Teacher Agency: Do teachers want to shake the tree? A study of teachers' responses to agency in the redeveloped curriculum
Citation:
Nally, Máiréad, Teacher Agency: Do teachers want to shake the tree? A study of teachers' responses to agency in the redeveloped curriculum, Trinity College Dublin, School of Education, Education, 2024Download Item:
Abstract:
This dissertation reports the findings of a qualitative practitioner study into teacher agency among teachers of junior classes in one Irish primary school. Teachers engaged in an inquiry-based learning intervention and worked within a community of practice, as they reflected on their experience of and responses to teacher agency. The last decade has seen a surge of research and policy interest in teacher agency, with teacher agency being foregrounded in the curricula of several countries (Priestley et al., 2015b). Teacher agency is often conceptualised as the ability of teachers to work as decision-makers, enacting meaningful learning experiences within their settings (Leijen et al., 2020; Vähäsantanen, 2015). Arguably the most influential theory of teacher agency at present derives from Biesta and Tedders (2007) ecological model, where it is recognised that teacher agency is always achieved in relation to contextual factors. As teacher agency is generally presented as a factor in promoting educational reform, the study of teacher agency in an Irish context is particularly relevant to the ongoing redevelopment of primary education. The Primary Curriculum Framework (DE, 2023), which will come into effect in schools from September 2025, embeds teacher agency in the vision of the curriculum. This study emerges at a timely juncture between the publication of the curriculum and its implementation in schools. It aims to make a contribution to the literature on teacher agency by capturing the lived reality of teacher agency in the context of ongoing curriculum reform. The study takes the form of qualitative practitioner research, conducted within my own school setting. A community of practice (CoP) was developed with six teaching colleagues from junior classes (Junior Infants to 2nd class). This CoP collaborated over the course of four months to develop their understanding of teacher agency and inquiry-based learning (IBL). Participants attended three IBL workshops, conducted inquiry with their classes for three months, and engaged in reflection on key themes throughout the research period. Interviews, participant diaries, and visual methods were used to generate data about teachers' responses to agency and inquiry. Findings reveal the complexity of teacher agency: a desire for agency in order to confidently enact child-led pedagogy; scepticism about the desire of other teachers for agency; distrust of management’s support for agentic practice and for teachers as decision-makers rather than implementers of school plans; and appreciation of the benefits of inquiry-based learning (IBL). The factors which influence teacher agency in this study might be thought of as '4 Cs': context, confidence, colleagues, and classroom walls. Contextual impacts on teacher agency have been theorised (Priestley et al., 2015a; Vähäsantanen, 2015) and empirically described (Karimpour et al., 2023; Ashton, 2021; Poulton, 2020) in existing literature. The present study adds to the research base by capturing the context of the COVID-19 pandemic with its regulations for social distancing of school children and staff, extensive sanitation protocols, and considerable flux in school attendance caused by health guidance. Confidence emerged as an influential element of teacher agency: the aspect of agency which most significantly determined its achievement or otherwise. Teacher agency was impacted positively by peer relationships but the data reveal the consequences of distant and hierarchical relationships with school management. Classroom walls were found to have a delimiting effect on teacher agency, as participants sought agentic practice within classrooms but negated their role as agents at school level. Overall, the findings pose challenges for the agentic professionalism envisaged in the new Primary Curriculum Framework. The study proposes an incremental model of teacher agency which encompasses the hesitant approach of these teachers towards agency and indicates some of the scaffolds which might support teacher agency. It is hoped that this model might support the transition from theory around teacher agency to embodied practices. The research provides an Irish perspective on the international study of teacher agency, and contributes the voices of practitioners in the field to the work of policy-makers as they develop the specification and supports for implementing the redeveloped curriculum in the coming years.
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APPROVED
Author: Nally, Máiréad
Advisor:
Bacon, KarinO'Sullivan, Carmel
Publisher:
Trinity College Dublin. School of Education. Discipline of EducationType of material:
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