Students’ perceptions of the use of Kahoot! in English as a foreign language classroom learning context

The present longitudinal survey study explored changes in and effects of foreign language classroom anxiety (FLCA) and listening anxiety (FLLA) on Chinese undergraduate students’ English proficiency over a semester in the COVID-19 context. A set of 182 matching questionnaires was collected from first-year undergraduate English as a foreign language learners at two time points of a 16-week semester. Analyses of the data revealed the following major findings: (1) the participants experienced high levels of FLCA and FLLA both at the beginning and end of the semester, neither of which changed significantly during the semester, (2) FLCA and FLLA were highly positively related to each other, (3) FLCA and FLLA significantly predicted students’ self-rated proficiency in listening and speaking English, and (4) confidence in using English, efforts and motivation to learn English and interaction with instructors and peers mediated FLCA and FLLA to exert effects on students’ self-perceived proficiency in listening and speaking English. These findings indicate that the learning environment is critical in influencing the levels of and changes in FLCA and listening anxiety and that these two types of foreign language anxiety are serious issues in the pandemic foreign language learning context.

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Using Rasch Analysis to Create and Evaluate a Measurement Instrument for Foreign Language Classroom Speaking Anxiety

JALT Journal - JALT Journal 24.1 ◽

10.37546/jaltjj35.1-1 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 35 (1) ◽

pp. 5 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Matthew Apple

Keyword(s):

Foreign Language ◽

Rasch Model ◽

Measurement Instrument ◽

Language Teachers ◽

Learning Context ◽

Speaking Anxiety ◽

Language Classroom ◽

Foreign Language Classroom ◽

Using Data ◽

Instrument Creation

Despite the existence of skill-specific anxiety instruments measuring reading anxiety, writing anxiety, and listening anxiety, there is still no single measurement instrument specifically designed to measure levels of speaking anxiety. This research had two purposes. The first was to provide for classroom-based foreign language teachers and researchers an example of the advantages of Rasch model analysis, the use of which is increasing in first-language educational contexts for measurement instrument creation and validation. The second purpose was to create and evaluate an instrument for measuring foreign language speaking anxiety within the classroom in an EFL learning context, in which few native speakers of the language are available for interaction. Using data from a sample of Japanese university students (N = 172), the Rasch model identified misfitting items and examined the construct validity of a 20-item questionnaire to measure levels of Foreign Language Classroom Speaking Anxiety (FLCSA). リーディング、ライティング、リスニングといった特定のスキルに関する不安を測定する手段はあるが、スピーキング不安のレベルを測定する手段は現在のところ存在しない。本研究の目的は二つある。一つ目は、教室で教える外国語教師や研究者にラッシュモデル分析の利点の例を示すことである。ラッシュモデルによる分析は、第一言語の教育環境において、測定手段の作成やその妥当性を高める目的でますます使用されるようになっている。本研究の二つ目の目的は、母語話者とのやりとりの機会がほとんどない「外国語としての英語」を学ぶ教室において、外国語スピーキング不安を測る手段を作成し、評価することである。日本の大学生（N=172）のデータを使用し、外国語スピーキング不安（FLCSA）の度合いを測定する20項目からなる質問紙からラッシュモデルにより不適当な項目を割り出し、構成概念妥当性を検証した。

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SUSTAINING INTERACTION THROUGH GROUP WORK IN ENGLISH FOREIGN LANGUAGE CLASSROOM

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL REVIEW ◽

10.33369/ijer.v1i2.8847 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 1 (2) ◽

pp. 62-70

Author(s):

Tahrun Tahrun

Keyword(s):

Foreign Language ◽

Group Work ◽

Teaching And Learning ◽

Learning Activities ◽

Learning Climate ◽

Learning Context ◽

Common Goal ◽

Language Classroom ◽

Foreign Language Classroom ◽

Learning Responsibility

The purpose of teaching and learning English as a foreign language in Indonesia is to enable the learners to use English for communication in various contexts. To promote communication in teaching and learning activities, the teachers should be able to initiate interaction. To initiate interaction, the teachers may use questions, by which the teachers should consider the appropriate types of question that match with the students. In addition, the teachers should be able to maintain or sustain the interaction in their teaching and learning context. One of the activities which are effective to sustain interaction in the process of teaching and learning is group work. By using group work, the learners are encouraged to interact in English communicatively. Besides, this method increases students' motivation in learning. This is as the effect of learning climate which offers freedom for the students to express their ideas, feeling or criticism freely in front of their group's members. In addition, group work promotes students' learning responsibility and autonomy. Each member of the groups must be responsible to achieve their common goal. Considering those ideas, group work can be one of the effective methods to sustain interaction in the EFL classroom.

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