An exploration into development of Iranian EFL learners’ oral fluency through online dynamic assessment: a case study

This case study examined the effectiveness of interactionist Dynamic Assessment (DA) in diagnosing and fostering the development of learners’ oral fluency. To achieve this, four independent EFL learners participated in six individual online DA sessions, followed by a transcendence session. During the DA and transcendence sessions, learners’ interactions with the mediator were audio-recorded for analysis. Microgenetic analysis was employed to identify and categorize the different mediation typologies based on the linguistic components that most influenced learners’ oral fluency. The findings indicated that lexical and grammatical issues were the primary sources of speech disfluency. Additionally, the microgenetic analysis highlighted noticeable improvements in the quality and quantity of mediation provided to learners, signifying a shift in their development from other-regulation to self-regulation and demonstrating growing autonomy in language use.