The Drawbacks of Insufficient English Grammar Skills For The TOEFL Proficiency Test - An Analytical Study

Oct 1, 2026

Research aims to determine how important English grammar skill mastery is for students preparing for the TOEFL proficiency test. A random survey was conducted in a TOEFL preparation class to examine students’ ability and progress. Statistical normality and homogeneity tests were used for sample result analysis comparing TOEFL pretest and post-test outcomes. Results show that over 45% of pretest scores indicate that students below the average could not perform well due to weak grammar skills, while post-test results reveal significant improvement after instruction and tested strategies.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryExam

FormatPDF

Pages4

Reading Time10 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Review of Literature

ISSN 2808-7259 (media online) The Drawbacks of Insufficient English Grammar Skills For The TOEFL Proficiency Test Yayuk Christianti Sastra Inggris, Fakultas Bahasa Asing, Universitas Nusantara Manado [1](1 rechristbest24@gmail.com)[ rechristbest24@gmail.com](1 rechristbest24@gmail.com) Abstrak Tujuan dari penelitian ini adalah untuk mengetahui pentingnya atau bahkan seberapa penting penguasaan keterampilan tata bahasa Inggris bagi siapa pun terutama siswa yang ingin mempersiapkan diri untuk tes kemahiran TOEFL. Dalam hal ini, peneliti juga melakukan survei terhadap siswa secara acak di kelas persiapan TOEFL untuk mengetahui kemampuan dankemajuannya. Oleh karena itu, penelitian ini kemudian menggunakan uji hasil sampel dari perbedaan kemampuan siswa yang telah mengikuti TOEFL pretest dan Post-test menggunakan uji normalitas dan homogenitas secara statistik. Hasilnya, terlihat bahwa lebih dari 45% hasil pretest siswa menunjukkan bahwa sebagian besar dari mereka yang kemampuannya di bawah rata-rata tidak dapat mengikuti tes dengan baik karena kemampuan tata bahasa yang kurang. Sementara itu, para siswa yang mengikuti post-test setelah kelas persiapan menunjukkan bahwa mereka mendapatkan peningkatan yang signifikan dalam keterampilan tata bahasa mereka karena mereka memiliki pengetahuan dan pengalamanyang cukup tentang keterampilan bahasa yang penting dan strategi pengambilan tes yang diajarkan dan dikuasai. Oleh karenaitu, hasil pretest dan post-test jelas menunjukkan bahwa siswa perlu mempersiapkan diri dengan baik sebelum mengikuti tes kemahiran TOEFL untuk memperoleh nilai yang baik sesuai target. Selain itu, untuk meningkatkan pengetahuan siswa dengan melatih semua keterampilan akademik bahasa Inggris seperti membaca, menulis, mendengarkan dan berbicara secara teratur. Kata kunci : Tes kemampuan TOEFL ,Penguasaan Tata Bahasa, Hambatan 1. INTRODUCTION Language is crucial thing in assessing our capability in English. The lack of knowledge in TOEFL will guide to difficulty to answer the questions which brings aborammar is one of the most difficult abilities to acquire and learners should spend lots of time to enhance their grammar skill. Grammar is an important factor of conducting TOEFL test and it gives a significant effect on considering the best answer. Apparently, language test is believed a valuable sources of information about the effectiveness of learning and teaching. (Brown 2003) , Meanwhile, A test is a method of measuring a person's ability, knowledge, or performance in a given domain.(Aprianto and Heaerazi, 2019) . Contrary to the fact, most of students do not bother much to the importance of grammar because they consider that the grammar is more complex than other English aspect. Learning grammar needs a lot of effort and time particularly when the international students learn English as a test. Grammar is a part of language aspects that on average everyone is reluctant to learn, as it becomes a complex language. Obviously, grammar is the most difficult to be learned in language aspects. There are some factors that English grammar is hard to learn, namely: complex rules and almost all of them have exceptions, no particular logic and must be learned as well as lack of motivation (Desheng and Vergese 2013) . Nevertheless, Grammar must be learned and it is an important part of communication that has a key role in communicative language teaching. Similar to it, Grammar is a crucial aspect of TOEFL and it gives a significant effect on determining the higher score (Dewi & Ahmad, 2021) . The opinion that sentence structure can lead to misunderstandings in EFL communication are the reason why teaching grammar is so important. In fact. grammar capacity is not handy to be extended in lots of schools due to the fact English is a foreign language. Most students and learners pick the use of their mother tongue inside the school than using English language, particularly the writing. On the other han

FAQs

What is the main aim of the research in this document?

To identify the importance of English grammar skill mastery for students preparing for the TOEFL proficiency test.

How was students’ progress measured?

The study used a random survey and compared TOEFL pretest and post-test results using statistical tests of normality and homogeneity.

What do the results suggest about grammar skills?

More than 45% of pretest results show below-average students struggled due to insufficient grammar ability, while post-test results show significant improvement after targeted preparation.

Oct 1, 2026

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