EFL students’ strategies in answering the listening section of the Longman TOEFL

Abstract

This study investigated the EFL students’ strategies in answering the Listening section of the Paper-based TOEFL test. The samples of this research were purposively selected consisting of 30 English major students at Universitas Syiah Kuala, Banda Aceh, Indonesia. The samples were selected based on their recent TOEFL scores. All the selected samples achieved low TOEFL scores, especially for the Listening section. The data were gained by means of closed questionnaire and interviews. The interviews were conducted with three students of the 30 students and they were selected randomly. The results of the questionnaire revealed that the top three strategies the students used when answering the TOEFL questions ranged from the strategies of (1) ‘before listening, I tried to anticipate the topic by looking at the answer in the test book’, (2) ‘while listening, I tried to determine the topic or main idea for each conversation, and (3) ‘before listening, I tried to anticipate what the questions would be and I listened specifically for the answer’. This imply that a majority of students used strategies only to answer part B (dialogues) and part C (monologues) of the TOEFL Listening section. These parts were considered more difficult since many students were not familiar with the topics. Meanwhile, strategies for part A were neglected. These students often forgot to choose answers in this section. Unfortunately, strategies for part A are also important because they can achieve higher scores if the 30 questions in this part are answered correctly.

Strategy Preference in Listening: A Profile of EFL Students to Answer TOEFL Test

“…On the contrary, they seldom realized about focusing on the first line of speakers when they answered the questions for Part B and C in the listening section. The result of moderate use is also not in line with the study conducted by Silviyanti, Rahmadhani, and Samad (2020), who found that their students attained more strategies on Part B and C than Part A. The reasons were that the first two parts have the most difficult questions that they need to apply the strategies.…”

“…However, among the three sections, listening is considered as a difficult section that students need some "strategy training" when they get the aural input from natives (Madina, 2016). Moreover, most students face a challenge to focus on the listening text as it is only played once (Silviyanti, Rahmadhani, & Samad, 2020). "Listening performance is the invisible, inaudible process of internalizing meaning from the auditory signals being transmitted to the ear and brain (Brown, 2004, p. 118).…”

Integrating Task- And Game-Based Learning Into an Online Toefl Preparation Course During Covid-19 Outbreak

“…Concerns regarding undergraduate students' poor TOEFL test scores have been significantly heightened by empirical studies which indicated that around 5-15 percent of all participating students at colleges normally attained the minimum score of 450 (Silviyanti et al, 2020;Yoestara & Putri, 2019). In a study conducted at a prestigious university in Indonesia, it was discovered that when the minimum required score was set at 500, 98 percent of the undergraduate students failed (Aziz, 2016).…”

The mapping of TOEFL scores among EFL students in Aceh

“…The question sheet from Phillips (2001) that was used in the test is widely adapted as a TOEFL teaching material, thus exposing some of its content to the general public. Although the test from the same source has been used in several academic research design, the book's recognition could influence a different gained scores compared to the actual institutional issued test (Fitri, 2017;Silviyanti et al, 2020).…”