Fostering Thai Students' Identities and Agency: Teacher Strategies for <scp>TED</scp>‐Style Presentations

ABSTRACT Foreign language education research has consistently acknowledged that students not only possess an array of “identities” beyond their role as mere learners, but also exercise “agency” making them active initiators and selectors of their learning actions. However, this conceptual understanding appears insufficiently reflected in practice, notably in Thai classrooms where asymmetric power relationships, teacher‐centered pedagogy, and certain cultural norms continue to prevail. To bridge this theory‐practice gap, this article presents theoretically informed strategies that the author has employed over the past 7 years to guide graduate students in delivering TED‐style presentations. These pedagogical strategies are integrated into three preparatory activities: topic selection, feedback delivery (self, peer, and teacher), and the presentation itself. The aim is to promote students' agentive actions—taking initiative, making their own choices, expressing their voices, and participating actively and legitimately. In tandem, these TED presentation instructional strategies also fostered students' positive identities as learning initiators, independent decision‐makers, advocates for their voices, legitimately engaged participants, and individuals embodying personal and professional identities to be showcased in TED‐style presentations. The article concludes by underscoring the crucial role of teachers in creating classrooms that promote identities and agency, highlighting potential caveats in implementing these strategies and offering recommendations for successfully incorporating them into EFL classrooms.