Speaker
Description
This personal account explores the self-directed development of teacher AI competence and professional agency within an under-resourced rural Vietnamese primary school. Operating independently of formal institutional frameworks, a Grade 3 English teacher navigated and integrated generative AI tools—including Suno AI, NotebookLM, and Gemini Live—into daily classroom practices over one academic semester. Grounded in systematic reflective practice, the study examines the autonomous selection, ethical adaptation, and pedagogical deployment of these emerging tools to address the rural digital divide. It highlights how bottom-up teacher agency and continuous self-reflection can effectively overcome systemic barriers, such as limited infrastructure, lack of professional training, and tool unfamiliarity. Crucially, this self-guided professional growth catalyzed a powerful learning movement, resulting in historic school achievements: 14 students qualifying for provincial competitions and three securing national prizes in the Internet Olympiads of English. This personal journey demonstrates that teacher agency is not just about tool mastery, but about pedagogical adaptation in challenging contexts. The account argues that fostering grassroots teacher agency is indispensable for ethical, sustainable technology integration in primary ELT, offering transferable, real-world strategies for educators navigating AI adoption in similar resource-constrained contexts worldwide.
Keywords: Teacher agency, AI competence, rural ELT, professional development, digital equity.
