The Importance of National English Assessment in Indonesia: A

Library Research

Baiq Wimandari Safitri; Arafatul Ulfa

University of Mataram, Indonesia

Abstract: This study aims to describe the importance of the National English

Assessment in the education field. The method that is used in this study is library research.

The results of this study are, there are five positive impacts of the National English

Assessment on education including the teacher, students, and government. The importance

of the National English Assessment is to increase the student’s motivation, motivate the

teacher, improve English knowledge, increase receptive skills in English, and

Achievement indicators.

Key terms: National, Assessment, English, Importance.

___________________________________________________________________________

INTRODUCTION

The Ministry of Education and Culture of Indonesia already issued a decision about the

abolition of the National Examination. The change of the curriculum from curriculum 2013

(K-13) into MBKM (Merdeka Belajar Kampus Merdeka) or Independent Learning brings

many changes to the system of the curriculum. One of the big changes in this case is, the

National Examination has been abolished.

According to Dr. E Mulyasa (2006), government policies in the field of education

determine educational quality standards. There are four subjects that will be tested in the

national exam, such as at the junior high school level, Mathematics, Indonesian Language,
and Science (Physic, Chemist, and Biology as elective subjects). Meanwhile, for social

elective subjects there are Sociology, Economics and geography). One of the subjects that

will be tested in national examination is English.

Recently, there is no assessment of English as the one of the subjects that assessed in

National Examination in national scale. The big problem in here is what will be the final

assessment for learning English if there is no national examination whereas the benefits of the

English national exam are many for students.

There are two skills that will be assessed in English subject, such as listening skill and

reading skill. The first session of the test is listening skill and it followed by the reading skill.

The students will answer all questions that provided in the test. To get the high score, the

students and teacher have to do the effort to reach the standard score.

Teaching and learning activities will be more extra particularly in EFL class. The

students will know more about English because they learn to pass the exam. Like it or not

they have to understand English to answer questions for the exam.

Based on the explanation above, it can be concluded the importance of English

Assessment to improve their English skill is increase because of the final assessment or

national examination particularly in English. So that what is the importance of national

assessment that can be improved English Competence from the students. Many people argue

that the implementation of the national exam tends has a positive impact on students, schools,

and some parties.

In the study of linguistics, the term most commonly used to describe the impact of these

tests is washback (Cheng & Curtis, 2012). Washback is broadly defined as the influence of

testing on teaching and learning (Brown, 2004; Cheng & Curtis, 2004; Cheng, 2005; Fulcher

& Davidson, 2007).

 METHOD

This study uses the qualitative method of library research. According to Zeid (2004),

library research is research that gathers information from library sources. On the other hand,

library research gathers data analysis using library sources. To create a cohesive conclusion,

the researcher also gathers and combines the ideas. The researcher refers to a few

publications and books in this study. Due to the fact that the research's data were gathered

from a variety of references rather than the field, it was also restricted to the library.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The results of this study are, there are five positive impacts of the National English

Assessment on education including the teacher, students, and government. The importance

of the National English Assessment is to increase the student’s motivation, motivate the

teacher, improve English knowledge, increase receptive skills in English, and

Achievement indicators.

1. Increase the Students’ Motivation

This system can trigger students as well to study more seriously and they show a

willingness to participate motivation in the national exam preparation class (Effendi and

Ichwan, 2016). Sukyadi and Mardiani (2011) and Suroyo (2012) reported that students

had a great deal of exercises that resemble the items of the exam. Most of the teachers

thought that the students' longer study time indicated a positive impact on the exam which

motivated the students to study harder (Mardapi & Kartowajiran, 2009). It was argued

that many students especially the low achievers and the deprived students made little
effort to study the subjects if there had been no high stakes in standardized national

examinations (Yulia, 2014). Most of the teacher participants in Sleman Regency, as

studied by Mardapi and Kartowajiran (2009) through a survey, had positive attitudes

towards the exam; they thought that it positively encouraged students to increase their

study efforts.

The students will take them seriously in learning because there is a standardized score

that has to reach by them. If there is no standardized score, they will learn only to fulfill

the obligation or have no target in learning. That is why the National English Assessment

is important.

2. Motivated teacher

Apart from the students' study time, studies also showed that the exam had made

English teachers work harder. Mardapi and Kartowajiran (2009) reported that most of the

teachers working in twenty different schools they surveyed felt more motivated to teach

their students.

Development in teaching will happen in this system. The creative way to teach

makes the students interested in learning English. The teacher has the target in teaching,

which is the students must succeed in the final assessment, particularly in English.

3. Improve the English Knowledge

In the national English Assessment, of course, the things that will be tested are skills

related to English. Students will be tested to answer questions with full text in English,

they will be familiar with English. This can improve both vocabularies in English and

other knowledge. In the teaching and learning process, they learn English, and in the

assessment, they will answer the question that is related to English. The positive impact

of this system is the students will not feel foreign to English.

4. Increasing Receptive Skills

Assessment and instruction are tied to one another. They are crucial components of

the learning cycle. To decide what to teach the next day, teachers must regularly analyze

their lessons. If we just go through the motions of teaching the whole lesson and wait

until the end test to see what the students have mastered, we can be pretty unpleasantly

shocked. Teachers do not need to add up all of the evaluations collected at a final

assessment, though, if testing is done every day during the whole course. Instead, we may

base that judgment on the most recent evaluations. Because of this, we do not hold the

student accountable who put in a lot of effort to grasp the ideas you thought were most

crucial despite having little prior knowledge at the beginning of the unit. Instead, we

provide grades depending on where each student is at the end of the unit. An objective

review or assessment of how they are doing is produced when the evaluation is made.

Nurgiyantoro (2016) continued by stating that language evaluation offers data for thought

and decision-making. The data presented here focuses on the knowledge, skill,

performance, and accomplishment that students acquire during the teaching and learning

process.

In National English Assessment, there are two skills that will be tested, it is called

receptive skills. Reading and listening skills will be tested here. The students will train to

understand the topic and the sound from those skills. The ability to comprehend these two

skills is conducting the exercise related to English. The students will familiar with

listening and reading in English. It helps them when they want to get information from

text or audio in English, they will easily to reach the information.

5. Achievement Indicator

Rind, Mumtaz, and Mohammad (2019) also argue for exams can be a very important

achievement indicator for successful students in further study due to its examination

system and the opportunity to provide a fair comparison across schools.

The success of the students in doing the national English Assessment helps the

government which school is included in the best grade. The government will know the

standard of each school and know the effort of all elements of the school in conducting

the National English Assessment.

CONCLUSION

Based on the results of the study, there are five positive impacts of the National English

Assessment on education including the teacher, students, and government. The importance

of the National English Assessment is to increase the student’s motivation, motivate the

teacher, improve English knowledge, increase receptive skills in English, and

Achievement indicators.
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