Investigating paragraph writing skills in the essays of undergraduate students at the Namibia University of Science and Technology

Abstract

This study investigated the writing abilities of first-year undergraduate students through essay paragraphs to determine the areas that needed to be concentrated on when teaching writing skills, because an essay consists of different paragraphs. The aim was to highlight areas that educators needed to concentrate on when developing students' writing abilities. The study was qualitative in nature. The population comprised all the essays that were written by Namibian school students in the matrix who were doing their first English communication module. Systematic sampling of probability was used to select 30 essays that were studied to provide findings for the research objectives. The study revealed that the students had mastered the basic components of essay writing, for example adding a topic, dividing the essay into paragraphs, and correctly interpreting the question or topic. However, the essays’ paragraphs were incorrectly structured, as most lacked thesis statements; the ideas were not discussed in detail; the body paragraphs lacked a topic sentence, supporting sentences, and a concluding sentence; and unity and coherence were lacking in most paragraphs. The study suggested strategies to write correctly structured paragraphs that aid the students’ general writing abilities. The study recommended that the teaching of the essay should emphasise the structure of the paragraphs as an unstructured essay affects comprehension of the message.