The Correlation between Students’ Anxiety during Class Presentations and Their English Speaking Achievement at SMA Islam Al-Maarif Singosari Malang

Abstract

English is becoming an essential foreign language in Indonesia, not just in school required to learn English but many professions also need to learn English, for English is the language of the world. One the most important factors in learning English are the anxiety that students have, since anxiety is one of the greatest fears experienced by every human being. The students feel anxiety when they speaking English, especially in classroom presentations. For those, the students’ anxiety has correlation with their English-speaking achievement. This study aimed to know whether there is a correlation between students’ anxiety during class presentations and their English-speaking achievement at SMA Islam Al-Maarif Singosari Malang, and whether there is significant difference in the students’ speaking achievement among 3 classes. This study used a correlation design with simple random sampling techniques. The participants are the eleventh grade Mathematics and Natural Sciences at SMA Islam AL-Maarif Singosari Malang who are joining English class. The researcher used questionnaire and document as the instrument. Therefore, the total participants in this study were 72 students. To analyze the data the researcher used SPSS 20 with Pearson Product Moment Correlation, and then the researcher used One Way Anova to compare three classes to find significance of the different in the students’ speaking achievement. The first finding indicated that there was negative correlation between students’ anxiety during class presentations and their English-speaking achievement. The correlation between two variables is .80 (0.80<r), that means there is very strong correlation. Then the level of probability (p) significance (sig.2 tailed) was 0.000, it means that p (0.000) was lower than 0.01. It means that the higher anxious students, the lower students’ English-speaking achievement. The second finding from differences among students’ speaking achievement, Anova table shows that mean difference (F) = 181,748, and the significant value is 0.000 which is lower than 0.05. It means that there is significant difference on the students’ speaking achievement among MIPA 1, MIPA 2, and MIPA 3 classes. Based on the finding of the study, it is addressed to English lecturers to be aware that speaking anxiety can hinder students' speaking skills and contribute negatively to students' speaking practice, so the teacher should create the comfortable and enjoyable at English class. It is also suggested for the students, Students who have high anxiety do not mean they cannot speak English during presentations. It is hoped that students can develop and improve their speaking skills using strategies, so the students will get better results and scores in their learning process. For future research, it is suggested to use wide scope and participant and use experimental design to get deeper analysis about students’ anxiety and English achievement. Key words: Correlation, Anxiety, English Speaking Achievement