Using Emoji to Improve Female Students' Coherence in Writing at Qassim University

Abstract

Writing is considered a very important learning tool for all content areas. There is no doubt that writing skill is essential for any kind of learning either at the school or the university level. Therefore, the present study attempted to explore the possibility of improving university students’ one of writing sub-skills, known as coherence through emoji. Coherence in the students’ writing was measured according to the students ability to a) use repetition to link ideas, sentences, and paragraphs, b)use transitional expressions to link ideas, sentences, and paragraphs, c) use pronouns to link sentences, d)use synonyms to link ideas and create variety, e) use parallel structures to link ideas, sentences, and paragraphs. The sample of this study was randomly selected from the Third Level female students joining the Department of English at one Saudi public university. The selected subjects were assigned randomly into control group and experimental group. After administrating the pretest for the two groups, the experimental group was given a six-week treatment of emoji meant for improving the writing sub-skill, while the control group was taught writing without using emoji. One week after the treatment, a posttest was administered to the two groups. Results revealed significant difference between the students’ scores in writing in favor of using emoji to improve students’ writing skills. Thus, the findings show the effectiveness of using emoji in improving students’ coherence in writing. The results were used to draw some conclusions and to suggest some recommendations for teaching writing using emoji. The results also recommend further researches to be done on using emoji to improve other language skills and sub-skills.