Cultivating student agency through teachers’ professional learning

ABSTRACT

Thoughtfully planned professional development (PD) that fosters teacher agency has the potential to impact student agency in the literacy classroom. Drawing on a body of research with 82 teachers across multiple schools and clinical settings, this article first presents findings from a variety of PD contexts that are synthesized to highlight four guiding principles for designing professional learning that encourages both teacher and student agency. Then, the article illustrates one vignette of agentive literacy teaching, which was subsequently facilitative of students’ agentic engagement with vocabulary learning. Throughout, the case is made that intentional and embedded opportunities for co-construction of knowledge and reciprocity between PD providers and teachers, teachers and leadership, and teachers and students are important ingredients for an agentic learning experience. Finally, conclusions are drawn emphasizing that teacher and student agency are forces of empowerment, critical to student and teacher well-being.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional Resources

1. Duke, N. K., Purcell-Gates, V., Hall, L. A., & Tower, C. (2006). Authentic literacy activities for developing comprehension and writing. The Reading Teacher, 60, 344–355. doi: 10.1598/RT.60.4.4

Duke, Purcell-Gates, Hall, and Tower discuss authenticity as a vehicle to improving comprehension and writing instruction in the elementary classroom. Filled with ideas for grounding teaching in student interests, experiences, and community engagement, the article promotes teaching that support student agency in literacy.

2. View, J. L., & Hanley, M. S. (2016). The playwright within: Fun, freedom, and agency through playwriting for urban elementary students. Urban Education. Advance online publication. doi: 10.1177/0042085916654524

Examining the arts as a means of interrupting fourth grade students’ sense of alienation in school, View and Hanley make a strong case for literacy teaching that puts student voice at the center of the learning work. Ultimately, students who originally felt “talked at” and unheard found classroom space to write creatively and agentically.

3. Duke, N. K., Halvorsen, A., & Strachan, S. L. (2016). Project-based learning not just for STEM anymore: The research is clear that social studies and literacy are fertile ground for robust project-based learning. Phi Delta Kappan, 98, 14–19. Retrieved from http://pdk.sagepub.com/

This article considers project-based learning for its capacity to facilitate meaningful literacy learning grounded in student choice, voice, and community-based motivations. In project-based learning conceptualized as student-led, the students must act agentively to develop projects that meet their personal and social goals.