Communicative Language Teaching is an approach which involves learners in real communication and information sharing. Now the English language textbooks claim that they CJ'e based on CLT The implication is that learners are expected to involve themselves in either .,;creating· meanings or receiving meanings or both. However, in actual English communicative classrooms, many students in Nefasmewucha Preparatory School in Laygaynt Woreda are found reluctant' to participate in speaking activities. The main purpose of this study is to identify the problems behind students who are reluctant to speak in EFL classroom in Laygaynt Woreda Nefasmewucha preparatory . school. Both quantitative and qualitative research design was used. . The researcher used three data gathering instruments. These are questionnaire with 22 closedended items with five options such as always (5), often (4), sometimes (3), rarely (2) and never (I); semi-structured interview for both students and teachers and classroom observation. Data were 'gathered from I 00 students through the questionnaire and 15 students and 6 EFL ieachers through interview and through 5 classroom observation of 5 EFL teachers. The reluctant students to fill the questionnaire were selected from each class purposely. The teachers for interview and classroom observation were selected from 11 teachers randomly using lottery techniques. The quantitative data were organized into tables and mean, variance, expected mean a~d t;lest we're used t~ interpret the r~sult~. The qualitative data were organized into "" themes. of th""-esearch questions and described tn words. The resulfs showed that students lack of experience , students' fear to participate and shortage of words to talk on the topic .. and the seating arrangement have been found as the main causes of students' reluctance to participate in speaking activities. It has also been seen that still there is considerable focus on grammar by both teachers and students ignoring speaking activities. It has also been found out that the teachers' initiation to solve problems of reluctance is low and the solutions they take are limited. · Unless these problems are solved, the students' reluctance in speaking activities will continue to exist.