The Impact of Integrating Gamification Strategies Into Courses on Students’ English Speaking Anxiety: Is Gamification Teaching a Solution to English Learning Anxiety?

Before speaking a foreign language, people will always spend more time and think more than they do about their native language. Such “more” has been defined as foreign language learning anxiety since the work of Horwitz et al. in 1986. Gamification teaching is one of the potential teaching methods that have been found by many educators to benefit learners, in terms of both learning motivation and self-confidence. In this study, the group activities were integrated into the fifth-grade English curriculum of Taiwan’s elementary school to explore the correlation between students’ English-speaking anxiety and English-speaking performance; through an empirically experimental test, it was found that the experimental group’s English speaking effectiveness and English anxiety showed a significant negative correlation, but there was no significant correlation in the control group. The interview records showed that students enjoyed the learning method of integrating English into group activities because not only was it easy and enjoyable, but it also enabled them to learn while playing and interacting with peers.