“I’m really worried for my teaching spirit”: professional agency, curriculum change and the primary arts specialist teacher

ABSTRACT

Arts specialist teachers have a unique place in primary schools. They are often the sole teacher responsible for an entire learning area and hence commonly provide leadership and drive the curriculum implementation of the arts in and for their school. This responsibility finds us asking questions about the ability of arts specialist teachers to create professional agency in an increasingly challenging school environment. Using a narrative portraiture approach, and seven propositions for professional agency, we focus on a single teacher in order to consider how both individual and structural elements are understood from the perspective of an arts specialist. Conditions explored include relationships, time, purpose and constraints, work-related identity, experiences, and work communities. Challenges such as isolation, ongoing support and the development of community are highlighted as potential difficulties in the process of developing agency. The study contributes to an understanding of the personal cost and potential growth the development of professional agency provides.

KEYWORDS:

• Professional agency
• curriculum change
• narrative portraiture
• arts education
• arts specialist teachers

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Dance, drama, media, music and visual arts.

2. A pseudonym.

3. This ‘arts-residency’ comprised of a day spent each week for a term at St Albertine’s teaching with, and mentoring Penny by the lead author. This was not an ‘artist in residence’ program as traditionally understood but was focused on arts-rich experiences for students with the associated opportunity to foster professional development through modelling and support over an extended period of time.

4. National Assessment Program Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) is a standardised testing regime in which all Australian Year 3, 5, 7 and 9 students sit annually. Results from this testing program are used by systems, sectors and schools to target strengths and weaknesses in the teaching learning process.

5. NAIDOC stands for National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee. Activities in this week aim to increase awareness in the wider community of the status and treatment of Indigenous Australians.

6. Duties other than teaching (DOTT) refers to the negotiated entitlement in the Western Australian Teachers Conditions and Award that allows for mandated time not teaching a class designated for preparation and marking. It is colloquially called DOTT-Time.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sian Chapman

Sian Chapman is a Lecturer in the School of Health Sciences at the University of Notre Dame, Australia. Her background is in dance education and she has over twenty-five years’ experience as an educator. Sian has just completed a PhD at Murdoch University. Her research interests lie in arts and movement, curriculum theory, practice and education policy practices.

Peter Wright

Peter Wright is Associate Professor of Arts Education and Research Methods at Murdoch University in Perth, Western Australia. He works across the Arts with a commitment to personal, social and cultural inquiry, agency, education and expression, health and wellbeing. Central to this work is an interest in socio-aesthetic pedagogy, social justice, and social inclusion, and ways they are mediated in and through the Arts. He is recently published in Arts Education Policy Review and Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education.

Robin Pascoe

Robin Pascoe is Senior Lecturer in Arts and Drama Education, School of Education, Murdoch University, Perth Western Australia. He teaches Drama and the Curriculum (Secondary, Teaching the Arts (Early Childhood and Primary) and Engaging Communities through Drama. Robin’s research interests include: arts and drama education, teacher education, curriculum and curriculum implementation, assessment in the arts and drama. Robin is also currently President of IDEA, International Drama/Theatre and Education Association. He has been a curriculum writer and worked as policy officer and Superintendent in the Arts, Department of Education Western Australia.