Anxiety reduction sessions in foreign language classrooms

Classroom Interventions and Foreign Language Anxiety: A Systematic Review With Narrative Approach

“…Our review further found learner-internal features of FLAR interventions. Five studies used performance such as drama ( Sağlamel and Kayaoğlu, 2013 ; Galante, 2018 ; Uştuk and Aydın, 2018 ; Kwiecień-Niedziela et al, 2020 ) or digital storytelling ( Liu et al, 2018 ), five involved strategies ( Alrabai, 2015 ; Mostafavi and Vahdany, 2016 ; He, 2017 ; Tsiriotakis et al, 2017 ; Bielak, 2018 ), four interventions used counseling and training ( Abood and Abu-Melhim, 2015 ; Kralova et al, 2017 , 2018 ; Toyama and Yamazaki, 2019 ), and four used mood boosters such as meditation ( Scida and Jones, 2017 ), music ( Shimbo, 2008 ), gaming ( Wei et al, 2018 ), and web-based L2 exercises ( Bashori et al, 2020 ).…”

“…Positive self-talk or “self-encouragement via positive statements” ( Oxford, 1990 , p. 142), as employed in Toyama and Yamazaki’s (2019) study, is often considered a type of affective strategy. Toyama and Yamazaki (2019) used positive self-talk in the framework of rational emotive therapy and reported within- and between-group decreases in FLA. Tsiriotakis et al (2017) implemented Graham and Harris’s (1989) self-regulated strategy development, which aims to enhance affective, behavioral, and cognitive aspects of learning, and confirmed its effectiveness in reducing L2 writing anxiety as well as improving L2 skills. The others used a range of questionnaire survey-based strategies ( He, 2017 ) or an assorted set of strategies taken from previous literature ( Alrabai, 2015 ).…”

“…In fact, they are designed to improve student–student interactions through peer feedback and teacher-student interaction through debriefing and feedback. Applying rational emotive therapy combined with positive self-talk, two studies ( Abood and Abu-Melhim, 2015 ; Toyama and Yamazaki, 2019 ) reported successful decrease in FLA.…”

“…For instance, virtual reality, video chat, and voice chat, as employed in York et al’s (2020) study, could reduce FLA. Another approach is the application of positive psychology ( Dewaele et al, 2019 ; MacIntyre et al, 2019 ), which offers various interventions to boost positive emotions while alleviating anxiety ( Oxford, 2017a ). For instance, positive self-talk, as employed in Toyama and Yamazaki’s (2019) study, can help anxious L2 learners “feel more confident in learning the new language” ( Oxford, 1990 , p. 143). Gregersen (2013) explained that positive psychology could be beneficial for L2 teachers and learners, who can capitalize on positive affect while mitigating the effect of negative emotions such as anxiety.…”

A Multidimensional Perspective on Individual Differences in Multilingual Learners’ L2 Chinese Speech Production

“…From an external side, teachers may consider organizing more regular communicative activities for learners in light of the positive influence of frequency of practice on speaking self-efficacy. From an internal perspective, teachers may consider equipping learners with anxiety reduction strategies, such as cognitive-affective talk, reflective self-talk, and positive self-talk, to boost their speaking self-efficacy (Toyama and Yamazaki, 2019).…”