English teacher's beliefs about explicit and implicit teaching of cohesive devices in English writing

Many students often get difficulties in using cohesive devices in English writing. Thus, English teachers should use appropriate methods to help students improve their ability to use cohesive devices. This qualitative research investigated the English teachers’ belief about explicit and implicit teaching of cohesive devices in English writing. Five English teachers in five different schools including junior and senior were interviewed. The teacher reflected that the utilization of explicit and implicit teaching helps them to improve the students’ ability in using cohesive devices. Explicit teaching is suitable for students in the regular classes, while implicit teaching is suitable for students in the superior classes. These suggest both explicit and implicit teaching are suitable for teaching cohesive devices. Explicit teaching helps the students to understand cohesive devices easily. However, it takes a lot of time to practice. Implicit teaching can build students’ critical thinking and creativity in learning, but it is less effective for beginner learner level or regular class. The result of this study also showed that there are some factors that affect their beliefs. The factors are based on the English teacher’s experience as a student and as a teacher, based on the teacher’s personality, and the last is based on school principles.