An investigation into oral fluency perceived by teachers and students—in a Vietnamese context of English education

Abstract

This study attempts to investigate how four groups of participants at Tra Vinh University perceive oral fluency. This study is conducted in the hope to obtain more perceptions of oral fluency so future rubrics can be developed based on such perceptions. The study used a set of items stating what oral fluency should be like, which was developed based on the Qualitative aspects of spoken language proposed by the Council of Europe (2019). To test if the items were accepted, the study invited 33 senior English-majored students, 20 English teachers with a BA, 22 English teachers with an MA, and 10 English teachers with a doctorate degree for the study. A five-point Likert scale questionnaire consisting of 18 closed-ended questions and an open-ended question was employed to collect the participants’ perceptions of oral fluency. The results showed that the participants with an MA and the participants with a doctorate degree tend to agree more with the items in the questionnaire while the other groups slightly agreed with most of the items. Furthermore, many of the participants provided the study with their own ideas about oral fluency, which were finally synthesized. Some limitations and recommendations of the study were also included.