King Faisal University Name/Abrar S. Al-Zoubi College of Arts I.D. #: 212503192 Foreign Languages Dept.

Course name: Topics in Al. Higher Studies Professor name: Dr. Al-Tarouti Applied Linguistics Program Date: 29 / 4 / 2013 ********************************************************************

Competitiveness and Anxiety in Adult Second Language Learning: Looking at and through the Diary Studies
Kathleen M. Bailey

1). The research question is Whether or not affective variables, especially

competitiveness and anxiety, play a role in enhancing or impairing learning process. *************************************************************** 2). Bailey wrote a first-person diary. She conducted her study in her French class (2R), which is a reading and grammar course designed for people who want to pass language exams rather than learn to speak French. Also, the other diaries and journals she mentioned were conducted in the classroom. ************************************************************** 3). Bailey herself was a participant observer. The study talked about her learning experience. She referred to her classmates and instructor's comments as well. This was the case of the other diaries she looked through. **************************************************************** 4). Bailey and the other diarist collected the data by keeping a journal of experiences related to her language learning. She wrote about class, tests, her classmates, and her instructor's method of teaching. She registered her feelings and comments after each class. ***************************************************************** 5). Bailey analyzed the data by rereading the entries and looking for patterns of important events and supporting examples. Moreover, she analyzed a number of diaries written by other diarist (i.e. language learners). She compared between her findings and the findings of other researchers. ***************************************************************** 6). Bailey used convincing and relevant excerpts from the data to support her statements.

*She said that she experienced what Gardner et al. (1976) called ''French Classroom Anxiety'': Today I was panicked in the oral exerciseHow frustrating it is to be looking for adverbial clues in the sentence when you dont even know what the word means. Today I felt a little scared. I'm so rusty''. * She also said that having an unsuccessful self-image made her have trait anxiety which helped her work more and therefore enhanced her learning:''I spoke to Maria and apologized for slowing down the class. I asked her how far they have gone.so that I could try to catch up''. * She said that the connotative power of the language used in diaries entries provides us with insights into the hidden emotions experienced by learners. She gave evidence from Plummer's diary: 'More than anything, I was jealous''. Leichman also wrote throughout the course there was a struggle within myself''. *Bailey agreed with Snell's claim that competition comes from different sources. Learners can compete with their classmates or other learners, with their idealized self-image and with the instructor's expectations. She supported her agreement with clues from her own diary: 'I hope Maria will like me and think I'm a good language learner' and later ' I know I am (or can be) a good language learner, but I hate being lost in class'. ***************************************************************** 7). Bailey concluded her review by saying that there is a complex relationship between competitiveness and anxiety, on one hand, and between anxiety and language learning, on the other hand. Competitiveness can have positive or negative effects on language learning. Positive competitiveness will create a mild anxiety to the learner and will make him/her improve and succeed. So, as anxiety decreases, the quality of performance increases and vice versa. Examples of successful self-image, which led to rewards and enhanced learning, can be seen in Scheding's diary study. She recorded her learning experience of acquiring German:' I could feel the anxiety among my fellow students. but it doesnt affect me''. Unsuccessful self-image can either led to trait or debilitating anxiety. The first of which leads to learning enhancement as we saw in her own experience. However, debilitating anxiety leads to abandonment of learning. A clear evidence can be seen in Jones' journal, which recorded her experience in learning Indonesian. She was unpleased with the instructor's method of teaching and treatment of the

class. That had the effect of turning me off entirely from the rest of the lectures'. ***************************************************************** 8). Bailey provided instructors and researchers with some pedagogical implications: * A successful researcher is the one who adopt a combination of both approaches, empirical and introspective, in order to get more reliable results *Diary studies can be easily conducted by teachers. They have major advantages in enhancing their teaching: 1- They help them getting access to hidden learner's responses, especially in the affective domain. 2-They give them insight into designing questionnaires and measuring tests. 3- They enable them to document and overcome the factors that influence language learning. 4-They allow teachers to identify the emotions that make changes in affects and control or induce such changes. 5- Finally, they open their horizons to the fact that diary studies are the mean used to see classroom experience as a dynamic and complex process. _______________________________________________________