Virtual Foreign Language Classrooms in Tunisia: Mapping Teaching, Learning and Technology-driven Anxiety
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24193/subbpsyped.2025.1.13Keywords:
Foreign language anxiety, Technological anxiety, Computer anxiety, Online learning, Tunisian Foreign language teachers and learnersAbstract
With the onset of COVID-19, the impact on education was unprecedented, leading to the rapid shift to online learning and subsequently an upsurge in research around the anxieties associated with it. This study examines the multiple faced anxieties during the pandemic of both Tunisian university English teachers and their learners, with a foreign language learning, teaching, and technological frames. Using the Foreign Language Classroom Anxiety Scale (FLCAS), the Teaching Anxiety Scale (TCHAS), and the Computer Anxiety Rating Scale (CART), data were collected from 19 teachers and 39 students. Results showed that overall, learners and teachers experienced an average level of anxiety in virtual classrooms, and findings also show that teachers and learners experienced lower technological anxiety than expected as a result of the early introduction and integration of technology into the daily lives of Tunisians. Yet students also highlighted the continuing challenges of foreign language anxiety. These findings indicate that early technological adoption have paved the way for distance education, lightening anxiety to some extent. However, persistent foreign language anxieties among Tunisians can be attributed to the late introduction of foreign language learning, with the average starting age being 14. This age falls within a critical period when acquiring a foreign language becomes somewhat more challenging.
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