Affective Strategies Language Learners

attitudes and motivation. A certain amount of anxiety sometimes helps learners to reach their peak performance levels, but too much anxiety blocks language learning. Anxiety-reducing strategies like laughter and deep breathing are therefore necessary. It can be concluded that self-encouragement and anxiety-reducing strategies help learners cope with ambiguity in language learning. The explanation of each strategy will be presented below. a Lowering Your Anxiety Three anxiety-reducing strategies are listed here. Each has a physical component and a mental component. 1. Using Progressive Relaxation, Deep Breathing, or Meditation This strategy uses the technique of alternately tensing and relaxing all of the major muscle groups in the body, as well as the muscle in the neck and face, in order to relax; or technique of breathing deeply from the diaphragm; or the technique of meditating. 2. Using Music Listening to music is a way to relax and can help reducing anxiety. 3. Using Laughter This strategy applies the use of laughter to relax by watching a funny movie, reading a humorous book, listening to jokes, and so on. b Encouraging yourself This set of three strategies is often forgotten by language learner, especially those who expect encouragement mainly from other people. However, the most potent encouragement may come from inside the learners. Self-encouragement includes saying supportive things, prodding learners to take risk wisely, and providing rewards. 1. Making Positive Statements This strategy can be done through saying or writing positive statements to oneself in order to feel more confident in learning the new language. 2. Taking Risks Wisely This strategy can be defined as pushing oneself to take risk in a language learning situation, even though there is a chance of making a mistake. Risk must be tempered with good judgement. 3. Rewarding Yourself Giving oneself valuable reward for a particularly good performance in the new language is the essence of this strategy. c Taking your emotional temperature The four strategies in this set help learners to assess their feelings, motivations, and attitudes and, in many cases, relate them to language tasks. The strategies in this set are particularly helpful for discerning negative attitudes and emotions that impede language learning progress. 1. Listening to Your Body This strategy related to paying attention to signals given by the body. These signals can be either positive, indicating happiness, like: interest, calmness, pleasure, etc. or negative, indicating stress like: tension, worry, fear, etc. 2. Using a Checklist This strategy can be explicitly defined as the use of checklist to discover feelings, attitudes, and motivations concerning language learning in general, as well as concerning specific language tasks. 3. Writing a Language Learning Diary This strategy includes write a diary or journal to keep track of events, and feelings. 4. Discussing Your Feelings with Someone Else Talking with another person teacher, friend, relative to discover and express feelings about language learning is the essence of this strategy.

f. Social Strategies

Language is a form of social behaviour; it is communication, and communication occurs between and among people. Learning a language that involves other people, and appropriate social strategies are very important in this process. Social strategies consist of three sets of strategies, each set comprising two strategies. The first social strategy is asking questions, one of the most basic social interactions. It helps learners get closer to the intended meaning and thus aids their understanding. It also helps learners encourage their conversation partners to provide larger quantities of input in the target language and indicates interests and involvement. In addition to asking question, cooperating in general —with peers and with more proficient users of the target language—is imperative for language learner. The second social strategy is cooperative learning, it consistently shows some significant effects, they are: higher self esteem; increased confidence and enjoyment; greater and more rapid achievement, more respect for the teacher, the school, and the subject, use of higher level of cognitive strategies; decreased prejudice; and increased altruism and mutual concern. Empathy is aime d at understanding someone‘s perspective better. The last social strategy is empathy. Finally, social strategies help learners to increase their ability to empathize by developing cultural understanding and becoming aware of others‘ thought and feelings. The discussion of each social strategies and their definition will be presented below. a Asking Question This set of strategies involves asking someone for clarification, verification, or correction. 1. Asking for Clarification or Verification This strategy covers asking the teacher to repeat, paraphrase, explain, slow down, or give examples; asking if a specific utterance is correct or if a rule fits particular case; paraphrasing or repeating to get feedback on whether if something is correct. 2. Asking for Correction This strategy simply asks someone for correction in a conversation. This strategy most often occurs in conversation, but may also be applied to writing. b Cooperating with others This set of two strategies involves interacting with one or more people to improve language skills. These strategies are the basis of cooperative language learning, which not only increases learners‘ language performance, but also enhances self-worth and social acceptance.