AN ANALYSIS OF THE THIRD YEAR STUDENT’S ABILITY TO ANSWER COMPREHENSION QUESTIONS IN TOEFL AT THE ENGLISH DEPARTMENT OF BUNG HATTA UNIVERSITY

Abstrak

The purpose of this research is to describe the third year student’s ability to answer comprehension questions in TOEFL text at the English Department of Bung Hatta University. The research design was descriptive research. The population of this research was the third year students at the English Department of Bung Hatta University who registered in the academic year 2022/2023. She used total sampling technique to select the sample, and the number of sample was 29 students. To collect the data, TOEFL reading test was used. Based of the result of data analysis, it was found that the students had low ability to answer comprehension questions in TOEFL text. It was supported by the fact that 22 students (75,9%) had low ability to answer comprehension questions. In detail, 17 students (58,6%) had low ability to answer comprehension questions requiring them to classify comprehension text, 20 students (69%) had low ability to answer comprehension questions requiring them to compare comprehension text, and 24 students (82,8) had low ability to answer comprehension questions requiring them to explain comprehension text. In accordance with the findings of this study, it can be concluded that the students had low ability to answer comprehension questions in TOEFL text. Relating to such conclusion, the researcher gives some suggestions to lecturers, students, and future researchers. The lecturers are suggested to explain reading comprehension and other types of questions and give more exercises. The students should do more exercises of comprehension questions in TOEFL reading comprehension text. The future researchers are suggested to do research that studies other types of reading questions. Key Words: Reading, Comprehension Question, TOEFL