VietTESOL International Convention 2026

As Vietnam shifts toward ESL-oriented English education, improving students’ speaking confidence and classroom participation has become increasingly important in English language teaching. This research investigates the effects of translanguaging strategies on 70 Vietnamese high school students’ speaking confidence and classroom interaction in English speaking lessons. In this study, students in the experimental group were encouraged to use both Vietnamese and English during speaking activities to develop ideas, facilitate communication, and collaborate with peers. Grounded in communicative language teaching and translanguaging theory, a mixed-method design was employed to collect the data for the study. Quantitative data was obtained through pre-and post-tests and questionnaires while qualitative data was gained through classroom observations and semi-structured interviews. The findings revealed that using translanguaging strategies had a beneficial impact on the students’ speaking confidence, willingness to communicate and participation in speaking activities. Results from paired-sample and independent-sample t-tests showed significant differences between the experimental and control group which suggests that translanguaging can effectively support speaking confidence development. Also, the students’ positive responses from interviews and observations also showed that translanguaging helped reduce speaking anxiety and created a comfortable environment for expressing ideas when they were allowed to use their full linguistic resources during classroom interaction. The study highlights the pedagogical value of translanguaging in creating supportive and interaction-oriented speaking environments and offers implications for multilingual pedagogy in Vietnam’s ongoing EFL-to-ESL transition.