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Literature Review

Enhancing Learner Autonomy through Exploratory Talk with Vietnamese Secondary School ELLs: Preliminary Literature Review

Dang (2010) Shows that ICT tools can help promote learner autonomy in certain ways, but these are mostly outside of class and passive/receptive activities, not the sort of productive activities necessary for dialogic teaching. Additionally, student participation in productive activities is varied; some contribute a significant amount, others just do enough to get by. 

Van Loi (2016). This paper illustrates the difficulty in promoting learner autonomy in Vietnam. Issues arise both from students previously learned habits and teachers' perceptions of their students abilities.  Further complicating matters, the paper shows that Vietnamese teachers themselves lack autonomy to effectively implement non-traditional modes of instruction, as they are constrained by government policy and strict curricular guidelines. 

Emler (2019) shows in a doctoral dissertation that dialogic teaching is an effective method for teaching English Language Learners while keeping a high standard of achievement in class, which benefits all students. "Students reported that the class had an impact on transforming their identity, developing confidence in their voices, and activating their agency as students and citizens" which could be summarized as promoting learner autonomy. 

Mercer, Hennessy, & Warwick (2019) also show that digital technology can promote and enhance the quality of dialogue in the classroom. However, professional development is needed to help teachers navigate "the tension a teacher may feel between allowing students’ unfettered exploration of ideas and the need for them to learn the ‘right answers’..." This is certainly a concern in Vietnam as noted by Van Loi (2016).

Finally Roe & Perkins (2020) show that the educational culture of Vietnam does tend to require students to be passive and teachers to be active, and so promoting learner autonomy requires a new method of engaging in exploratory talk. Additionally, the authors point out that very little literature focuses on actually implementing change-making practices.  

So, it would seem that using an ICT tool to promote exploratory talk as in Mercer, Hennessy and Warwick (2019), along with the teacher training to use this tool effectively, could help untangle this problem and ultimately promote learner autonomy. Digital tools could help create the dialogic space that otherwise doesn't exist in Vietnamese classrooms. 

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