<![CDATA[Lexical cohesion plays an essential role in creating coherent and meaningful texts by establishing semantic relationships among lexical items. However, previous studies on students' recount writing have predominantly focused on grammatical cohesion, while lexical cohesion has received comparatively less attention. This study aims to identify the types of lexical cohesive devices employed by students in recount texts and examine their contribution to textual coherence. A qualitative descriptive design supported by content analysis was adopted. The data consisted of sixteen recount texts written by eleventh-grade students of SMK Darul Ulum Kepuhdoko, Jombang, Indonesia. The analysis was conducted using Halliday and Hasan's framework of lexical cohesion, which includes repetition, synonymy, antonymy, hyponymy, meronymy, collocation, and general words. The findings reveal that all categories of lexical cohesion were present in the students' writing, although their distribution was uneven. Collocation emerged as the most dominant lexical cohesive device (149 occurrences), followed by repetition (75 occurrences). Synonymy and general words were each identified 18 times, whereas hyponymy (4), meronymy (2), and antonymy (1) appeared only rarely. These findings indicate that students primarily maintained textual coherence through semantically related lexical items and repeated key vocabulary rather than employing more sophisticated semantic relationships. The study concludes that while students have developed the ability to construct basic textual cohesion, their lexical repertoire remains limited. Therefore, English writing instruction should incorporate explicit teaching of lexical cohesion, including semantic relationships, lexical variation, and lexical chaining, to enhance students' vocabulary development and overall writing quality.]]>
