Download - Teacher Agency in Curriculum Contexts

Editorial

Teacher Agency in Curriculum Contextscuri_593 183..190

ELIZABETH CAMPBELL

Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of TorontoToronto, ON, Canada

The concept of human agency has been discussed and debated over theyears by, among others, philosophers, sociologists, psychologists, politicalscientists, and anthropologists. Simply defined, the state of agency enablesindividuals (and, to some, collectives) to make free or independentchoices, to engage in autonomous actions, and to exercise judgment in theinterests of others and oneself. It also can describe those who have thecapacity to act on the behalf of others. Educational scholarship frequentlypositions the examination of agency from the perspective of the teacher’srole. The capacity of teachers to use professional discretion in their peda-gogical and curricular practices exists, not always easily, alongside theiraccountability to the state, which generally maintains the overall authorityfor educational policy. Teachers are seen as alternatively agents of social-ization as well as change agents, whose choices and actions variably reflectthe implementation, interpretation, adaptation, alteration, substitution,subversion, and/or creation of the curriculum contexts in which they work.Some of these expressions of agency stand in evident tension with oneanother.

Such tension highlights the value of contemplating the question point-edly raised in the first article in this issue of Curriculum Inquiry; in it theauthors, Priestley, Edwards, Miller, and Priestley, ask, “Agency for what?” Inconsidering what aims, purposes and ends does, and indeed should,teacher agency serve, we might question, as do the authors, whether agencyis uniformly positive and beneficial; we might also ask whether agency isbest expressed through its support of or challenge to normative educa-tional discourses and expectations. Of course, our likely answers are diver-gent, changeable, and context-specific, inevitably rooted in values andassumptions of a political, social, and philosophical nature.

Teacher agency has also been defined in moral terms; for example,Buzzelli and Johnston (2002) argue that “teaching is fundamentally amoral activity, that classrooms are sites of moral interaction, and that

© 2012 by The Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of TorontoCurriculum Inquiry 42:2 (2012)Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc., 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA, and 9600 Garsington Road,Oxford OX4 2DQ, UKdoi: 10.1111/j.1467-873X.2012.00593.x

teachers are moral agents” (p. 118). Hugh Sockett (1993) describesmoral agency as being a fairly generalized state in which “a person con-siders the interests of others, does not make discriminations on irrelevantgrounds, and has a clear set of principles or virtues in which he or shebelieves and on which he or she acts” (p. 108). And, in my own work, Iexplore moral agency as a “double-pronged state that entails a dual com-mitment on the part of the teacher. The first relates to the exactingethical standards the teacher as a moral person and a moral professionalholds himself or herself to, and the second concerns the teacher as amoral educator, model, and exemplar . . . [these are interrelated] asteachers, through their actions, words, and attitudes, may be seen to beliving by the same principles that they hope students will embrace”(Campbell, 2003, p. 2).

This dual perspective can be adapted more broadly beyond a focus onthe moral to position teacher agency in terms of, firstly, a teacher’s com-mitment to governing his or her professional practice according to deeplyheld values, convictions, and beliefs about teaching, learning, and episte-mology. The teacher’s capacity to engage students in curricular experi-ences that are compatible with these values is a powerful measure of his orher agential potential. Again, in their discussion of teacher agency, Buzzelliand Johnston (2002) note that “teaching is an activity involving a deepawareness of the significance of one’s choices and how those choicesinfluence the development and well-being of others” (p. 120). Secondly, asan extension of their own agency, teachers need to respect the agency oftheir students as autonomous human beings. In asking themselves whatthey are trying to achieve in their classroom interactions, teachers need alsoto consider this from the point of view of cultivating and fostering studentagency. And, to return to the core question previously introduced, theyneed to reflect on both of these perspectives in terms of the question,“Agency for what?” What do they strive for as a result of their own agencyand what do they similarly aim to facilitate in their students’ ongoingdevelopment of agency?

These questions about agency provide a possible lens through which toview the five articles that follow. Collectively, they provoke significant ques-tions about teaching, learning, schooling, and curriculum making withincontemporary policy contexts. The first three by Priestley et al., Zanaza-nian, and Sonu, respectively, document empirical accounts of school basedstudies that explicitly refer, to varying degrees, to conceptions of agency.The fourth article by Stagg Peterson is a content analysis of curriculardocuments for writing; and, in the fifth article, Sanger presents a concep-tual essay arguing an analogous connection between modern ethical theo-ries, as critiqued by Stocker, and his own critical perspective on “prevailingeducational ideology.” While neither of the latter two articles uses theterminology of agency, each explores important curricular issues that havepotential implications for agency. Thus, the purpose of this editorial is to

184 ELIZABETH CAMPBELL

introduce each article briefly as it relates, either explicitly or implicitly, tothis overall theme.

In their article, “Teacher Agency in Curriculum Making: Agents ofChange and Spaces for Manoeuvre,” Priestley et al. offer a rigorous exami-nation of the concept of agency, specifically teacher agency, as an “under-theorized” and “misconstrued” phenomenon. In their extensive theoreticalaccount of agency, they warn of several misconceptions and assumptionsthat often underpin discussions of agency. For example, they challenge thenotion that change and agency are the same things and that they areuniformly and narrowly positive; they question the extent to which teacherscan achieve agency; and, they conclude that this capacity varies acrosscontexts and is dependent on both “environmental conditions of possibilityand constraint” and the teacher’s ability to “mobilize” their “beliefs, valuesand attributes” in response to particular conditions, including externallydeveloped policy. They caution us about adopting “an overly individualisticview of agency” (p. 191) that de-emphasizes the impact of society’s forces andstructures, while also dismissing positions that over-interpret the power ofsuch forces and structures to represent individuals as helpless and depen-dent, rather than as autonomous beings. Consequently, the article’s concep-tual framework is influenced by Biesta and Tedder’s “ecological” view ofindividual human agency in which agency is “a matter of personal capacity toact, combined with the contingencies of the environment within which suchaction occurs” (p. 196).

To explore the potential for individuals, in this case teachers, to achieveagency in ways that wavered and varied from situation to situation, Priestleyet al. observed classrooms in a Scottish high school. They also interviewedteachers and students as part of a larger project on agency. The policycontext of the school was one framed by curricular reforms that prioritizedstudent attainment and sought to elevate academic achievement standardsas measured by standardized testing. The resultant “cultural ecology of theschool” (p. 194) at times enabled some teachers “to be agentic” (p. 202),perhaps surprisingly, because most perceived the attainment agenda to be asignificant barrier or constraint to their own sense of individual autonomyand agency.

Nonetheless, some teachers more than others seem able to navigatearound such constraints to “engage in curriculum making” (p. 208) in theirclasses based on strongly held views about teaching and what should consti-tute student learning. In this respect teacher agency is revealed throughaction based on espoused beliefs as well as attentiveness to the furthering ofstudent agency. The article, however, also reveals how articulated beliefs andconvictions were not uniformly manifested in practice, thus impinging onagency. The ebb and flow of agency, as illustrated in case studies of threetechnological studies and biology teachers, offer much to contemplate. And,on a promising note that should encourage teachers not to foreclose on theirindividual professional autonomy under the pressure of reform agenda,

185TEACHER AGENCY IN CURRICULUM CONTEXTS

Priestley et al. convincingly conclude that while agency may be achieved tochallenge “current school discourses,” it can also be achieved to enrich andsupport them.

The agential capacity for teachers to interpret and shape the curriculumexperiences of their students is similarly relevant to issues addressed in thesecond article, entitled, “Historical Consciousness and the Structuring ofGroup Boundaries: A Look at Two Francophone School History TeachersRegarding Quebec’s Anglophone Minority.” In this article, author PaulZanazanian reports evidence from his qualitative study of Francophonehistory teachers in the Canadian province of Quebec. The study exploredthese teachers’ historical consciousness in terms of how they perceive thehistorical past and how they represent it to contemporary students, specifi-cally in relation to the prior and continuing role of Quebec’s Anglophoneminority. Importantly, their construction of reality which reflects how theymake sense of the past is shown as central to the negotiation of “theiragency towards the significant Other” (p. 217), in this case the Anglo-Québéçois. And, engaging with this “Other” in past and current contexts,both fraught at varying times with conflict and tension, underpins percep-tions of inter-group power relations and group boundaries that have serveddivisive ends.

Zanazanian situates his study conceptually within a carefully describedtheory of “ethno-cultural agency” (p. 219). This specific view of agency isattentive to both the teachers’ own “sensitivity to Anglophone social reali-ties and historical experiences” (p. 217) and “their willingness to transmitsuch information to students” (p. 217). Thus, agency for the teachers isachieved when they make “moral decisions” (p. 217) built on “ethicalmotives” (p. 218) to embrace the historical agency of the Other; one mightadd that it is further achieved when teachers respect the agency of theirstudents in the ways they organize and represent curricular content in theirlessons. While the two teachers described in this article adopt quite differ-ent approaches to the teaching of the Anglo-Québéçois narrative, bothmay be seen to achieve a level of agency as history teachers. Zanazanianconcludes:

Seeking to teach history as a moral act for knowing and doing, my overall approachconsists of enabling teachers and students to recognize both their active involve-ment in the making of history and the many ways in which humans interact with thepast in constructing social reality. It is hoped that such an acknowledgement wouldnot only lead to appreciating the usefulness of history for living life, but also tounderstanding the different workings of historical consciousness on human identityand agency. (p. 235)

In the third article, “Illusions of Compliance: Performing the Public andHidden Transcripts of Social Justice Education in Neoliberal Times,”Debbie Sonu explores the twists and turns of agency as it is realized in


multiple and contrasting curricular contexts within one high school inBrooklyn, New York. Sonu describes Justice High, a specially focused schoolin which teachers and students strive to advance social justice educationwithin an overall education system “increasingly driven by market mentali-ties of efficiency, evaluation, and standardized practices” (p. 240). Thecentral questions of her qualitative study ask, “How do students and teach-ers work two seemingly divergent views about education? How do thediscursive frames of neoliberalism manifest in relation to discourses aboutsocial justice education?” (p. 243). Sonu’s investigation is situated withinthe seeming co-existence of these two divergent views about education. Onone hand, those at Justice High are seen to act out the “public transcript”by fulfilling institutional expectations under the watchful eye of authori-tarian “surveillance”; on the other hand, they create “private spaces” asrepresentative of a “hidden transcript” in which to pursue goals of equity,diversity, and community activism.

It is within this “hidden” context that agency is most seen to flourish.Agency in this sense transcends the teacher’s autonomous interpretationand adaptation of existing curriculum to encompass a variant of curricularsubversion. In citing Scott, Sonu refers to a curriculum of resistance inwhich “acting out” against expected behaviours, going “behind the backs ofthe dominant,” and using “disguise, deception, and indirections” (p. 242)are necessary pedagogical tactics. Curriculum making as a political act isrooted deeply in the school’s overall “revolutionary spirit” (p. 248) thatallows teachers to exercise their sense of agency. As Sonu concludes,“hidden transcripts may serve as critical sites of agency in reconceptualizinga curriculum of justice” (p. 256).

But, in recalling the dual perspective on agency, one may ask, what ofthe second aspect—the teacher’s respect for and engagement with theagency of students? In this article, student agency surges to the forefront ofthe discussion as Sonu introduces us to Tommy and Sadie, two studentswho clearly do not embrace the school’s (and their teachers’) politicalvision; and they exercise their resistance to a resistance curriculum, so tospeak, in ways that parallel the “hidden transcript” of the teachers. Thus,this article presents layers of agency and differing manifestations of thehidden transcript. To Sonu, the students are resisting the control, author-ity, and dominant rule of the school that they see imposes, ironically, itsown kind of “universalizing intentions” and “absolutes.” Ultimately,“hidden transcripts then expand agency” (p. 256) for both the teachers andstudents. How very interesting that they seem to serve quite divergent endsin terms of valued curriculum.

The fourth article, “An Analysis of Discourses of Writing and WritingInstruction in Curricula Across Canada,” by Shelley Stagg Peterson employsIvanic’s framework of six “discourses” about writing and learning to write toanalyze the content in English-language writing curriculum documentsacross Canada’s ten provinces and two territories. The analysis of grade six


writing curricula is situated conceptually within a perspective that regardswriting as a “complex social practice” (p. 261). Stagg Peterson argues thatcurricula should neither ignore grammatical and mechanical conventionsof writing while prioritizing process over product, nor do the inverse byemphasizing writing products to the exclusion of developing thinkingprocesses.

While the detailed and systematic analysis of curriculum documentsoffered in this article may seem remote from the theme of agency, it doesraise issues that I believe provoke considerable thought about the teacher’sagency in interpreting and implementing curricula, as well as studentagency as it is supported by curricular expectations. Indeed, the six dis-courses reveal more or less fluctuating avenues for teacher and studentagency; the focus of agency for meeting various curriculum objectivesincreasingly switches from teacher to student as the discourses movetowards more constructivist orientations to writing. Stagg Peterson refersclearly to a variety of perspectives reflecting the discourses that teachershave regarding what effective writing education should be. Some favourapproaches that stress skills development, while others focus on cultivatingcreativity in students; yet others are more process-oriented, and othersadopt sociopolitical principles embedded in theories of critical literacy.

Stagg Peterson writes that there exists some “dissonance between teach-ers’ theories of teaching writing and those underlying mandated writingcurricula. Teachers may come to a deeper understanding of tensions theyexperience as they attempt to implement curricula emphasizing particulardiscourses that teachers feel are less important for example” (pp. 280–281).Such tensions are charged by the teacher’s own values, beliefs, and convic-tions, and agency is influenced by his or her capacity to engage in curricu-lum work that expresses these values. In this respect, teachers of writingwho encounter the curricula described in this article might not be dissimi-lar from Priestley et al.’s teachers striving to honour their visions of tech-nology and biology education in the face of reform; or Zanazanian’steachers struggling with personal perspectives on history as they createnarratives of agency and engagement with the Other; or Sonu’s teacherswhose commitment to the ideals and practices of social justice educationwrestles with “public transcripts” responding to the dominant curriculum.

In the final article, “The Schizophrenia of Contemporary Education andthe Moral Work of Teaching,” Matthew Sanger presents an elegant philo-sophical argument that similarly identifies the frustration of teachers whoseagential possibilities are constrained by current curriculum policy contexts.While he does not directly speak to the theme of teacher agency, he doesconclude that the consequences of contemporary education ideology “con-strain educational practice in a narrow and instrumental language thatdoes not support the meaningful discussion, let alone the effective pursuitof practitioners’ own basic educational values and identities” (p. 298). And,such constraints, which according to Sanger lead to demoralization among


teachers whose motives and reasons for becoming teachers in the first placeare thwarted, could be seen to signal a diminished potential for teachers toexercise agency. Teacher agency is inescapably connected to the teacher’scapacity to govern practice in ways that are consonant with personal andprofessional values and beliefs. And Sanger notes, as do the previousarticles by Priestley et al. and Zanazanian, that such values are at least inpart expressions of one’s personal experiences and background.

To explore his thesis that teachers face “a life of professional work thatis educationally impoverished and/or schizophrenic” (p. 285), Sangerdevelops an analogous argument that applies Stocker’s critique of “modernethical theories” to his own indictment of “the prevailing educationalideology” (p. 285). This ideology is one of accountability, high-stakestesting, instrumentalism, and effectiveness as measured in terms of stu-dents’ academic achievement levels—Sanger’s account of such a curricularcontext is in ways reminiscent of Priestley et al.’s discussion of attainmentstandards and Sonu’s criticism of neo-liberal orientations to evidence-basedpractices and evaluation efficiencies. It is, Sanger contends, an ideologythat “fails to address the moral nature of teaching” (p. 285). Further, themoral work of teaching is integral to the very essence of education. Onemay recall Buzzelli and Johnston’s (2002) claim that teaching is fundamen-tally a moral activity. Sanger defines the moral work of teaching as:

those elements of practice that are within, or meaningfully connected to, the moraldomain, using a broad and inclusive view of morality—a complex aspect of humanlife that involves issues of what is good, right, and virtuous in what and how we think,feel, and act—in who we are, and in our relationships with others. Such elementsprominently include all those things that go into being a morally good person as aneducator, and also in the effects educators have on the moral functioning anddevelopment of students. (p. 291)

Attentiveness to one’s own practice as well as to the enhancement of others’(most notably students’) well-being and indeed agency is a mark of teacheragency that parallels what was addressed at the beginning of this editorialas a dual perspective on agency. It cuts to the core of the question raised bySanger in his discussion of Biesta’s work: “What are we educating for?” (p.294). And, this, I believe, is another way of phrasing the question intro-duced by Priestley et al.: “Agency for what?” (p. 199).

The five articles that follow collectively advance our thinking aboutagency in education. The focus in this editorial has been on the agency ofteachers in both direct and indirect ways across curriculum contexts.However, the agency of students and the state (notably in the form of policymakers) weave in and out of the discussion as well. Consequently, anyresponse to the “Agency for what?” question embraces much more than asingular statement of purpose. It may prioritize some curricular orienta-tions and pedagogical practices over others, as revealed, for example, by


Stagg Peterson’s description of the six discourses as well as Zanazanian’sand Priestley et al.’s contrasting portraits of teachers. It may offer eithersupport or opposition to official policy discourses that frame curricularcontexts, as addressed by Priestley et al., Sonu, and Sanger. It may focus onteacher and/or student agency within the context of the classroom, or itmay locate agency beyond the school to invoke broader societal ends, as inthe case of Sonu’s and Zanazanian’s articles. What does seem clear,however, is that if each of the five articles were to respond to the “Agencyfor what?” question, their answers would inevitably be framed by broadersocial, political, and/or moral agendas.

REFERENCES

Buzzelli, C. A., & Johnston, B. (2002). The moral dimensions of teaching: Language,power, and culture in classroom interaction. New York: Routledge Falmer.

Campbell, E. (2003). The ethical teacher. Maidenhead, UK: Open University PressMcGraw-Hill.

Sockett, H. (1993). The moral base for teacher professionalism. New York: TeachersCollege Press.
