Özet:

This study examines secondary school students’ and their teachers’ perceptions of foreign language anxiety. Also, the current study aims to compare public and private secondary school students’ foreign language anxiety level. Demographic variables such as gender and grades were also investigated to reveal whether they were acting as provoking or easing factors for foreign language anxiety among students. The sample group of this study consisted of 379 secondary school students chosen randomly and 9 English language teachers from public and private secondary school in Sakarya province, Turkey. The data were collected through two measurement tools, a scale for students and a questionnaire for teachers, which included open and close-ended questions. The quantitative data were analyzed through descriptive and inferential statistics, and for the qualitative data analysis, content analysis was conducted. The findings of the research revealed that public school students experience moderate level of foreign language anxiety, while private school students experience low level of foreign language anxiety. The findings of current study demonstrate that there is meaningful difference between public and private school students in terms of their foreign language anxiety. In both schools, females were more anxious than males however, the difference between two gender groups was significant in private school. Grade was not a predicting factor for foreign language anxiety in the current study. However, in both schools, 8th graders are the most anxious group of all. As for the teachers, they were well aware of their students’ anxieties, and they implemented useful strategies for decreasing this anxiety. Also, they adapted their pedagogical instructions in order to reduce their students’ foreign language anxiety. However, research findings demonstrated that there was a discrepancy between teachers’ and students’ perceptions in terms of test anxiety.

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