Fear of making mistakes as a Major of Student's Anxiety in Speaking Section of EFL classroom
Author:
Anda Roofi' Kusumaningrum, Andhika Wahyu Rustamaji, Eric Dheva Tachta Armada, Rahmadilla Kurniasari.
Universitas Sebelas Maret
2021
INTRODUCTION
Dr. Stephen Krashen, a foremost scholar, in his book (1982) emphasized three things that affect the affective filters including anxiety, self-confidence, and motivation. He asserted that if the students had anxiety, the affective filters are higher. Consequently, it will hinder the language acquisition process. Hence it is important for teachers to lower the students' affective filters by reducing their anxiety. The way of teaching that is mostly implemented to teach speaking skill, the teachers need to resolve the problem that might cause the student anxiety. The problem that mostly affects the students to be anxious is afraid to make mistakes.
THE CHALLENGES
A high motivation can influence the language learning process. While low motivation can cause the students to have many thoughts on why they are speaking a foreign language. One of the limiting factors related to low motivation in the language learning process is the fear of making mistakes. There are many causes for this fear of making mistakes that range from the lack of vocabulary, fear of being judged and negative feeling when they make errors are negative things that lead to anxiety. To avoid the occurrence of negative factors.
Vocabulary is  frequently known as "all the words known". We can study English more readily if we have a large vocabulary. However, a lack of vocabulary will make it tough for us to study English and speak fluently. Therefore they try to remember the words while speaking. Because we use so many vocabulary when we speak. Vocabulary has a significant impact on our speaking ability. In short, vocabulary is really essential and good communication can help the students to expand their vocabulary in an indirect way.
Students often feel that other students are judging their speaking skills in the classroom. Most speakers feel insecure when they are evaluated by others. They also worry about what others think about them. The worst part is that people will remember what you said and how you said it. Several surveys indicate that the average student believes other students have better speaking skills than their own. This explains why students are likely to worry about sounding dumb in the classroom. This problem underlies the reason behind students' anxiety about their speaking abilities. This insecurity is very real and it may drive many students to shy away from expressing their thoughts in the classroom.
