Given the importance of corrective feedback in foreign language learning, this study aimed at exploring the effect of verbal and procedural scaffolding and conventional instruction on L2 speaking and listening anxiety. The participants of the study were 90 intermediate female EFL learners of English who were studying at ZabanNegar Institute in Qazvin, Iran. The participants were divided into two treatment groups and one control group of 30 students each and were given two separate questionnaires to measure their speaking and listening anxiety before the treatment sessions. During 10 sessions, experimental group A experienced speaking and listening instruction using corrective feedback; experimental B received speaking and listening instruction via pairing and grouping of the students; and in group C, control group, the teacher taught speaking and listening in the conventional teacher-fronted way. At the end of the treatment sessions, they were given the same two questionnaires as the posttest. The collected data were analyzed using one-way ANCOVA. The results showed there were significant differences among the three groups' speaking and listening anxiety means on the posttest. The findings suggested that procedural scaffolding was more effective than both procedural scaffolding to reduce both speaking and listening anxiety. These findings can have implications for pre-service or in-service teachers, students and material developers.

Abbas Ali Zarei is an associate professor of ‘Teaching English as a Foreign Language’ at Imam Khomeini International University in Qazvin, Iran. He has 27 years of teaching experience and has had 140 papers and 58 books published. He has also attended and presented papers at 78 conferences across the world.