UNITY AND COHERENCE IN WRITING AN ARGUMENTATIVE ESSAY OF ENGLISH EDUCATION STUDY PROGRAM UNIVERSITY OF MUHAMMADIYAH MALANG

Writing is crucial for expressing ideas clearly and effectively. Good English technical writing should be reader-centered, minimizing reader effort and ensuring understanding. Challenges such as linguistic, cognitive, and psychological barriers can hinder effective essay writing. Developing proficiency is key to conveying thoughts coherently. Argumentative writing, common in universities, honest reasoning and research skills, aiding persuasive communication. Unity and coherence are vital for well-structured writing, ensuring logical flow and readability. Studies emphasize the need for clear topics, logical order, and proper use of transitions for coherence. Collaborative writing can improve content and coherence in student essays. This study focuses on errors in unity and coherence in argumentative essays by 29 students aged 19 to 21 in the English education program at the University of Muhammadiyah Malang. Data were collected using a checklist
to identify errors and interviews to gather insights on correcting them. Results
showed errors in unity: lack of thesis statement (20.7% of subjects), unsupported body paragraphs (24.1%-27.6%), and incomplete concluding paragraphs (10.3%-17.2%). Additional unity errors were noted in 20.7% of cases. Coherence errors included lack of transitions (13.8%), inconsistent pronoun usage (20.7%), lack of keyword repetition (24.1%-27.6%), and illogical order of ideas (20.7%-24.1%). Other coherence errors were identified in 31.0%-34.5% of cases. To overcome these difficulties, students employ various strategies to reduce errors.