VietTESOL International Convention 2026

This study examines how 15 B1–B2 level students in a multicultural Content and Language Integrated Learning (CLIL) English Communication class at a private university in Tokyo perceived content-aligned small talk activities, framed through the heuristic pyramid model of willingness to communicate (WTC; MacIntyre et al., 1998). During a 13-week semester, students engaged in ten five-minute conversational sessions, six of which with instructor-prepared content-aligned questions and four with open prompts. At the end of the semester, a bilingual survey consisting of 16 Likert items and open-ended questions was administered. Data gathered were analyzed quantitatively and through reflexive thematic analysis. Students reported strong enjoyment (M = 4.40), low nervousness (M = 2.73), and near-universal agreement that small talk should occur every session (93.3%). Identified themes mapped clearly onto WTC pyramid layers, namely, rising state communicative self-confidence, interpersonal and intergroup motivation in the multicultural cohort, and transfer to L2 use beyond the classroom such as at English café, part-time work, and other courses. Japanese and international students differed in how they articulated benefits, with Japanese students foregrounding anxiety-to-confidence shifts and international students foregrounding intergroup motivation. Implications are drawn for L2 pedagogy in multicultural higher education contexts where WTC development is a curricular priority.