‘Complete freedom to choose within limits’ – teachers’ views of curricular autonomy, agency and control in Estonia, Finland and Germany

ABSTRACT

To examine different approaches to teacher autonomy in nation-states, three countries were selected for a comparative study: Estonia, Finland and Germany. The emphasis of the study lies on the subjective perceptions of upper secondary school teachers (n = 33 semi-structured interviews) regarding their curricular autonomy and experiences of being controlled by the system. The article discusses different concepts of teacher autonomy and agency theoretically and concludes that they are partly overlapping, but not the same. Agency can be understood as the realistic actualization of autonomy within the constraints of the teaching profession, while autonomy is, in theory, more liberating, focusing on self-directedness, capacity for autonomous action and freedom from control. The data analysis showed that the expectations of teachers as to the amount of desired autonomy varied greatly. While the Finnish teachers in the study perceived control over teachers’ work to be unnecessary, due to their high professionalism, the Estonian and German teachers did not advocate absence of control, instead preferring to ‘have complete freedom to choose within limits.’

KEYWORDS:

• Teacher autonomy
• agency
• professionalism
• curriculum
• comparative research
• teacher perception

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Gymnasium is a German grammar school which leads to higher education access. Until the beginning of the 2000s, gymnasium used to ccontain school years 5–13 in most German states (Länder), except Saxonia which followed the eastern German tradition of a 12-year secondary school. The reform was motivated by economic arguments that German students spend compared to their European peers too many years in education system before they start their professional careers.

2. The quotes in the results part originate from the dissertation of Erss (2015, pp. 161–240).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the European Social Fund's Doctoral Studies and Internationalization Program DoRa [grant number 30.1–9.1/756].

Notes on contributors

Maria Erss

Maria Erss is a lecturer of curriculum theory and researcher at the School of Educational Sciences in Tallinn University, Estonia. In 2015 she gained her PhD in educational sciences focusing on a comparative study of teacher autonomy in three countries. Her research interests include curriculum theory and policy, teacher autonomy and professionalism, educational change and comparative education. She has published in international journals British Journal of Educational Studies and Journal of Curriculum Studies.