Teacher Agency: Repertoires for Maneuver in an Era of Technology

• In Event: 47.077 - Teacher Agency as a Complex and Emergent Phenomenon: International Perspectives

Abstract

1. Objectives or purposes
This presentation explores the relationship between available “repertoires for manoeuvre” (Priestley et al., 2012, p. 211) and teacher agency as expressed in the exploration and use of a digital literacy curriculum in Ontario, Canada. This curriculum is a rich, multimodal writing program produced in digital form. The inquiry studies the degree to which teacher agency is achieved within the context of curriculum making using available designs, technologies and material conditions.
2. Perspective(s) or theoretical framework
We view teachers as “curriculum makers” and as designers of meaning across multimodal texts and learning contexts. We draw upon Priestley et al.’s (2012) view that “teacher agency is largely about repertoires for manoeuvre, or the possibilities for different forms of action available to teachers a particular points in time” (p. 211).
3. Methods, techniques, or modes of inquiry
Visual narrative inquiry (Bach, 2007) allowed researchers and participants to use both image and story to make sense of their experiences together. One or two researchers attended the classrooms during literacy lessons (approximately 100 minutes per week). Collaborative review of video recordings, field notes and lessons with teacher participants and or the research team informed the coding and analysis process in an iterative way.

4. Data sources, evidence, objects, or materials
The empirical data in the presentation is drawn from working with 4 junior elementary (Grade 5) teachers in two schools, over six months. Observations of instructional periods captured recorded videos, pictures and written field notes of lesson activities and discussions. The researcher also documented responses to questions posed by the teacher and the researcher to the students about what they noticed.

5. Results and/or substantiated conclusions or warrants for arguments/point of view
This study makes visible the ‘repertoires for manoeuvre’ of teachers, as they sought to achieve agency. The results illustrated that: each individual teacher’s own critical knowledge of the available technologies within and outside of the school system influenced their capacity to purposefully redesign or modify lessons to meet the needs of their students; the relationship between the researcher and the practitioner participant was mutually beneficial; and that teachers’ choices were central to enriching or limiting students’ experiences. These insights compelled them to think about how they may take their own learning about teacher agency and apply it to improving student agency.

6. Scientific or scholarly significance of the study or work
Teachers have frequently been caught between the need to be professional decision makers and a unidimensional portrayal of them as passive agents steered by accountability-related curriculum policies. This study makes the relationship with technology visible, so that other teachers can critically look at both the affordances and limitations of available designs and technologies on teacher agency.
References

Bach, H. (2007). Composing visual narrative inquiry. In D. J.Clandinin (Ed.), Handbook of narrative
inquiry: Mapping a methodology (pp. 280–307). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Priestley, M., Edwards, R., Priestley, A. & Miller, K. (2012). Teacher agency in curriculum making:
Agents of change and spaces for manoeuvre. Curriculum Inquiry, 42(2), 191-214.

Authors

• Kathryn M. Hibbert, University of Western Ontario

• Mary Ott, University of Western Ontario