An Investigation Into The Current Situation Of English Classroom Anxiety Of Senior High School Freshmen And Its Countermeasures

With the development of humanistic theory,the role of affective factors in foreign language teaching has been paid more and more attention by scholars at home and abroad.It can't be denied that in the process of foreign language learning,learners will be affected by various affective factors,among which anxiety is the main factor that affects the foreign language learning.For the freshmen who have just entered the senior high school,they are under the coming burden of college entrance examination and the invisible pressures of parents.Moreover,they have to adapt themselves to the new learning environment,new teaching materials and new teaching methods,thus,classroom anxiety can hardly be avoided.Many related researches also show that the anxiety of high school freshmen in English classroom is quite common and the anxiety problems will directly affect their English learning in senior high schools.In view of this situation,the present research attempts to investigate and analyze the current situation and the causes of English classroom anxiety of high school freshmen.Besides,the present study aims to explore countermeasures that can alleviate and relieve the anxiety in English classroom.Further,the study endeavors to provide certain advice and help for high school freshmen,so that they can soon adapt themselves to the new learning environment and throw themselves into high school life with a positive and healthy attitude.Three questions are to be addressed in this study: 1)How is the current situation of English classroom anxiety for the freshmen in senior high schools? 2)What are the causes of anxiety in freshman English classroom? 3)How to effectively alleviate and eliminate the freshman English classroom anxiety?This research is based on the theories of Krashen's affective filter hypothesis and humanistic psychology.105 students and their English teacher from two classes of Senior One in Shandong Province are chosen for the research subjects and qualitative and quantitative research are adopted for the present study.The tool of quantitative research is Horwitz's foreign language classroom anxiety scale(FLCAS)and Egna Minnenav Barndoms Uppfostran(EMBU).The qualitative research is to analyze the results of interview of 12 students from the chosen classes and their English teacher.Through data collection,data analysis and discussion,this study has found that first of all,the phenomena of freshmen English classroom anxiety are widespread and many students sufferfrom a relatively higher degree of English classroom anxiety.And communicative anxiety is the most prominent form of English classroom anxiety.Secondly,the causes of freshman English classroom anxiety are various,which can be summarized as the follows : 1)For the teachers: the causes arising out of classroom questions teaching methods,evaluation methods and classroom error correction;2)For the students: the causes arising out of communication fear,test dear,and evaluation fear,as well as individual differences and learning strategies;3)For the parents: the causes arising out of the lack of emotional understanding and excessive interference.Finally,based on the analysis of the phenomena and the various causes of classroom anxiety,this study intends to explore the countermeasures so as to alleviate students' English classroom anxiety: 1)For the teachers: to optimize classroom questions,,to improve teaching methods and teaching evaluation and be tolerant to students' errors.2)For the students: to change their concept of learning,adjust learning strategies and to overcome their inferiority and fear.3)For the parents:to have more appreciation of children,more respect for children's autonomy,to have reasonable expectations and be good at reflection.It is sincerely hoped that the results of this study will offer some inspiration and help for understanding freshmen English classroom anxiety,alleviating the anxiety,improving their English learning efficiency and promoting their mental health.At the same time,it is expected that this study can shed light on further multi-perspective explorations of English classroom anxiety.