ANXIETY IN THE EFL SPEAKING CLASSROOMS

Year 2019, Volume: 9 Issue: 2, 23 - 36, 30.06.2019

Suleyman Kasap

Abstract

 

Abstract


There are times in which we can all experience feelings of anxiety when we are
verbally communicating with others. However, anxiousness when speaking aloud is
commonly found within the EFL speaking classroom. This study aims to determine
in what forms this anxiety has been observed by teachers of EFL and experienced
by students of EFL, how it appears to influence and impede the successful
production of language, how the students’ participation is affected and how the
classroom and lesson at large appear to be affected, in English speaking
classes in Turkey. In order to determine this, qualitative semi-structured
interviews were used. Five teachers of EFL, who either focused purely on
speaking or who regularly incorporated speaking into their lessons, were interviewed
to learn in what ways they had observed anxiety in students when speaking
English and any further impact this had upon other students and the lesson
itself. Furthermore, five students of EFL with high levels of anxiety when
speaking English were interviewed to learn the effects of anxiety upon them
when speaking and how they felt it affected their ability to communicate.  The results of the study showed that teachers
observed such symptoms as visible discomfort and difficulty speaking in
students. Students reported feelings of unease, feelings affecting their
self-esteem and bodily sensations associated with anxiety. Communication was
shown to be severely stunted by these feelings and their effects by reports
from both groups. Participation in lessons was found to be strongly affected by
speaking anxiety by both groups, and the speaking anxiety of anxious students
was found to strongly affect other students and the atmosphere of the
classroom.

Keywords

psycholinguistics ; anxiety; foreign language ; English ; speaking

References

• Anxiety UK, (2018) Anxiety Conditions: Symptoms of Anxiety’, https://www.anxietyuk.org.uk/get-help/anxiety-information/.
• Council Project Team and TEPAV Project Team, (2015) The state of English in higher education in Turkey, http://www.urapcenter.org/2016/he_baseline_study_book_web_-_son.pdf,
• Kitano, K. (2001). Anxiety in the college Japanese language classroom. The Modern Language Journal, 85, 549–566.
• Matsuda, S., & Gobel, P. (2004). Anxiety and predictors of performance in the foreign language classroom. System, 32, 21–36
• Sahin, I , Gülmez, Y. (2000) Social Sources of Failure in Education: The Case in East and Southeast Turkey’, Social Indicators Research, Springer, Vol. 49, No. 1 , pp. 83-113.
• Saito, Y., & Samimy, K. K. (1996). Foreign language anxiety and language performance: A study of learner anxiety in beginning, intermediate, and advanced level college students of Japanese. Foreign Language Annals, 29, 239–251.
• Savignon, S. J.( 1983). Communicative Competence: Theory and Classroom Practice. Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, Canadian Modern Language Review, 40(3), pp. 464–465
• The British Psychological Society, (2019) ‘An A to Z of Psychology: Anxiety’, https://www.bps.org.uk/public/a-z-of-psychology#,
• TEPAV Project Team and Vale, D. (2014.) Turkey National Needs Assessment of State School English Language Teaching , https://www.tepav.org.tr/upload/files/13993883565.Turkey_National_Needs_Assessment_of_State_School_English_Language_Teaching.pdf, British Council and TEPAV.
• Onwuegbuzie, A. J., Bailey, P., & Daley, C. E. (1999). Factors associated with foreign language anxiety. Applied Psycholinguistics, 20, 217–239.
• Ohata, K. (2005). Potential sources of anxiety for Japanese learners of English: Preliminary case interviews with five Japanese college students in the U.S. TESL-EJ, 9, 1–21
• Woodrow, L. (2006). Anxiety and speaking English as a second language. RELC Journal, 37, 308–328.
• Zgutowicz, R. (2009). What effects does language anxiety have on ESL students’ decisions to speak English in a middle school classroom?’, Hamline University.