The effects of peer-translanguaging on academic writing essays in Vietnamese universities

This paper examines how peer translanguaging, or the flexible application of both Vietnamese (L1) and English (L2) in academic writing by students, influences academic writing performance of Vietnamese EFL university students. The study uses the Sociocultural Theory (SCT) and the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) to analyze the role of peer translanguaging in the writing development of learners in three phases: pre-writing, during writing, and after writing. Quantitative design was applied, and a 46-item questionnaire was administered to 200 participants (N =200). The findings revealed that peer translanguaging is a strong tool in boosting idea generation, textual coherence, learner engagement, and revision quality. It also encourages inclusive learning, alleviates language anxiety, and encourages collaborative learning. Regardless of its advantages, there were certain difficulties, such as the confusion due to the dialectal variation and the inability to balance between the L1 and L2 use. The results, in general, confirm that peer translanguaging is a useful scaffolding process that promotes both linguistic and emotional growth. It is a very important pedagogical tool as a transformative approach to multilingual EFL academic writing situations.