St. Fatihah MR. Nadirah Angel

Abstract

English Education study program students are expected to have advanced speaking skills as future English teachers. However, the observation at STAIN Majene indicate that many students still have difficulties in speaking English and their speaking skills under the expected standard. These gaps between expectations and reality require attention to improve the quality of EFL education at the higher education institution. Therefore, this study aims to analyze the difficulties encountered by English Education students in speaking English and the factors that caused the difficulties. This research utilized a qualitative method with phenomenological approach in conducting the research. The researcher used observation and interviews as data collection techniques. Additionally, the subjects of this study were English Education Study Program students in the second, fourth, and sixth semesters. The findings of this study revealed four main areas of students' difficulties in speaking English, including errors in pronunciation, limited vocabulary, low grammatical accuracy, and lack of fluency. In the Debate and Critical Speaking class, the main difficulties were limited vocabulary and lack of fluency. While in the Public Speaking class, there were fewer difficulties, although pronunciation and fluency issues were still evident. The factors of students' difficulties in speaking English are linguistic obstacles, inhibition, mother tongue interference, and access to speaking opportunities/practice.