A Coh-metrix Study of Writings by Majors of Mechanic Engineering in the Vocational College

Abstract

Through Co-Metrix analyses of the writings of the mechanic vocational students, some findings are as follows: First, the students prefer to use more concrete and familiar content words. Second, they seldom use pronouns and parallel structures, as a result, the writing is not central to the main idea and not coherent enough. Third, those in favor of simple sentences tend to prefer similar sentence structures and repetitive tenses and aspects. Fourth, they prefer to use overlapping pronouns and content words. Finally, the students use hypernymous verbs can make the writing more diverse in sentence structure. In summarizing the findings, the paper also gives some suggestions on how to improve the writing proficiency of the students.