohesiveness, strengthened this investigation. A descriptive qualitative approach, embedded in an interpretive paradigm, underpinned this paper. Semi-structured interviews were administered to 6 English First Additional Language (EFAL) while document analysis, in the form of essays, was used to collect data from 36 conveniently chosen grade 10 EFAL learners in the Eastern Cape Province, South Africa. Thematic analysis enabled the author to categorise the data into themes, which formulated the findings of this inquiry. Outcomes of this inquiry indicated that learners’ essays lack grammatical coherence due to their inadequate knowledge about the use of grammatical cohesive markers, resulting in lengthy and disjointed sentences. Learners’ restricted acquaintance with these structures could derail efforts aimed at producing comprehensible discourse. It is recommended that the Text-based Approach, which can help learners understand grammatical cohesion indicators by exposing them to real texts, should be the subject of professional development. This study will contribute to the development of learners’ good writing skills, which enable them to be communicatively competent.