This study attempts to investigate the prevalence of grammar-related speaking anxiety among Bangladeshi secondary school ESL learners. In many secondary classrooms in Bangladesh, teachers place excessive emphasis on grammatical accuracy. Consequently, students often experience anxiety while speaking English, particularly regarding whether their spoken language is grammatically correct both inside and outside the classroom. The study aims to explore the levels of anxiety related to grammatical errors that discourage secondary ESL students from speaking. Furthermore, the study examines the core reasons for teachers’ excessive insistence on grammatical accuracy rather than oral participation. The researcher adopted a mixed-method research design incorporating both qualitative and quantitative approaches and collected data from urban and rural secondary school ESL learners in Bangladesh using a structured survey. The questionnaire was administered to both urban and rural students to measure their levels of speaking anxiety influenced by teachers’ focus on grammatical accuracy. The findings show that most students experience nervousness during English speaking, resulting in moderate to high anxiety levels due to fear of making grammar mistakes and frequent teacher corrections. A notable positive relationship was observed between teachers’ focus on grammatical accuracy and students’ anxiety levels, and rural students reported higher anxiety compared to their urban peers. The results highlight the necessity of providing more opportunities for spontaneous speaking, reducing continuous correction of grammatical errors, and building students’confidence in oral communication.
Keywords: Bangladesh, ESL Learners, Speaking Anxiety, grammar-related speaking anxiety, grammatical accuracy, oral communication, secondary school students, teacher correction.
