Leveraging Educational Technologies to Boost and Assess Spoken Fluency: A Systematic Review in Elementary and Secondary Schools

Abstract

This systematic review examines how educational technologies enhance and assess spoken English fluency in elementary and secondary school. Analysing 20 studies (2010–2025) using PRISMA 2020, findings reveal linguistic gains in terms of speech rate, decrease in pauses and self-corrections. Common instructional strategies included task repetition, pre-task planning, and awareness raising through role-playing, video production, and gamification. Web 2.0 tools (45%) were most prevalent, followed by CALL/MALL (30%), social medias (25%), and generative AI (20%); percentages sum to over 100% as studies utilized multiple tools. Assessment practices shifted from manual recordings and rubrics to AI-driven automated scoring (ASR/NLP), enabling real-time feedback and interactive tools like chatbots. Despite these advances, challenges such as technical limitations, bias, and language standardization remain, highlighting the need to supplement AI-based practice with classroom role-play for fairness and authenticity. Results suggest educational technologies significantly improve fluency, offering insights for educators and researchers in technology-enhanced language learning.