This study was conducted to investigate the level of students’ speaking anxiety, the causes of students’ speaking anxiety, and the strategies to reduce the speaking anxiety in the classroom. The current study utilized a mix-method approach which called “The explanatory sequential design.” The sample of this study involved 72 students from 3 classes of the English Language Education Program of Mulawarman University in the academic year 2019/2020. The quantitative data were collected through a Google Form-based questionnaire which categorized speaking anxiety into three main domains: causes related to the classroom atmosphere, causes related to the EFL teachers, and causes related to the test to find out the level of students’ speaking anxiety. The qualitative data were analyzed through semi-structured interview with 6 students through WhatsApp voice notes in order to find out the causes of students’ speaking anxiety and the strategies to reduce speaking anxiety in classroom.
The quantitative data results showed that foreign language speaking anxiety in classroom does exist among the English Language Education Program students of Mulawarman University, by knowing class A at anxious level and either class B or C at moderately anxious level. On the other hand, the qualitative data found that the causes of students’ speaking anxiety in classroom were teachers’ role in raising or reducing speaking anxiety (including the lack of support, lack of understanding due to language barrier, and the fear of teacher's negative feedback), lack of vocabulary, test anxiety, and classroom atmosphere. The qualitative data also found out the strategies used by students were using relaxation strategy, preparation strategy, and positive thinking strategy.
Keywords: Foreign Language Speaking Anxiety, Speaking Anxiety, Causes of Speaking Anxiety, Reducing Speaking Anxiety.