English discourse awareness in Vietnamese tertiary education

Abstract

The term “Discourse Awareness” is a new concept in Vietnam. Discourse awareness, conceptualized as a classroom pedagogy, can improve students’ language capacity and has gained popularity over time. Our literature review suggested that there has been little research into this domain locally in Vietnam. This paper aims to discuss the ecology of the concept, examine its developments in Vietnamese tertiary education, and make some arguments for raising students’ discourse awareness in teaching and learning English. It introduces the literature review on discourse awareness in Vietnam, which presents an overview of the supportive role of discourse awareness development in English language teaching and learning. Findings outlined how discourse awareness-raising activities have extensively and successfully been exploited in language classrooms through teaching and learning practices, teacher education, literacy development, and maximizing the cultural competence of language learners. Since then, it is reasonable to hold a strong belief that discourse awareness can serve as an enabling tool to facilitate students’ communication.