Students’ Difficulties in Answering “Structure and Written Expression” TOEFL-like at STKIP PGRI Sidoarjo

. This study was conducted to investigate the types of questions which were difficult in TOEFL- like and to find the students’ difficulties in answering the ‘Structure and Written Expression’ of TOEFL -like. The subjects of this study were the batch 5 students of Master of English Education (S2 MPBI) at STKIP PGRI Sidoarjo who had TOEFL-like test as the placement test in taking master ’s degree. This research applied descriptive qualitative method. The instruments were students’ results of the TOEFL -like Test and interview. The data were taken from Longman Complete Course for the TOEFL written by Deborah Phillips (2003). The results show that there are 18 items (45%) categorized ‘difficult’. Meanwhile, there are 22 items (55%) categorized into ‘very difficult’. There are several reasons of students’ difficulties in answering the ‘Structure and Written Expression’ on the TOEFL -like done as the placement test. First, there was no preparation in advance. Second, students lack of vocabulary. Third, the test was considered difficult because the students took the TOEFL-like for the first time. Lastly, there was a limited time provided.


INTRODUCTION
The capability of mastering English language in global era is a significant thing regarding that English as an international language mostly used in many countries around the world.
Measuring the English proficiency of a non-native speaker of English, TOEFL is the internationally accepted standard of English being applied (Fanani, in Hajri, Jufrizal, & Wahyuni, 2018:93). TOEFL, Test of English as a Foreign Language, is undoubtedly known as the most used examination in the admission process of foreign students to college and university in the United States and it is also required by English-language colleges and universities. Moreover, TOEFL test has a very good reputation in the international levels because it is recognized by the top universities for its accuracy testing techniques covering Listening Comprehension, Structure and Written Expression, Reading Comprehension and Writing.
TOEFL provides students the opportunity to prove the capabilities in mastering English as well. The language used in the TOEFL reflects real-life English language usage in the university lectures, classes and laboratories (Mufidah, 2012:1). It means the language used in TOEFL is the same language applied by lecturers when they are in the teaching activities within learning concepts with students. Thus, by taking this kind of test, students can explore their English skills and measure the understanding in mastering the English in the international standard.
Concerning the TOEFL, as argued by Hajri, Jufrizal, & Wahyuni, (2018), there are some purposes why people and/or students take the TOEFL. First, people take TOEFL in order to ensure their ability as a second language or their foreign language. Second, they have to pass the graduation requirement in the university level which means that the requirement has become one of the obligations for the students who will pass the college study. Third, they have to apply for particular things such as by taking their master/doctoral's degree or applying particular jobs either abroad or inside the country.
Furthermore, there are three types of TOEFL namely (1) Paper Based Test (PBT), (2) Computer Based Test (CBT), and (3) the internet Based Test (iBT). The university may also administer a TOEFL-like or a TOEFL-equivalent test, or a TOEFL prediction, such as by the center of language studies or by the language laboratory within the university. This kind of TOEFL is locally administered by the university, and only used for internal usages in order to examine the students' English proficiency (Noviyenty, 2018:55). In TOEFL, there are several sections being examined, namely listening, speaking, grammar or structure, reading, and writing, depending on the type of TOEFL taken. Listening Comprehension measures the ability to understand English as it is spoken, Structure and Written Expression measures the ability to recognize language that is appropriate for standard written English, and Vocabulary and Reading Comprehension measures the ability to understand nontechnical reading matters. In Indonesia, the TOEFL test was originally conducted by English Language System (ELS), a specific institution for TOEFL Test, known as Institutional TOEFL.
A number of universities in Indonesia determine TOEFL score as the graduation standard requirement for students and those who want to continue study in higher level (Munaida, 2016:1). In the English Department of Master of English Education (S2 MPBI) at STKIP PGRI Sidoarjo, the students get the placement test as the requirement in taking the masterdegree. Since the "test is measuring English proficiency covering many skills and aspects such as listening, reading, and structure and written expression, the students find difficulties to do the test involved" (Mahmud, 2014:2). Based on these facts, the researchers believe it is essential to know the mastery of English Department students in TOEFL-like at STKIP PGRI Sidoarjo and to know the types of questions which are considered difficult by the students. Based on the description above, the researchers formulated the problems of the study as follows: (1) What are the types of questions in TOEFL of Structure and Written Expression dealing with very difficult and difficult for students to answer? and (2) What are the students' difficulties in answering the TOEFL (Structure-Written Expression) at STKIP PGRI Sidoarjo?
Achieving a high score of the TOEFL test is not easy. This fact is proven by two related studies which were reviewed in this study. First, the work of Samad, Jannah, & Fitriani, (2017) find that most students fail to achieve a required score to graduate from their study. They found that thirty students of English Education Department of Syiah Kuala University who were involved had difficulties in answering the TOEFL test and this result has shown that most students still could not achieve the TOEFL score requirement. Another study was written by Halim & Ardiningtyas (2018) which was aimed at identifying the difficulties in answering TOEFL test questions. The findings of this research show that the thirty students of English department students at the seventh-semester in STKIP YPUP Makassar had difficulties in answering the TOEFL test questions. This study has similar discussion focusing on the TOEFL test and its difficulties in answering the questions. However, this study is an expansion of those previous studies which focused on the students' difficulties in answering the Structure and Written Expression of the TOEFL-like test' section. It is expected that the results of this study will be useful to 1) test-makers to provide the TOEFLlike test and preparation for the students who will take the TOEFL-like test in future, 2) students to have more preparation before taking the TOEFL-like test, 3) other researchers to develop and to conduct the similar research by exploring the methodology used and materials in TOEFL.
TOEFL, Test of English as a Foreign Language, is a standardized test evaluating the English proficiency of people whose native language is not English. This kind of test is primarily required among the colleges and universities. According to Mufidah (2012:3), "The TOEFL evaluates the potential success of an individual to use and understand standard American English at a college level which is required for non-native applicants at many US and other English-speaking colleges and universities. Moreover, it becomes the product of the Educational Testing Service (ETS) contracted by the private, non-profit firm, the College Board to administer the test in institutions in the US.
There are several sections being examined, namely listening comprehension, structure and written expression, reading comprehension, and test of written English depending on the TOEFL types involved. TOEFL PBT, known as TOEFL Paper Based Test, has three sections namely listening section, structure and written expression section, and reading section. In the structure and written expression section, the knowledge of English grammar is being tested. Structure and grammar are two things different, but they are similar and related to each other.
On the TOEFL Test, there are three kinds of test classifications as mentioned by Mufidah (2012). First, the Internet-based Test (IBT). The TOEFL IBT is well-known as a test that assesses students' proficiency in the type of English in an academic environment which is administered on the internet. The exam takes about four hours to complete and integrates four essential skills covering reading, listening, writing, and speaking. Second, the Computer-Based Tests (CBT). This kind of test, firstly introduced in July 1998, became the first critical step toward a long-term goal of enhancing assessments by using electronic technology to test more complex skills. A primary goal of the TOEFL program is to provide more general information than it has in the past about applicants' English proficiency. New types of questions were added to the Listening and Reading sections; these new question types moved beyond multiple-choice questions. In the test, the computer was programmed to continuously find questions of an appropriate difficulty for test takers of all performance levels (ETS Team, Princeton, 2007:8;cited in Mufidah, 2012). Third, PBT is the most conventional one regarding it uses paper. It still becomes favorite among the students because TOEFL PBT is made-up as the easier and the cheapest one. Moreover, the local institutions or companies in Indonesia still accept the certificate of TOEFL PBT as long as the institutions which held TOEFL are legally reliable.
There are two versions of the TOEFL, namely the paper-based exam, and the more common internet-based exam. The paper-based test is now given only where the internet-based version of the test is unavailable. The internet based TOEFL has four sections that consist of reading, listening, speaking, and writing. The paper-based TOEFL has a test of structure and written expression instead of a speaking section. There are 140 numbers of questions administered in 115 minutes and the score scale is 310 -677 covering the three categories of tests. First, Listening Comprehension is used in order to measure the ability to understand English including short and long conversations and short talks or lectures. Second, Structure and Written Expression, mainly focuses on the ability to recognize standard written English. Lastly, Reading Comprehension is concerned to the ability to read and understand short passages at the university level (Mufidah, 2012).

METHOD
This study was conducted by using descriptive qualitative research. It is lined by Fraenkel & Wallen (2006:430), "Qualitative data of the research are collected in the form of words, phrases, and sentences by using description forms them rather than numbers". Moreover, this study applied a descriptive research which describes the situation to gain information focusing on the current status of the issues and it is pointed to determining of the nature of situation as it exists at the time of study (Ary. D., et.al., 2010). This study was aimed to find out the types of question which are categorized into very difficult and difficult in the TOEFLlike and to analyze the students' difficulties in answering the Structure and Written Expression section of TOEFL-like. It was done at STKIP PGRI Sidoarjo. The researchers conducted the study on September 7 th , 2020. The results of the students' TOEFL-like test were analyzed by using Microsoft Excel.

Subjects
In qualitative research, a subject is identified as a number of people who have a similar characteristic (Creswell, 2012: 142). The subjects of this research were the batch students 5 of Master of English Education degree (S2 MPBI) at STKIP PGRI Sidoarjo who were having TOEFL-like test as the placement test in master's degree program. There were 20 students who were classified as the subjects of this study. They were 10 males and 10 females whose age ranged from 26-50 years old.

Instruments
The researchers used two instruments. First, a standardized test of 'Structure and Written Expression' of TOEFL taken from TOEFL books of Longman Complete Course for the TOEFL written by Deborah Phillips (2003) and second, interview guideline to find out the students' difficulties in answering the TOEFL test.
The first instrument was used to answer the first question consisting the types of questions which classify into very difficult and difficult categories. Then, the second instrument was interview in order to get the detail information about the students' difficulties in answering the TOEFL as proposed by Arikunto (2013:270). In line with Gay & Diehl (Munaida, 2016:29), for descriptive research the sample of research should be 10% or more. The researchers decided 4 students to participate in interview session which means it was 20% of the total sample. There were two questions asked by researchers in the interview: 1. Why do you choose the alternative answers in your test? 2. What are your problems or difficulties in structure and written expression section in the TOEFL?

Data Collection Procedure
The data were collected through test answering the first problem, supported by Longman Complete Course for the TOEFL written by Deborah Phillips (2003). The students were tested in a provided time. TOEFL test consists of one section called Structure and Written Expression (40 questions for 25 minutes). In analyzing the interview data, the researchers transcribed the interview recording of the 4 selected students in order to gain detailed information answering the second problem of the study. Then, the answers of the interview were classified to be interpreted. Lastly, the researchers drew the conclusion based on the data examined in the study.

Data Analysis Procedure
After all of the data were collected, the researchers examined the data by using descriptive qualitative method. It was done to allow the researchers to give information on how the research was done and analyzed the data through the description forms. Then, the interpretation of data was needed to describe the significant meaning of data concerning the data findings. To interpret the difficulty level of the questions in TOEFL, the researchers modified the theory of Robert L. Thorndike and Elizabeth Hagen who originally divided the category into four namely: (1) very difficult category, (2) difficult category, (3) fair category and (4) easy category as follows: = B

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
This research was conducted by the aims to answer two problems: (1) the types of questions which were very difficult and difficult for the students and (2) the students' difficulties in answering the 'Structure and Written Expression' of TOEFL-like. The test was done as a placement test among the batch 5 students of Master of English Education at STKIP PGRI Sidoarjo.

Results
By conducting the study, the researchers formulated the two statements of problem containing (1) the types of questions categorized into 'very difficult' and 'difficult' to be answered and (2) the students' difficulties in answering the 'Structure and Written Expression' through the test done. After analyzing the data examined in this study, the researchers found some findings as follows: Based on the result findings in Table 2, there are 40 questions in 'Structure and Written Expression' section on the TOEFL test. It can be described that the questions are considered difficult if the index of difficulty less than 0.30. Therefore, questions number 1,2,4,6,8,9,10,16,17,18,22,24,25,26,33,34,37 and 39 are in difficult category. Thus, the category of 'difficult question' consists 18 items. Meanwhile,questions number 5,7,11,12,13,14,15,19,20,21,23,27,28,29,30,31,32,35,36,38 and 40 are categorized as 'very difficult question'. The 'very difficult' questions contain 22 items. Concerning to the result findings of the study, it can be figured out that all of the students had the same difficulties in answering the questions in the TOEFL test.
In order to answer the first statement of the study about the types of question consisting the difficult and very difficult categories, the researchers provided the following table to classify the types of difficult questions based on the index of difficulty: The correct use "live" "alive" and "living" Based on Table 3, it can be identified that all of the questions in the TOEFL as the placement test are categorized into 'difficult' and 'very difficult' questions. It means that all of the questions on the TOEFL through the 'Structure and Written Expression' were difficult to be conducted the interview as the second instrument of the study. Among 40 items assessed in 'Structure and Written Expression', most of the students had difficulties in answering the TOEFL-like test. There were several reasons that made them do not do well. Based on the interview conducted by the researchers, the reasons are first, they did not know the rules because they never learned the material of TOEFL before; second, they have learned it but they might forget what kinds of grammar are applied. Concerning to the reasons, it was possibly because it has been more than years for the students since they studied their last grammar subjects in strata-1 (S1). The students also did not practice the lessons when they had the placement test in master's degree. Therefore, students forgot the lessons when they were taking TOEFL-like test. This also supports the explanation of Winkel (in Hajri, Jufrizal, & Wahyuni, 2018:102), they argue "Insensibleness is incapability to dig what has been noticed, processed, and inserted into mind." It means that 'forgetfulness' might happen because of some factors such as lack of practice, interference of materials they learn in other courses after structure courses, and lack of interest. It can happen because it was not used for a long time. However, the main reasons why the items become difficult were, first the students do not have a well understanding about the sentences' structure, format; second the students do not have a well understanding about the form of the questions in 'Structure and Written Expression'.
Based on the results of the interview which involved 4 students as the samples, the 4 students were chosen randomly based on the research findings. The interview section concerned on the structure and written expression questions in which most students had made error through the items of TOEFL questions. The first question of the interview stated, "Why do you choose the alternative answer in your test?" the respondent 1 said "I don't even know what kind of the question is… So, I chose that answer randomly but at least I guess it can be the correct answer". It can be said that the student did not know well the type of questions in the TOEFL regarding that they had no preparation before taking the test. Meanwhile, it is supported by result of the interview, as said by Respondent 3 "I have lack of mastering vocabulary, thus I don't know which the correct answer is… I have never got test of TOEFL when I was in S1. It was the first time for me I did the TOEFL". Therefore, it can be said that the student had no preparation, so he did not know how to solve the difficulties in answering the items in the 'Structure and Written Expression' of TOEFL-like.
The second question is related to the students' difficulties in answering the test. It is stated "What are your problems or difficulties in structure and written expression section in the

CONCLUSION
There were 40 questions in 'Structure and Written Expression' section on the TOEFL-like test as the placement test for the batch 5 of master's degree students at STKIP PGRI Sidoarjo (S2 MPBI). All of the items were considered as 'difficult' regarding the index of difficulty in range of 0.30 < 0.49 and 'very difficult' regarding the index of difficulty in range of 0.00 < 0.29. There were 18 items (45%) categorized 'difficult'. Meanwhile, there were 22 items (55%) categorized into 'very difficult'.
There were several reasons of students' difficulties in answering the 'Structure and Written Expression' on the TOEFL taken as the placement test. First, there was no preparation in advance. Second, students had lack of vocabulary. Third, the TOEFL-like test was assumed as a difficult test since it was the students' first time taking the test. Lastly, the time provided was very limited.
TOEFL becomes one of the requirements for English students in the bachelor's degree and master's degree or even doctoral degree. It means they are projected to get a high score in the test. However, many students take TOEFL and they have minimum scores which are not expected by them because of some reasons. As the result of this study, it is directly suggested to English students that they have to practice more and be careful in answering the test. The students need to understand well in the grammar materials of the TOEFL. Lecturers have to explain the grammar materials deeply. It is because there are some topics that are hard for the students to answer and they do not know the types of questions given. By explaining the grammar and material in TOEFL clearly, students will have more knowledge and more