Search

AbstractThe indispensable relationship between Research and Statistics makes the teaching of both courses crucial in all postgraduate programmes. However, over the years, postgraduate students have displayed a high level of anxiety in studying Statistics. Therefore, exploiting the descriptive case study strategy knitted within the sequential explanatory design, a Statistics teacher was studied in one of Ghana’s outstanding universities and the reported pedagogical behaviours were profiled. Primary data were obtained from 99 postgraduate students (reading various postgraduate programmes on regular, sandwich and distance modes of education) on their level of anxiety in Statistics (using the Statistics Anxiety Rating Scale) and their experiences with their teacher’s pedagogical behaviours. Also, 12 of the postgraduate students were interviewed about the pedagogical behaviours of their teacher that reduced their anxiety in Statistics. To triangulate the primary data, secondary results on the teacher’s teaching practices were obtained from the Directorate of Academic Planning and Quality Assurance Unit of the university (originally gathered through a statistical academic support scale). Descriptive (mean and standard deviation) and inferential (one-way ANOVA and SEM) statistics were used to analyse the quantitative data and the qualitative data were analysed into themes. Consequently, the study found 17 teacher pedagogical behaviours under teacher characteristics (cognitive and affective factors) and pedagogical practices that reduced postgraduate students’ statistical anxiety and heightened positive attitudes towards the study of Statistics. Therefore, a recognition of these pedagogical behaviours and their open display during the teaching of Statistics will go a long way in reducing postgraduate students’ high statistical anxiety.

The issue of language learning anxiety has received considerable attention in the last decades due to interest in learner psychology. Foreign language anxiety has been investigated as situation-specific anxiety related to the language classroom. Lately, researchers focused on language anxiety from a skills perspective, mainly the productive ones, speaking and writing, exploring the debilitating effects of anxiety on language learners. This paper reports on a study on speaking anxiety that included a sample of sixteen EFL undergraduates who took part in focus group interviews. They were conducted to collect qualitative data that would shed light on speaking anxiety from students’ perspectives. Based on existing language anxiety research, a theoretical overview of some of the personal and procedural factors that are thought to contribute to foreign language speaking anxiety is provided. The findings revealed a significant impact of the teachers’ role (s) in alleviating much of the anxiety experienced by the subjects in EFL speaking. An essential aim of this paper was to suggest some possible pedagogical measures that would help learners, as well as teachers, overcome major difficulties caused by foreign language speaking anxiety in an EFL university setting with reference to the teaching and learning of the speaking skill in the EFL Algerian university context. Ways to deal with and minimise foreign language speaking anxiety could be more effective if they intersect with students’ concerns.

The common problems faced by students in English speaking are anxiety and the lack of confidence and ideas. This research was conducted to determine the relevant factors and to provide a solution by using the smartphone video camera. To obtain the data in this research, experimental research was performed inside and outside the classroom with a series of treatments and a questionnaire sheet as the instrument. The data were analyzed using a model proposed by Smeda, Dakich, and Sharda (2014) and a Likert scale questionnaire, which was adapted from Spratt, Humphreys, and Chan (2002). The result from the test showed a significant difference between the experimental and control classes as the carried t-test presented the score of -8.36, which was out of the limit (between -1.96 and 1.96). Another result was the students developed positively which was shown by: the anxiety tends to decrease as they were given time before performing thus prepared better, their self-confidence was increased and challenged by using the smartphone video camera method due to the application of innovation in the speaking class. The conclusion of this research is lecturer needs to apply new methods, one of which is using a smartphone application.

Pre-service teachers who have grown up with ICT all around them are considered to be digitally literate. In this case, they are supposed to be proficient in their use of ICT for learning and teaching. This article explores ICT as the factor that influences pre-service teachers’ anxiety. Additionally, it aims at determining the role of ICT in reducing the level of pre-service foreign language teachers’ anxiety during their teaching activities. Anxiety is considered to have a powerful impact on people’s everyday life and on learning and teaching process in particular.The research tools were close-ended questionnaires filled by the respondents.The first one was used to measure pre-service teachers’ anxiety scale in different everyday life situations. The second questionnaire was based on the authors’ socio-psychological experiment, aiming at revealing the influence of ICT on pre-service teachers’ anxiety during their teaching practicum. The study was carried out with 120 pre-service EFL teachers studying at Vasyl Stefanyk Precarpathian National University and Pavlo Tychyna Uman State Pedagogical University who completed their teaching practicum as part of their graduation requirement at the Departments of Foreign Languages.The data obtained from the questionnaires were grouped into two main categories: the general level of students’ anxiety and the anxiety connected with using ICT in teaching English. The latter was categorized into “Very positive”, “Positive” and “Negative” groups based on pre-service teachers’ experience gained during their teaching practicum. ICT use was found to be positively and significantly related to reducing teachers’ level of anxiety. The results of the research proved that the students who did the ICT-related course as a part of their curriculum felt more confident while conducting classes and their level of anxiety was reduced while using modern information technologies.