ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education 
Volume 6, Issue 2, June 2018 

p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 
https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 

 

41 
 

THE USE OF WEB-BASED EXAM (WBE) 

TO OPTIMIZE STUDENTS’ TESTING RESULT 
 

Abdul Ngafif 
English Education Program, Teacher Training and Education Faculty, Purworejo Muhammadiyah 

University, Indonesia 
E-mail: abdulngafif@gmail.com 

 
APA Citation: Ngafif, A. (2018). The use of web-based exam (WBE) to optimize students’ testing result. 

English Review: Journal of English Education, 6(2), 41-50. doi: 

10.25134/erjee.v6i2.1241. 

 
Received: 11-02-2018 Accepted: 23-04-2018 Published: 01-06-2018 

 
Abstract: This research was conducted based on the problems found during the mid and final test by 
using paper and pen test; those are the students tend to do cheating, the sleepy supervisors, the 

inconsistency of test time, and the risk of losing the answer sheet. Therefore, the goals of the research 

are; 1) to make an appropriate WBE testing system, 2) to know the cheating rate of the students, 3) to 
find out the effectiveness of the system, and 4) to inform the benefits that might be taken by the WBE 

testing system’s users. By applying RnD research model, the researcher applies a concept called web-

based exam system which uses three main tools to run the system (teacher’s laptop as the server, 
WBE software, and access point to communicate the server and the user). The results indicated that 

the system reduces the students’ cheating rate 100%. Then, from the questionnaire given, the 

teacherstend to likeusing WBE testing system because they can monitor the whole process of the test 

from his own laptop and the result of the test will be analyzed and be saved automatically in his 
laptop. Moreover, it reduces time consumption and paper use.  

Keywords: web-based exam, testing system, testing result, cheating, software 

 

INTRODUCTION 

The widespread use of e-exam as a tool to 

measure students’ ability has risen to wide 

area of education. As Williams (2007) do to 

test pre-hospital students at Monash 

University, it is found that the students found 

WBE experience to be very positive, preferred 

WBE to PBE and preferred to receive their test 

results automatically. Furthermore, Rutkowski, 

et al. (2007) developed a close-ended 

computer assisted exam which is go online in 

the form of web-based assessment and based 

on the questionnaire spread out to the students, 

it is found that the students have low 

difficulties to operate it, it has a direct result, 

and it is much better than PBE. In line with 

those, Chang and Ming (2012) had compared 

platform pattern of various web examination 

system and they use ASP.NET as the 

programming language with the background 

database is SQL Server version 2000. They 

use three basic layers in the system namely 

data layer (database), application layer (the 

software used), and user layer (the students). 

The system provides a good condition for 

organizing all kinds of tests and also has a 

great reference value for other colleges and 

universities.  

Web-based exam refers to a situation in 

which a student accesses questions and 

submits answers by a web browser and in 

which the exam results (partially or 

completely) determine the final grade for the 

subject (Sessink, et al., 2004). Meanwhile, 

Wang, et al. (2004) defines web-based exam 

as an exam works over internet and utilizes 

web browsers as its interface. It is not only 

provide online real-time tests and online 

construction of items, but also enable teachers 

to check answer sheets rapidly and record 

scores over the Internet.  

Related to the use of web-based exam, 

Kuzmina (2010) points out that the benefits of 

using web-based exam are effective, efficient, 

safe, instant scoring, professional time, 

reducing time lag, greater availability, 

accuracy, standardization, control, and long-



Abdul Ngafif 
The use of web-based exam (WBE) to optimize students’ testing result 

42 
 

term cost saving. Rice (2003) states that the 

pros of using web-based test are it is effective 

for testing students’ knowledge and attitudes, 

it is user-friendly, love to have direct result, 

less time to prepare, and the data are save and 

easy to be managed and to be analyzed. From 

the report of Prometric (2012), it is found that 

the benefits of using computer-based test are 

flexible, data-rich test result, enhanced 

security, consistency and reliability, 

availability of immediate scoring, streamlined 

logistic, multiple item types, and engaging 

navigation and presentation. 

During the final test in English 

Department of Muhammadiyah University of 

Purworejo in the academic year of 2015/2016, 

the researcher did an observation to the 

students and to the supervisors using an 

observation sheet. During the observation, he 

divided the observation based on two kinds of 

subject namely non skilled subject and skilled 

subject. The result shows that from six non-

skilled subjects (Al Islam dan 

Kemuhammadiyahan II, Pendidikan 

Kewarganegaraan, Al Islam dan 

Kemuhammadiyahan IV, Introduction to 

Literature, CCU, and PPBI) followed by 810 

students from semester II - VI, the total 

students did cheating is 253 (31%). 

Meanwhile, from the eight  skilled subjects 

(Pre-intermediate grammar, English Varieties, 

Writing for Formal Communication, English 

Morphology, Modern English Grammar, 

Genre-based Reading, and Reading 

Comprehension V) followed by 978 students 

from semester II - VI, the total students did 

cheating is 163 students (17%).  

Besides grouping the students based on 

subjects, he also did grouping the students did 

cheating based on the type of the questions 

that is Multiple Choice Test, Essay Test, and 

Mixed Test (MC and Essay). The result shows 

that for MC test, there are 362 students among 

780 students or 46.4%. Then, for Essay Test, 

there are 69 students (12.9%) among 534 

students did cheating. Meanwhile, for Mixed 

Test question type, there are 179 students 

(40.7%) among 440 students did cheating. For 

the supervisors of the test, from 16 supervisors 

there are 8 of them (50%) did chatting outside 

of the class during the test, 6 supervisors 

(37.5%) did other job while waiting for the 

test, and only 2 supervisors (12.5%) just focus 

on the test they supervised. From the findings 

above, it can be seen that the dominate 

students did cheating is on non-skilled subject 

and MC test type. Then, to overcome those 

problems, the writer develops a testing system 

called web-based exam. 

The researcher is interested in 

developing that testing system because he sees 

that the test will be easier to be handled if 

there is a system which helps the 

teacher/lecturer in conducting the test included 

testing, analyzing, and saving the result. 

Meanwhile, it will be a transparent test if the 

students and the teacher are able to see the 

result of the test and they can discuss the test 

together. The other goal of the research is to 

reduce the weaknesses of the manual test such 

as cheating habit, the main role of the 

supervisors, the inconsistency of time, and the 

risk of losing/broken answer sheet. In 

developing the system, the researcher did 

collaboration with the lecturer, students, the 

stakeholders, and IT practitioner so that the 

system will be good. Then, after the system 

got ready, he needs three main tools to run the 

system those are the laptop which function as 

server, the web-based exam software, and the 

access point which functions to spread out the 

signal which is caught by the students’ laptop 

to do the test. For the server, the teacher may 

transform his own laptop to be a server using 

wampserver software. The basic requirements 

of the laptop server are the clock should be 

higher than 1.5 GHz and the RAM installed at 

least 4 GB. After the server is ready, then the 

next is the web-based exam software. Here, 

the researcher with his team make software of 

computer based test and he named it with web-

based exam 1.0. This software is easy to 

operate because it is windows-based and we 

have made the manual book so that the 

teachers can use it easily. The last tool is the 

access point which functions to communicate 

between the server and the users (the students’ 

laptop).  

In holding the test, the teacher just needs 

to plug the access point to his laptop and he 

needs to activate his laptop as server by 

clicking wampserver software. Then, he has to 



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education 
Volume 6, Issue 2, June 2018 

p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 
https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 

 

43 
 

open the web-based exam software and set the 

test open so that it can be seen by the students. 

After that, he asks the students to do the test 

using any web browser installed in their own 

laptop and they must log in using username 

and password set before. When the students 

have already done the test, the result will be 

appeared both in the teacher and the students’ 

laptop screen. By the time, the students can see 

which number answered correctly and 

incorrectly. By applying this system, the 

researcher can measure the students’ real 

competence. 

In doing the research, the researcher has 

two questions to be answered. Those are; 

1) How is the development of WBE testing 
system?  

2) Is WBE effective in overcoming the paper 
and pen problems?  

 

METHOD 

This research uses research and development 

(RnD) method developed by Richey 

(2007).This research is done in English 

Department of Muhammadiyah University of 

Purworejo. In running the research, the 

researcher takes three main steps namely 

exploring (research), developing (design and 

development), and evaluating (design 

research). In this report, the researcher 

discusses exploring stage or preliminary study 

as the first stage of the research. Meanwhile, 

the second stage is on progress. The subjects 

of the research are the students of English 

Education Program Purworejo 

Muhammadiyah University in the academic 

year of 2016/2017. There are 99 students from 

3 classes and 3lecturers (listening, grammar, 

and vocabulary) as the subject of the research 

which uses the researcher himself as the 

instrument and the researcher uses two 

supporting instruments namely observation 

and questionnaire. The researcher takes the 

data for about 6 months since August 2016 till 

February 2017. The observation is chosen as a 

method to dig up problems arises during the 

test and the researcher uses the result of the 

early observation to plan up the solutions of 

the problems.  

Qualitative analysis is a technique used 

to analyze the data. Here, the researcher 

analyzes the data from the observation and the 

questionnaire given to the students and the 

teachers of the three subjects. For additional 

information, the researcher also considers the 

validation result f expert judgment from the IT 

and from the testing. For IT, the researcher 

asks the IT expert to do validation from the 

side of technology, system users, and the 

application in classroom. For the test, the 

researcher asks the expert of test to analyze the 

questions made by the teachers whether it has 

fulfilled the validity and the reliability of a 

good test.  

 

RESULT AND DISCUSSION 

The way in developing web-based exam 

testing system 

Step 1. Observing 

At the very beginning of the research, the 

researcher did an observation to get the early 

data. The observation was done during final 

exam in English Education Program of 

Purworejo Muhammadiyah Purworejo. In 

observing the students’ activity in the test, the 

researcher observed them from a little hole in 

the door. The researcher categorized the 

students who do cheating if they see their 

friends’ work, opening books, opening their 

phone cell, and asking the answer to their 

friends. Moreover, the researcher categorized 

the result of the observation into two category 

namely non-skilled subject and skilled subject. 

 

Table 1. The observation’s result of non-skilled subject 
Non-Skilled Subject Total 

Students 

Number of Cheating 

Students 

Percentage of 

cheating students 

AIK II 99 63 63.64% 

Pend. Kewarganegaraan 99 22 22.22% 

AIK IV 138 61 44.20% 
Intro to literature 138 14 10.14% 

Cross Cultural Understanding 168 25 14.88% 

PPBI 168 68 40.48% 



Abdul Ngafif 
The use of web-based exam (WBE) to optimize students’ testing result 

44 
 

 

Table 2. The observation’s result of non-skilled subject 
Skilled Subject Total 

Students 

Number of Cheating 

Students 

Percentage of 

cheating students 

Pre-intermediate communicative grammar 99 13 13.13% 

English Varieties 99 45 45.45% 

Writing for formal comm. 99 0 0.00% 

Basic listening 99 14 14.14% 

English morphology 138 16 11.59% 

Modern Eng. Grammar 138 23 16.67% 

Genre-based reading 138 20 14.49% 

Reading V 168 32 19.05% 

 

The goal of observing is to get the early 

data so that the researcher knows the 

weaknesses of the testing system at the 

present. Here, the researcher divides the 

observation into two terms namely non-skilled 

subject which consists of 6 (six) subjects and 

skilled subject consists of 8 (eight) subjects. 

From the observation, the researcher found 

that the rate of the students’ cheating is quite 

worse seen from the percentage Table 1 and 2 

in which the highest cheating is on AIK II 

(63.64%) and English varieties (45.45%). 

From the observation, the researcher then got 

the idea to use WBE in order to reduce the 

cheating habits of the students.  

 

Step 2. Drafting the system 

From the observation, the researcher did 

early data. The next step is drafting the system 

by consulting it with IT expert to make a 

computerized testing system which can handle 

the problems found in conventional testing 

system. The main features of the system are 

login/registration, question bank, inserting 

media (picture and sound), time controller, 

auto correction, monitoring, and users. Figure 

1 shows the draft of the system. 

From a series of activities done in the 

research, the process of the test using web-

based exam can be seen in Figure 2. 

 

 
Figure1. Draft of WBE testing system 

 

 
Figure 2. Diagram of WBE testing system 



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education 
Volume 6, Issue 2, June 2018 

p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 
https://journal.uniku.ac.id/index.php/ERJEE 

 

45 
 

 

The figure shows the process of test 

using web-based exam in which the tester 

upload the questions into server and then it is 

spread out through access point. Then, the 

students do the test using their own device. 

After the time finished, the score will be sent 

to the server automatically. To run the system, 

the writer uses software named web-based 

exam 1.0. 

Knowing that the rate of cheating habit is 

quite high, the researcher then drafts the 

system. By using AJAX language program and 

XAMPP (server software) combined with 

Access Point, the researcher makes the offline 

web-based exam. It consists of main menu, 

login, quiz form, and so on. The figure of the 

pages can be seen below. 

 

 
Figure 3. Main menu Figure 4. Form login 

 

 

 
Figure 5. Making new quiz/test Figure 6. Page of question and answer 

 

When the early draft of the system was 

ready, the researcher then asks the expert of IT 

to check the system and the IT expert gives the 

following advices; 1) to smoothen the page to 

be more user friendly, 2) Database PHP 

MySQL is good, 3) the access point used 

should be changed to handle 30 students, and 

4) the aspect of security should be paid 

attention more so that only administrator may 

handle the whole process of the test.  

 

 

Step 3. Running the system 

In running the system, the researcher did the 

following steps; 1) testing the system and 

evaluating it, 2) asking for expert to give 

comments and advices, 3) developing the 

system means the researcher overcomes the 

weaknesses of the system from evaluation and 

the advices of the expert, 4) re-testing the 

system which goals to know the system works 

well or not, 5) re-evaluating, and 6) asking for 

users to give assessment to the system.  

 



Abdul Ngafif 
The use of web-based exam (WBE) to optimize students’ testing result 

46 
 

Holding the test and Evaluation I 

Since all the system got ready, the researcher 

then held the test to know the system and later 

the researcher will have some evaluation on it. 

From the test, it is known that this system still 

has some weaknesses, including; 1) audio are 

not clear enough, 2) it has long transferring 

data (delay of one question and next question), 

and 3) sometimes the picture did not shown 

up. Then, the system cannot be applied when 

the laptop has low specification, so that the 

teacher (administrator) should use middle 

specification of laptop with minimum RAM 3 

GB with processor which has clock speed 1.30 

GB. This system requires no internet 

connection, so it will be no problem for them 

who have no internet connection in their 

school. 

 

Fixing the problems 

Knowing the weaknesses of the system, the 

researcher fixes it with the bug. The researcher 

then tests the system by himself to make sure 

that the weaknesses are already fixed up. 

 

Re-test the system and evaluation II 

In order to know the system is ready to be 

used, the researcher asks the lecturer and the 

students to have the test by using the system. 

From the test, it is known that the weaknesses 

as it is found in test I was already fixed.  

 

Students’ cheating rate 

The subjects of the research are 99 students 

and 3 lecturers who take listening, grammar, 

and vocabulary subject. In test II, the 

researcher with the lecturer did observation to 

know the students’ cheating rate, and from the 

observation, it is known that there is none of 

them did cheating because the lecturer set the 

questions to be answered just in a very limited 

time and when the time ends, the question will 

be closed automatically so that the students 

must answer the next questions. The result of 

observation can be seen in the table below.

 

Table 3. The observation’s result of the research subject 
Subject Total 

students 

Number of Cheating 

Students 

Percentage of 

cheating students 

Listening for everyday communication 99 0 0% 

Intermediate communicative grammar 99 0 0% 

English vocabulary 99 0 0% 

 

Seeing from the observation at test II, 

there is no students who did cheating because 

their movements indicating to cheat are limited 

by the time. Furthermore, it is a fun for the 

researcher and the lecturers finding their 

students try to cheat by opening the dictionary 

or Google in their laptops but when they found 

what they are looking for, the time to answer 

the question in that number ends so that they 

have to answer the next question. Seeing the 

situation, the students just focus in answering 

the questions and afraid that the number of the 

question will close automatically if the time 

ends. That is a big progress. 

 

The effectiveness of the system in reducing 

the students’ cheating habit 

In order to know the effectiveness of Web 

Based Exam testing system, the researcher did 

statistics computation by employing test of 

normality, test of homogeneity, and test of z. 

Before counting the statistics, the researcher 

determines the hypothesis that are the use of 

WBE testing system is ineffective to reduce 

the students’ cheating habit (Ho) and the use 

of WBE testing system is effective to reduce 

the students’ cheating habit (Ha). In counting 

test of normality, the researcher employs Chi 

Square test for independence formula, it is 

known that the data of the students are 

abnormal because the x2value(listening, 

grammar, and vocabulary) is higher than the 

x2table with degree of freedom 5% (228.52, 

25.16, and 35.65 > 11.070). To count the test 

of homogeneity, the researcher uses F formula 

and from the computation, it is known that the 

Fvalue is lower than Ftable (1.137 < 1.822) means 

that the data are homogenous. Because the 

data have abnormal distribution so that the 

researcher uses Mann-Whitney U test to 



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education 
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p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 
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compute the effectiveness of the system and 

from the computation, it is known that Zvalue is 

higher than Ztable (5.438 > 1.96) meaning that 

the use of Web Based Exam testing system is 

effective to reduce the students’ cheating habit 

(Ha is accepted). Below is the result of 

statistics computation in a brief.

 

Table 4. Statistics computation result 
Computation Subjects Statistics Results Meaning 

Test of normality Listening Chi Square 228.52 > 11.070 Abnormal 

Grammar 25.16 > 11.070 Abnormal 

Vocabulary 35.65 > 11.070 Abnormal 

Test of homogeneity  Ftest 1.137 < 1.822 Homogenous 

Test of hypothesis  Mann Whitney U test 5.438 > 1.96 Effective 

 

To know whether the use of WBE testing 

system is effective or not, the researcher used 

two methods (observation and test result) in 

recognizing the effectiveness of the system in 

overcoming the students’ cheating habit. From 

the observation, it can be known that there are 

no students did cheating because they have full 

concern to answer the questions in front of 

them. Furthermore, when they try to see their 

friends’ work or when they want to see 

dictionary, they must be in rush due to the 

limitation of time and when they did it, they 

will miss the questions. Secondly, from the 

statistical computation, it shows that the zvalue 

is higher than ztable which indicates that the use 

of WBE testing system is effective to reduce 

the students’ cheating habit. From those two 

methods, it can be known that the use of WBE 

testing system is effective to reduce the 

students’ cheating habit. 

 

Assessment from the users 

The researcher made questionnaire to know 

the effectiveness of the system. The researcher 

made two questionnaires for the lecturer and 

for the students. With the 110 students as its 

population, the questionnaire was given to 30 

random students as respondents taken from 2 

(two) different classes which is taught by the 

same lecturers. After the students answer all 

the statement in the questionnaire, the result of 

those can be seen in the chart below. 

 

 
Figure 7. The result of students’ questionnaire 

 

From the result of questionnaire above, it 

can be known that; 1) most of the students 

prefer to have Web Based Exam than Paper 

Based Exam, 2) they face no difficulties in 



Abdul Ngafif 
The use of web-based exam (WBE) to optimize students’ testing result 

48 
 

operating it due to it is windows-based, 3) they 

may see the result directly after the test ends, 

4) they are hard to cheat because the questions 

are shown randomly, 5) they feel that it is 

more comfortable and focus in doing listening 

test because they use their own headset so that 

they pay more attention on it, and 6) some of 

them ignore the timer so that they got 

disappoint to have unfinished test. 

The second questionnaire was given to 

the 3 (three) lecturers in English Education 

Program as the subject of the research. The 

result of teacher’s questionnaire shows that; 1) 

they like the auto correction feature because it 

helped them much in correcting the answer of 

the students, 2) this software is only 

appropriate for multiple choices test, not for 

essay, 3) they need to transfer the questions 

from Ms. Word to the system manually, it 

takes time, and 4) the system reduces the 

chance for students to cheat. 

 

 
Figure 8. The result of teachers’ questionnaire 

 

Benefit of the WBE testing system 

From the questionnaire, the benefits that can 

be taken by the teachers by applying this 

testing system, are; 1) no paper needed 

because all has been handed by the system, 2) 

the efficiently of time for doing and scoring 

the test, 3) scoring transparency, 4) the low 

cheating chance due to the questions appear in 

random, and 5) low cost of test due to no more 

paper needed. By using the same source, there 

is a significant influence of the system used 

toward teachers’ testing model especially the 

teacher of the listening course. Those 

influences are; 1) it helps the teacher much in 

scoring and grading, 2) for the multiple choice 

test, this system appropriates much, and 3) it 

only appropriates to measure the students 

competence for knowledge and 

comprehension. 

 

CONCLUSION 

From a series of research findings and 

discussions, the researcher draws the following 

conclusions. First, the researcher succeeds in 

making the WBE testing system which is user-

friendly, practical, and low cost. Moreover, the 

system can be applied in a middle 

specification of laptop (as server) and it 

requires no internet connection so that it will 

be no problem for the teacher and the students 

who have low fund to get internet connection. 

Second, from the observation and the 

statistical computation, it can be seen that the 

use of WBE testing system is effective to 

reduce the students’ cheating habit. There is no 



ENGLISH REVIEW: Journal of English Education 
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p-ISSN 2301-7554, e-ISSN 2541-3643 
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students did cheating in the test and their 

movements to cheat are limited by the time so 

they will have no benefits to do cheating. 

Third, there are benefits that can be got from 

the usage of WBE testing system such as low 

chance to cheat, no paper needed, and 

efficiency of time. Moreover, by applying 

WBE testing system, the students’ real 

competencies in taxonomy range 1 and 2 

(remembering and 

understanding/comprehending) will be 

measured with great accuracy.  

 

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