Abstract This paper reports a case study that explores elementary learners’ reading anxiety over Chinese as a second language (CSL). Two elementary CSL learners were chosen as research participants. Lived experience descriptions, think-aloud, retrospective interviews, field observations, and research journal writings were used to investigate the sources of elementary CSL learners’ reading anxiety and the ways employed to reduce their reading anxiety. The data were analyzed by Moustakas’ (1994) data analysis procedures, Creswell’s (2007) three steps, and Bogdon & Biklen’s (1992) data analysis methods. Results show that elementary CSL learners do have reading anxiety in their reading process and the sources of the anxiety include cross-linguistic differences between English and Chinese expressions, lack of previous knowledge, difficult and complex vocabulary, wrong guesses, and comprehension difficulties. Both participants tried to use strategies such as guessing, looking up words, understanding two character words based on the meaning of each character, skipping and keeping reading, and using previous knowledge to predict the rest of the text to reduce their reading anxiety. The present study provides both theoretical and pedagogical implications in the field of CSL reading learning and teaching.

中文翻译：

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初级CSL学习者阅读焦虑案例研究

摘要本文报道了一个案例研究，探讨了小学生对汉语作为第二语言（CSL）的阅读焦虑。选择了两名基本的CSL学习者作为研究参与者。使用现场经验描述，思考方式，回顾性访谈，实地观察和研究期刊著作来调查基本的CSL学习者阅读焦虑的来源以及减轻其阅读焦虑的方法。通过Moustakas（1994）的数据分析程序，Creswell（2007）的三个步骤以及Bogdon＆Biklen（1992）的数据分析方法对数据进行分析。结果显示，基本的CSL学习者在阅读过程中确实存在阅读焦虑，并且焦虑的来源包括英汉表达之间的跨语言差异，缺乏先验知识，困难而复杂的词汇，错误的猜测和理解困难。两位参与者都尝试使用诸如猜测，查找单词，根据每个字符的含义理解两个单词，跳过并保持阅读以及使用先前的知识来预测文本的其余部分以减少阅读焦虑的策略。本研究在CSL阅读学习和教学领域提供了理论和教学意义。