Promoting Willingness to Communicate in Synchronous Online EFL Classrooms: Vietnamese Secondary School Teachers' Beliefs and Practices

Abstract

Although students' willingness to communicate (WTC) inside the classroom is a growing research interest in second and foreign language (L2) education, little research has investigated L2 teachers' strategies to promote students' WTC in Asian contexts. This study explores Vietnamese secondary school teachers' beliefs and practices regarding promoting English as a foreign language (EFL) students' WTC inside the classroom. The sample included eight EFL teachers (three males and five females) from two Vietnamese secondary schools. After we analyzed the recordings of classroom procedures available in the schools' archives, we sent an email invitation to the teachers. Eight teachers were invited to participate in 40-minute semi-structured interviews. The results show that the teachers' belief systems were complex and dynamic. Surprisingly, the contextual factors, teachers' experience, teachers' gender, and technological constraints were found to affect their beliefs and practices. Also, there were more congruences than incongruences between the teachers' beliefs and practices concerning L2 WTC inside the classroom.