Supporting Student agency

A recent article in the New York Times detailed a new teaching model that many struggling schools in the Houston Independent School System have been required to adopt over the past two years. The model is highly regimented, giving teachers little freedom to veer from intricately prescribed lesson plans (so prescribed that large timers on classroom whiteboards count down allotted times – teaching, thinking, and sharing ideas all within a strict number of minutes and seconds). Teachers and classrooms are closely observed for adherence to the program and the minute-by-minute lesson timeframes. The article described one classroom lesson this way:

The teacher leading the English lesson allowed her fourth graders “10 more seconds to log in” for tech problems. Then she asked the class to read a passage to determine the author’s motivations, set the timer to one minute, and called out at the 25- and 15-second marks. Students took 30 seconds to share answers with a partner before their daily 10-minute quiz.

As I read the article, all I could think about was research on student agency, the powerful benefits agency brings about, and the autonomy-supporting teaching style that supports it. We’ve written for a long time about the importance of agency – for all members of a school community. In our Radically Reimagined Relationships framework, Agency and Trust is one of our key indicators. 

In order to help students develop agency, teachers need to support students’ autonomy. The benefits are real. In their article, How teachers can support students’ agentic engagement, Johnmarshall Reeve and Stephanie Shin note the wealth of research on the positive effects of autonomy support, which include “increased classroom engagement, conceptual learning, skill development, academic achievement, performance, prosocial behavior, positive self-concept…[and decreases in] amotivation, classroom disengagement, antisocial behavior, problematic peer relationships, and emotional exhaustion.”

Because here’s the thing: a student with agency is not being acted upon. A student with agency will feel that they have the skills and ability to deeply engage with the classroom activities and – importantly – even have the potential to influence what is happening. Agency is an inherently reciprocal process. A student can’t have agency if teachers aren’t legitimately responsive to them and open to their influence. This doesn’t mean that students run the show. It does mean that when a student asks questions, makes suggestions, or expresses opinions and desires, teachers are responsive.

There are things we can do to become more autonomy supportive. We can pay attention to our students’ inner resources and motivations and make room in our lessons for students’ interests. We can help students understand why we are doing what we are doing. Not everything is inherently interesting, but we can help students understand the roadmap of skills that may be in our heads but is not yet in theirs. When we give feedback, we can use more inviting and collaborative language: Rather than You need to fix it this way, we can say, I’d love for you to try it this way. Would you be willing to give it another go?  We can make room for students’ perspectives and even their harsher criticisms. When a student complains, we can ask them to tell us more about what they are feeling, and we can consider whether they might just have a point. Supporting students’ autonomy and agency isn’t about ceding all control to students but about helping students develop the inner resources and skills to become powerful actors in their own lives. Reeve and Shin put it this way: “In general, this means asking students what they want, listening to what they say, being responsive to students’ input and suggestions, and appreciating the engagement-fostering potency of students’ interests, goals, and personal strivings.”

Back in Houston, proponents of the regimented model are touting the significant gains already made on standardized tests. By this measure, many schools have gone from passing to failing grades in a very short period. What is less clear is what opportunities for learning and growth are being lost, and whether those students and teachers are being served in the long run. What is very clear is that neither the teachers nor the students have much – if any – agency.