Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and English as a Foreign Language (EFL) pre-service teacher education in Vietnam

For the last several decades, ICT has been increasingly applied in education, especially foreign language education. In order to understand the status quo as well as the effectiveness of ICT use, a vast body of research has been conducted on ICT integration and impact on relevant stake holders such as the teacher and learner. However, much of the research to date has been done in the contexts of Western and/or developed countries, and little is known about ICT integration in EFL teacher education in Vietnam, a developing country. This study was conducted at three leading institutions of teacher education located in the North, Central, and South of Vietnam. The study adopted a mixed-methods design with triangulation, collecting data from different sources: policy documents and questionnaires, semi-structured interviews, and class observations. Nine official documents issued at all three levels of state, ministry, and institution were collected. There were 186 questionnaire participants (136 EFL pre-service teachers and 50 EFL teacher educators), 19 interviewees (10 EFL pre-service teachers and 9 EFL teacher educators), and five classes observed. Data analysis was carried out using SPSS for the questionnaire responses and analytical coding for policy documents, interviews, and observations. Collected data were analyzed separately and mixed at the discussion stage to answer the research questions around ICT use in EFL teacher education, the attitudes of the EFL pre-service teachers and educators towards ICT use, how such attitudes were reflected in the actual teaching and learning practice, and the coherence between policies and ICT use in EFL teacher training programs. The study found that in the teaching and learning practice, a mix of different ICT applications were used for the purposes of developing the EFL pre-service teachers’ general ICT knowledge, the English language proficiency, and the English language pedagogical skills. This study also suggested that both the EFL pre-service teachers and educators had positive attitudes towards ICT use and those attitudes were well reflected in their teaching and learning practice. Furthermore, there appeared to be coherence between the Vietnamese Government policies and the use of ICT in the EFL teacher education programs despite the absence of official institutional guidelines/requirements for the use of ICT in the three institutions.