1

Reducing Anxiety among English Language Learners

Colorado State University

CoTESOL Fall 2016
Elham Alhudithi elham@rams.colostate.edu
Lauren Porter lporter0812@gmail.com
Jenny Stetson-Strange Jenny.StetsonStrange@colostate.edu
 2

Reducing Anxiety: The Teachers Role

A teachers negative response to an incorrect answer may affect a learners anxiety and
contribute to poor performance. Teachers should also recognize that silence (non-speaking
from the learner) does not indicate the absence of L2 acquisition (Bailey & Nunen, 1996, p.
158). As Bailey & Nunen (1996) state, each learner may process differently; some may
analyze the question for a period of time before being able to answer correctly. Silence should
be tolerated in the classroom. If a teacher does not permit silence, a students self-confidence
may be undermined (p. 157).
Here areTeaching
Reducing Anxiety: some helpful tips for teachers in a classroom to prevent anxiety ongoing:
Methods
accept a variety of answers from students, encourage peer support in the classroom,
Thecontinually
best methods
havefor
thethese
classclassrooms to lessen
do group work anxiety
together, are: Communicative
and encourage and foster a Language
great
Teaching (CLT) model, Content-Based Instruction (CBI), Task-based
relationship with your students (Bailey & Nunen, 1996, p. 160, 162, 164). Language
Teaching (TBLT), and Total Physical Response (TPR). These methods are appropriate
because they allow for the positive encouragement of students, facilitate learning, and create
an atmosphere of security.
CLT: Encourages communicating competently and functionally, instead of focusing on step-by step language
and grammatical skills that may take rigid forms in instruction and assessment. CLT also has a flexibility to it
(Larsen-Freeman & Anderson, 2011). CLT also encourages Activities
student interactions in pairs, small groups, and a
whole group. CLT focuses on the teacher as a facilitator who tolerates errors and understands them as a part of
The following are a list of activities, and their adaptations/considerations, that are useful in
development (Larsen-Freeman & Anderson, 2011, p. 125). The use of authentic materials is also emphasized in
CLT, classrooms
and authentic where
materialsstudents are experiencing
can be scaffolded anxiety. Please
to become meaningful note thatinput
comprehensible manyfor of
thethese activities
learners. For
example,
werethepart
emphasis
of an that CLT puts
original on using
report games to give
on reducing purpose
anxiety to language
in the Japaneseexchanges (Larsen-Freeman
EFL classroom, & be
but can
Anderson, 2011) was considered when designing and/or including in this paper the fly swatter game, baseball
game, and running dictations, for example. adapted for anythose
Additionally, ESL/EFL classroom.
activities allow the students to make errors, so the
instructor can informally assess the students as they play with their group in order foster positive teacher-student
relationships.
CBI: A good model for this classroom because the teacher can incorporate content that is relevant and
ActivitytoName:
interesting the students. This can help relaxBaseball
them and Pronunciation
make class more Game fun. CBI is a strong version of the
Communicative
Goals/Objectives:Approach to teaching, meaning that language
Students will beis acquired through communication
able to distinguish (Larsen-
the difference between
Freeman & Anderson, 2011). It is also referred to as a top-down approach, where learners use the language in
order to learn it. The emphasis on communication and content can be achieved by using games and interactive
the phonemes /l/ and /r/.
models. For example, the teacher could facilitate communication in small groups with content that the students
Levelsuch
enjoy, of as
Proficiency:
American culture. Low to High Intermediate.
Preparation
LearnersTime:
should be active participants15inminutes
choosing examples of the target language that they would like
toApplication
learn; for example,
Time:in a high-school course,25students
minutes will not be able to choose all of the material, but allowing
them to study
Skills/Focus: topics that are relatable and enjoyable
Speaking and and
to them, then adapting that authentic material to the
Listening
lesson, can be helpful. In the materials for this project, students learn content in a variety of the activities. For
Materials: Various words using /l/ and /r/
example, with the Fly Swatter game, the teacher can choose content-specific vocabulary. Ted Talks are all related
to a certain topic that help to increase their knowledge.
TBLT: Students are given tasks to complete, and therefore must communicate in order to complete these tasks.
The teacher can oftentimes replace a quiz or a test by giving students a variety of tasks to complete, and
assessing them informally on their ability to complete these tasks. Removing a test component reduces anxiety,
and can also provide motivation for the students because they are doing tasks that prepare them for the real
world. TBLT was especially considered when designing the smell game, emailing a professor activity, and the
Ted Talk activity. In each case, instead of being formally quizzed or tested, students are required to complete a
task or share an opinion.
TPR: Although it would not be the main method driving the course design, Total Physical Response is a great
way to engage students. Through games and activities that include physical motion, the teacher can change the
energy of the room and help learners connect kinesthetically to what they are learning. As Larsen-Freeman and
Anderson (2011) writes, TPR was developed in order to reduce the stress people feel when they are studying
other languages (p. 109). TPR encourages students to interact, but does not force them to speak out loud, which
often causes anxiety for these Japanese learners. TPR is very present in the C or U for noun activity, baseball
game activity, and running dictations. The goal was to incorporate kinesthetic learning, via TPR, into the
classroom to help change the energy of the room and reduce stress. Specifically in the C or U for noun activity,
the students do not have to speak, which is helpful, because speaking usually increases anxiety.
 3

Procedures:
1. Move all desks against the wall.
2. Create a baseball field in the classroom, with different bases and a home plate.
3. Split the class into two teams and have them name their team after a baseball team.
4. Create multiple questions revolving around vocabulary, grammar, spelling, and pronunciation. In this
example, the teacher may wish to use minimal pairs to have students practice listening for the
difference between /l/ and /r/.
5. The teacher is the pitcher and asks the questions.
6. Pitch away!
7. If student gets a question wrong, they get a strike and then can phone a friend on their team to help.
8. If they get it right, they can hit the ball and run to first. The team in the outfield can try and get
them out.
Adaptations/Considerations:

This game can utilize various other skills such as Reading and Writing. All levels of students in
Elementary, Middle, and High school can play this game. This activity could be used as an alternative
assessment for the teacher to check in and see where the students are at throughout the course. The
teacher can focus on several skills during this activity and observe the students output and whether
they comprehend the materials presented in class.

Activity Name: Mailing an Imaginary Professor at a University

Goals/Objectives: Develop the students skills in English writing through email

Level of Proficiency:
Preparation Time:
Application Time:
Skills/Focus:
Materials:
writing.
Mid Intermediate to Low Advanced
3 minutes
12 minutes
Focus on writing with integrating skills of listening & speaking.
Laptop, Internet, and email address.

Procedures:
1. Teacher explains the concept of the activity by saying imagine that you are interested in
attending a course at university as a guest student. You need to send an email to the professor
who teaches that course to ask for permission to attend the class for one day. In your email,
you need to mention the professor, the course that you are interested in, the reason for your
interest, request an attendance, and introduce yourself.
2. Pair students up. Students will work in pairs to write a formal email to the professor.
3. After the pairs write an email, the teacher will ask each pair of students to send their emails to
another pair.
4. Each group will pretend that they are the professor and respond to other groups email.
5. Teacher will write feedback for each group at the end, and will send feedback to their emails
 4

the next day.

Adaptations/Considerations: It is helpful to use a tool that learners are already familiar with
to reduce the level of their anxiety and give them confidence to produce in the target language.
Any application or software that the learners are used to is helpful (email). It is important to
pair the students who have a similar levels of proficiency together in order to insure that each
one is contributing to the pair work.

Activity Name: Would you shape C or U for this noun?

Goals/Objectives: Learners will be able to recognize the singular and plural forms of

count nouns, and distinguish between count and noncount nouns.

Level of Proficiency: Low, mid, & high Beginners
Preparation Time: 4 minutes
Application Time: 10 minutes
Skills/Focus: Listening & Speaking
Materials: Flashcards/index cards

Procedures:
1. Teacher describes the different between count and noncount nouns in English.
2. Teacher has a deck of flashcards with count and noncount nouns printed on them.
3. Teacher shows one flashcard to the whole class.
4. The students have to figure out if the nouns are count or noncount (individually).
5. Students will model the shape C if they think it is countable or shape U if they think it is
uncountable with their hands.
6. The teacher will select a student who has the right shape to stand and model the shape with
her/his hands, so other students can know the noun type.
7. If it is countable, the teacher will ask students to write on their mini white board the plural of
that noun.
8. The teacher will pick a student who got the right spelling to stand and show their plural noun
to the rest of the class.

Adaptations/Considerations: It is helpful to test the students understanding of a particular

rule in a friendly environment to reduce the learners anxiety. The teacher can monitor
students production, and students are given the opportunity to practice a grammatical rule.
This is helpful for kinesthetic and shy learners.
 5

Activity Name: What Does Ted Say in his Talk?

Goals/Objectives: Develop listening & speaking skills by listening for main ideas

and specific information. Improve writing skills by writing a

summary and personal reflection.

Level of Proficiency:
Preparation Time:
Application Time:
Skills/Focus:
Materials:
High Intermediate Mid Advanced
4 minutes
40 minutes
Writing, Listening, and Speaking
Internet, Laptop, Printer, Headphones, Papers

Procedures:
1. The teacher introduces the TED TALK website to the students.
2. The students are paired up, and each pair has a laptop.
3. The teacher asks each pair of students to talk for five minutes with her/his partner to find a
shared interest.
4. Each pair will search the TED website to find a video that they both are interested in listening
to.
5. Students watch and listen to their TedTalk.
6. The students will discuss their ideas about the Ted Talk video that they listened to for seven
minutes.
7. Each pair will write an outline about the main ideas of the video.
8. Each group will use the outline to write a summary.
9. Each group will write a reflection for the main ideas that are mentioned in the summary.
Adaptations/Considerations: Being able to listen to authentic materials provides students with the
opportunity to listen to the production of native speakers since it does not have aspects of foreigner
talk. Using any other software that has short videos about different topics would serve the purpose of
this activity. Depending on the level of the students, the teacher needs to ensure that the recorded videos
match the learners levels. It is helpful to the high school students to get to listen to semi lectures to
transition into studying in college smoothly. This will help them not only to increase their language
about different topics, but also to become independent learners, which is an important component of
studying in a university. Additionally, once the students have done an activity utilizing TedTalks and are
familiar with the site, they can refer back to it for more listening practice on their own time (or for a
homework assignment).

Activity Name: No, Apple Picking Again Story!

 6

Goals/Objectives: Develop their abilities of listening & speaking.

Use their critical thinking skills.

Level of Proficiency: Mid Intermediate Low Advanced
Preparation Time: 7 minutes
Application Time: 20 minutes
Skills/Focus: Reading, Listening, and Speaking
Materials: Papers

Procedures:
1. The teacher organizes the seats of the class into three circles.
2. The teacher will have a short story about a stolen iphone in Tokyo (students can relate to this).
Note that it is good to choose a story that is relatable to the students and therefore grabs the
attention of the specific group of learners.
3. The teacher makes copies of the story and cuts the sentences into strips.
4. Each circle of students receives a set of sentences.
5. The teacher tells the students to figure out the sequence of these sentences to form a story
about a stolen iPhone in Tokyo to get the teenage students attention.
6. The students work together to figure out the sequence of the story by discussing the possible
events that took place.
7. After the group members reach an agreement with group members about the story sequence,
each group of students will be asked to think about possible reasons for Apple picking.
8. After discussing the reasons with their group, the students will be asked to think about possible
punishments that they would give for apple pickers.
Adaptations/Considerations: Having themes of stories that are related to the students
interests really helps them to develop their reading comprehension skills. Thus, any other
theme that is easy for all students to comprehend would be great. Doing the reading in form of
segments with groups really empowers them to express their ideas and increase their language
abilities. Small group work is a less threatening form of listening and speaking for many
students, and is therefore helpful in reducing anxiety. It is important to form each group with
similar levels of proficiency, so the lower level students will not be dominated by the higher
ones.

Activity Name Fly Swatter Game

Goals/Objectives: Practice listening skills with vocabulary, minimal pairs, or

pronunciation
Level of Proficiency: High Beginner to Low Advanced
Preparation Time: 0-5 minutes
Application Time: Variable (5-25 minutes)
Skills/Focus: Listening
Materials: Whiteboard and markers; fly swatter
 7

Procedures:
1. Words are written on the large whiteboard in columns (example: two columns of three words
each for a total of six words).
2. The class is divided into two groups teams. The class can choose their team names for fun
and to increase competition.
3. These teams form two lines starting at the whiteboard.
4. The person at the front of the line for each team is handed a fly swatter.
5. The teacher calls out the name of the word (or definition, etc. see considerations) and the team
that uses their fly swatter to hit the correct word on the board wins a point.
6. The first person to go hands the fly swatter to their next teammate in line and moves to the
back of the line.
7. After working through the initial items on the whiteboard, the teacher can switch the
words/items and continue to move through the activity.

Considerations: This activity requires zero to very little prep by the teacher. It is also an easy
way for the teacher to informally assess students listening skills and/or vocabulary knowledge.
It is a fun activity for the students and can be adapted to work on a variety of listening skills.
The game can be adapted to include work on minimal pairs, vocabulary, etc. The teacher can
merely say the word (when working on minimal pairs), give a definition (when working on
vocab), or give antonyms or synonyms, depending on the level.

Activity Name: Smell Game

Goals/Objectives: Create a relaxing environment for writing. Improve writing

Level of Proficiency:
Preparation Time:
Application Time:
Skills/Focus:
Materials:
fluency.
Mid Intermediate to Low Advanced
2 minutes
Variable (5-15 minutes)
Writing, Speaking (if adapted)
Ground coffee, paper, music (if adapted)

Procedures:
1. The teacher brings in a baggie of ground coffee.
2. The students each get out a piece of paper and are instructed to silently write down whatever
comes to mind when they smell the coffee. This can be memories, stories, emotions, etc.
Whatever the smell triggers for them is fine to write down.
3. Pass around the bag of coffee and have students smell the coffee.
 8

4. They can write silently, working on fluency, for a time amount chosen by the teacher.
5.
Considerations/Adaptations: The teacher can bring in different substances that produce
different smells. For example: coffee, tea, cinnamon, cumin, etc. Depending on the
location/culture, different smells might trigger more or less memories or emotions. The teacher
may choose to play soothing music while the students write. Time can be adapted based on
level. The students can also be asked to share their writing in small groups or pairs to work on
speaking skills.

Activity Name: Running Dictations

Goals/Objectives: Practice all four skills and negotiation of meaning. Change

the energy of the room by having students get out of their

seats.
Level of Proficiency: High Beginner to Low Advanced
Preparation Time: 5-10 minutes
Application Time: 10-25 minutes
Skills/Focus: Listening, Speaking, Reading, Writing
Materials: Paper, Tape

Procedures:
1. The teacher prepares dictations on pieces of white printer paper. For example, the teacher can
write (or type) the same three sentences on multiple pieces of paper, depending on the class
size.
2. The teacher tapes these papers on the wall around the room.
3. The students pair up. Each team must run to a designated paper taped to the wall in order to
read the sentence, then run back to their partner to dictate it. Partners switch roles after each
sentence.
4. At the end, the teacher can write the correct answers on the board, or display the answers on an
overhead (if available).
Adaptations/Considerations: The teacher can write different sentences depending on the
9

level, or to incorporate different or new vocabulary related to the unit. The pairs can switch
roles after each sentence, or after the three sentences, if the teacher has prepared more. The
teacher can either ask students to share their correct answers, have them jigsaw to review, or
display the correct answers on the overhead. These dictations can be reused to do
comprehension checks with vocabulary, or as writing or conversational prompts later.
Additionally, the students must work on negotiation of meaning when dictating a sentence to
their peer, which has been demonstrated as an integral piece of the input, interaction, and
output hypothesis (Gass & Mackey, 2007).

Sources
Bailey, K., & Nunan, D. (1996). Voices from the Language Classroom. New York City,
NY. Cambridge University Press.
Gass, S., & Mackey, A. (2007). Input, interaction and output: An overview. AILA
Review, 19, 3-17.
Larsen-Freeman, D., & Anderson, M. (2011). Techniques & principles in language
teaching. New York City, NY. Oxford University Press.
Robinson, P. (2002). Individual Differences and Instructed Language Learning.
Amsterdam, The Netherlands. John Benjamins Publishing Co.
Toth, Z. (2010). Foreign language anxiety and the advanced language learner. Bristol,
CT. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.