Agency Of Chinese University EFL Learners In Developing Their Oral English:an Ecological Perspective

Oral English development constitutes an essential part of Chinese university EFL(English as a Foreign Language)learners’ language learning due to its increasing significance in a globalized world.Given the fact that the EFL context has been regarded as providing limited access to the target language,it is significant for learners to exercise agency within and outside the classroom in order to develop their oral English.Existing research on learner agency in the field of Second Language Acquisition(SLA)has been predominantly carried out from other perspectives,such as cognitive approaches,sociocultural approaches,etc.,few attempts,however,have been made to investigate learner agency from the ecological perspective,which regards provides a holistic perspective to investigate learner agency by combining spatial factors and temporal factors and regards agency as something emerging from the interaction between individual learners and the‘ecology’of their learning environment.With the aim to provide a holistic perspective to investigate learner agency and to explore how and why Chinese university EFL learners enact agency in developing their oral English,the present study adopted the ecological framework on agency as its theoretical underpinning and undertook a qualitative study among six participants at a university in China.In particular,it addressed two research questions:1)What agentic orientation do Chinese university EFL learners demonstrate in developing their oral English?2)What are the underlying factors within each dimension that contribute to the achievement of their agency?How do these factors influence their agency?Semi-structured interviews,reflective journals,and classroom observation as well as field notes were used to collect data,which was then subjected to qualitative thematic analysis.The findings revealed that participants displayed three agency patterns of agentic orientations in developing their oral English:future-oriented agency-continuous engagement,present-oriented agency-a problem-solving manner,and past-oriented agency-avoidance.The first pattern denoted that learners exhibited a high level of agency by consistently engaging in various speaking activities or creating opportunities for practicing their oral English despite the contextual constraints imposed by their restricted access to the target language.Their agentic choices and actions were mainly driven by a range of future aspirations from the projective dimension.The second pattern suggested that learners’ agentic choices and actions were mainly employed to address the challenges that they met in the ecology of their present learning environment.The third pattern implied that learners avoided involving themselves in a variety of speaking activities to practice their oral English and taking steps to deal with the challenges they encountered.Their agentic choices and actions were mainly influenced by their prior thinking pattern and behavioral schema.It was the interplay of three dimensions that helped to achieve their agency patterns.Furthermore,several factors within each dimension were identified.In particular,the iterational dimension had to do with learners’ life histories and English learning histories.The projective dimension had to do with their long-term career and academic learning goals,and long-term and short-term goals regarding oral English.The practical-evaluative dimension included structural factors,cultural factors,and material factors.In particular,structural factors concerned the macro-socioeconomic environment and the diverse relationships in their learning context.Cultural factors had to do with their beliefs regarding English major(s),oral English,and good leaners.Material factors had to do with resources available in their learning context and the physical environment.Each agency pattern was a result of the interplay of these factors.This study is beneficial in that it enriches the conceptualization of learner agency from an ecological perspective on the one hand,and informs the teaching and learning practices regarding oral English on the other hand.