Student Attitudes and Speaking Assessment

MEXT argues that amid ongoing globalization, it is essential that universities develop an educational environment where students can acquire English speaking skills.Within its Five Recommendations on the English Education Reform Plan Responding to the Rapid Globalization, MEXT also calls for the improvement of evaluation methods while taking into account students' motivations and attitudes.This paper details one cycle of a multi-cycle action research process that critically analyses current evaluation methods in a local context and students' attitudes towards them.Both qualitative and quantitative data were collected, analysed and triangulated via an emic perspective, with qualitative data analysed inductively and quantitative data analysed through the Rasch model.Data analysis found that students experience a range of strong emotions during conversation in the classroom, and particularly during the assessment of this conversation.The most prominent of these emotions was nervousness.Observation and reflection highlight potential sources for this nervousness and propose future pedagogical and research approaches that can help mitigate this nervousness during assessment.