Педагогические науки\5. Современные методы образования

A. E. Krasheninnikova

Siberian state aerospace university named after academician M.F. Reshetnev

Foreign Language Anxiety and Ways to Decrease It

“You need to have something special if you want to speak English.” “It is impossible to learn a foreign language for me no matter how hard I try.” “When I am in my English class and my teacher calls on me I just freeze and can’t say anything. “ “I know grammar rules quite well and my vocabulary is Ok, but my mind goes blank when it is time to speak.” These statements are familiar to all teachers of foreign languages in Russia. Russian people learn foreign languages for 7 years at school and for 2 or 3 years at university and when it is time to speak most of them could not say a word. Many people claim they have a kind of a mental block although they are diligent students who have a strong motivation. In many cases, they may have an anxiety reaction which impedes their ability to perform successfully in a foreign language class.

In general, anxiety is defined as a psychological construct that is described as a state of apprehension, a vague fear that is only indirectly associated with an object (Hilgard, Atkinson, & Atkinson, 1971). Anxiety interferes with several types of learning but when it is associated with learning a foreign language it is coined as „foreign language anxiety”. McIntyre and Gardner (1994) defined this linguistic phenomenon as a subjective feeling of tension, apprehension, nervousness, and worry associated with an arousal of the automatic nervous system. Furthermore, McIntyre (1999) states that language anxiety as the worry and negative emotional reaction aroused when learning a second language.

Anxiety prevents students from performing successfully especially in classroom situations. Thus, symptoms and consequences of foreign language anxiety should be identified to those concerned with language learning and teaching. Steinberg and Horwitz found that students experiencing an anxiety-producing condition attempted less interpretive (more concrete) messages than those experiencing a relaxed condition. These studies indicate that anxiety can affect the communication strategies students employ in language class. So, the more anxious student tries to avoid difficult or personal messages in the foreign language. Moreover, it is necessary to say that anxious students often experience fear, worry, cannot concentrate, they sweat and become forgetful. Some students to avoid stress miss classes, show indifference and become passive.

As the researches show the most difficulty students have in speaking and listening tasks. When they need to speak they just freeze unable to say a word. In listening tasks the majority face problems with discriminating sounds and structures of the language message. A lot of students are afraid of making mistakes they believe that nothing should be said until it is said correctly. It would be safe to say that the better the command of English students have the less anxious they are in class. Onwuegbuzie et al. (1999) found no significant differences among the anxiety levels of beginning, intermediate and advanced foreign language learners. Liu (2006), who examined anxiety in EFL learners at three different proficiency levels, did not find significant differences in anxiety among the three groups either. Similarly, Pichette’s (2009) study reports no difference in anxiety between first-semester language students and their more experienced peers. Moreover, a number of studies have indicated that advanced learners score higher on anxiety than their lower level counterparts (cf. Cheng, 2002; Kitano, 2001; Marcos-Llinás & Garau, 2009; Saito & Samimy, 1996).

Scovel in his work differentiates various types of anxiety: trait anxiety (a permanent predisposition to be anxious), state anxiety (a social type of anxiety that occurs under certain conditions) and situation-specific anxiety (caused by specific situation or event such as public speaking, examinations or recitations).

Learning anxiety is usually associated with three categories: teacher, institution and learner. What are the causes of anxiety related to the learner? They include low self esteem, competitiveness, self-perceived low level of ability, communication apprehension, lack of group membership and attitudes and beliefs about language learning (Young, 1994). Teacher factor includes the manner of teaching, teacher’s attitude to the student. Institutional anxiety can be traced to the classroom activities used by the teacher in class such as role playing, oral presentation or report, spontaneous speech in front of the class. Thus, the main causes of learning anxiety are 1) communication apprehension 2) fear of negative evaluation 3) test anxiety 4) anxiety in the English classroom.

Communication apprehension is a fear, shyness or worry to communicate with people. It can be a personal characteristic of a student who is reserved and shy by nature. Just imagine what this student experiences when he should speak in groups or in front of a class in a foreign language. The foreign language class requires students to communicate in the situation when they have little control and constantly monitored by the teacher or more successful students. The tension is strengthened by disability to understand others and make oneself understood.

Fear of negative evaluation is defined as "apprehension about others' evaluations, avoidance of evaluative situations, and the expectation that others would evaluate oneself negatively" (D. Watson & R. Friend) This factor plays an important role especially for teenagers who tend to estimate their classmates. Thus, students miss classes or refuse doing the tasks to avoid being a figure of fun for others. A lot of students in Russia claim that one of the reasons to learn a foreign language is that it can help enhance their statues among classmates.

Test anxiety is a fear of failing a test. Such students usually put unrealistic demands on themselves and any result but a perfect test performance will be a failure for them. Oral tests for test anxiety students are a completely unbearable situation. That is why, so many bright students show poor results in oral or written tests.

Anxiety in the English classroom is derived from the atmosphere in a class and classroom activities necessary to be fulfilled. Young (1991) compiled a list of classroom activities which are perceived by students as anxiety-producing activities: (1) spontaneous role play in front of the class; (2) speaking in front of the class; (3) oral presentations or skits performed in the class; (4) presenting a prepared dialogue in front of the class; and (5) writing work on the board. The manner of error correction also turned out to play an important role in contributing to a student‟s anxiety.

Taking into consideration all the above mentioned facts, it is necessary for teachers to realize that their students experience anxiety in their classes. Teachers have to understand the nature of learning language anxiety and help students cope with it. They may be able to design their lessons in a different way thinking weather the activities can be embarrassing and anxiety provoking for the students, pay more attention to the choice of the activities performed in class and may opt for an alternative assessment or students evaluation to lessen the anxiety. Moreover, one of the most effective ways to help students deal with anxiety is to attack their negative thoughts. In essence, the teacher should help anxious students focus less on what they are doing wrong and more on what they are doing right. One more way to lessen anxiety is to acknowledge students' anxious feelings and help them realize that anxiety is a widespread phenomenon.

By and large, language educators must be willing to understand that the learning difficulties learners are encountering in their classes stem from a more deeply rooted problem which is caused by anxieties they are experiencing once they are in their English language classes. It is important that language teachers look at the affective state of the learners as this greatly affects their learning.

References

1. Rochelle Irene Lucas, Edna Miraflores, Dianne Go. English Language Learning Anxiety among Foreign Language Learners in the Philippines, De La Salle University, Manila Philippine ESL Journal, Vol. 7, July 2011

2. Elaine K. Horwitz, Michael B. Horwitz, Joann Cope. Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety, the Modern Language Journal, Vol. 70, No. 2 (Summer, 1986), pp. 125-132

3. Hilgard, E. R., Atkinson, R. C., & Atkinson, R. L. (1971). Introduction to psychology (5th ed.). New York: Harcourt.

4. Watson, D., & Friend, R. (1969). Measurement of social-evaluative anxiety. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 33, 448-451.

5. Young, D. J. (1991). Creating a low-anxiety classroom environment: What does language anxiety research suggest? The Modern Language Journal, 75, 426-439.

6. Scovel, T. (1978). The effect of affect on foreign language learning: A review of the anxiety research., Language Learning 28, 129-142.