İngilizce Öğretmenliği birinci sınıf öğrencilerinin sözlü iletişim becerileri dersindeki sözlü iletişim stratejileri, yabancı dil konuşma kaygıları ve iletişim kaygıları

The aim of this study is to reveal the level of speaking anxiety in the target language, communication apprehension experienced by students, and students' use of communication strategies in an oral communication course. To this end, a cross-sectional survey design was employed, and only quantitative data were collected through questionnaires. 315 university students studying their first year in English Language Teaching department composed the study group and the obtained data were analysed through descriptive and inferential statistics. The results indicated that freshman ELT students experience both speaking anxiety in foreign language and perceived communication apprehension on a moderate level in their Oral Communication Skills course. Regarding the relationship of these two constructs, communication apprehension was not found to be effective on predicting foreign language speaking anxiety. Furthermore, the results unveiled that the most frequently employed communication strategies were non-verbal strategies whereas message abandonment strategies were found to be the least. On the other hand, the level of foreign language speaking anxiety was not detected to have a statistically significant impact on students' preference of communication strategies. Nevertheless, the results presented that attempt to think in English and message abandonment strategies are moderately correlated with FLSA and play a role in determining speaking anxiety in the foreign language to a certain degree.