Authentic Materials, Learners’ Confidence, Speaking Proficiency,
Vocational High School, Qualitative Research
E. This study examines the role of authentic materials and learners’ confidence in
enhancing English-speaking proficiency in a vocational high school setting in
Kabupaten Bogor, Indonesia. Employing a qualitative case study design, data
were collected through semi-structured interviews, classroom observations,
and document analysis. The data were analyzed using thematic coding, a
process that involves reduction, categorization, and interpretation. The
findings reveal that authentic materials, such as restaurant menus, reservation
forms, business emails, and service dialogue scripts, enhance students’
fluency, communicative relevance, and workplace readiness. Learners’
confidence functions as a mediating factor that influences willingness to speak,
participation, and interactional risk-taking. The interaction between authentic
input and confidence forms a reciprocal relationship, indicating that speaking
development emerges from both affective readiness and contextualized
communicative practice rather than linguistic exposure alone. The study
concludes that effective speaking instruction in vocational schools requires
pedagogical alignment between contextual learning resources, confidence
building strategies, and meaningful communicative tasks. The implications
underscore the importance of consistently integrating authentic materials,
providing supportive feedback, and collaborating on curriculum to prepare
students for effective real-world communication and employability.