A teacher's handbook for reducing anxiety in foreign and second language classrooms.

Abstract

Language anxiety affects a significant number of second and foreign language learners and has been shown to negatively impact student performance and language acquisition. This curriculum project addressed the specific causes of anxiety, the negative effects it can have on students' behavior and achievement, and strategies that can be utilized to reduce language anxiety in the classroom. There are many sources of language anxiety including student beliefs about the process of language learning, classroom atmosphere and procedures, the nature of interactions between the instructor and the students, language testing, and personal factors such as self-esteem. Research has shown that anxiety has negative effects on cognitive processing, and it can also inhibit the development of communicative competence by causing students to avoid interactions that would help them increase their oral skills in the target language. This handbook provides middle school, high school, and adult foreign and second language teachers with general practices they can implement to create a low-anxiety classroom atmosphere, as well as specific strategies to help students realize and overcome their anxieties about the language learning process.