Cultivating intercultural learning in EFL through a staged VR-mediated multimodal design

Purpose This Innovative Practice article describes a staged pedagogical design developed to address persistent difficulties in operationalizing intercultural language teaching (ILT) in EFL contexts with limited intercultural encounters, where ILT is often underdeveloped in classroom practice.Design/methodology/approach Implemented in a Taiwanese university EFL course and framed as a context–specific process of innovating, the staged design drew on ILT principles of noticing, comparing, reflecting, and interacting to negotiate meaning, and the notion of a third place for mediating perspectives. It sequenced increasingly demanding tasks from (1) systematic intracultural analysis, to (2) taking on the role of cultural knowledge producers through virtual reality (VR)–mediated multimodal composition, and finally to (3) practicing anticipatory intercultural perspective–taking through mediated and imagined audiences afforded by VR, without direct intercultural contact. Students analyzed archived cultural videos using ILT–guided questions, designed VR galleries in Spatial for differentiated imagined visitors, and conducted VR tours requiring real–time cultural mediation.Findings The design illustrates how staged tasks can operationalize ILT processes through multimodal and VR affordances, creating structured opportunities for cultural interpretation and anticipatory intercultural mediation in intracultural settings with limited intercultural contact. The evidence documents uneven task–based engagement with these processes but does not establish individual intercultural or linguistic development.Originality/value This staged design, functioning as the key innovative mechanism, provides a context–specific approach to operationalizing ILT through staged VR–mediated tasks by documenting the design inputs, iterative processes, and learning products.