First, take a moment to reflect on this statement:
"A teacher cannot give any more agency to students than they themselves have."
- Anne Paoletti Bayna
This powerful idea suggests that a teacher’s capacity to cultivate student agency—autonomy, competence, and relatedness essential for self-determination (Deci & Ryan, 1985)—is directly tied to the level of agency they themselves experience in their professional environment. For student-centered classrooms to truly flourish, teachers need both the space and the support to model these qualities in their practice.
But this transformation cannot rest solely on teachers’ shoulders. School leadership plays a crucial role in creating environments where teachers feel empowered, trusted, and supported in fostering student autonomy.
This article explores how giving teachers professional agency can lead to student-led, learner-centered classrooms. Leaders must accept this responsibility to set the stage, model expectations, and provide personalized coaching teachers need to shift from control-based to autonomy-supportive teaching practices.
"A teacher cannot give any more agency to students than they themselves have." - Anne Paoletti Bayna
1. Leadership’s Role in Setting Expectations and Building Trust
Leaders are responsible for setting clear, actionable expectations for fostering student agency, starting by modeling how autonomy and agency can be responsibly promoted in their interactions with teachers. When administrators micromanage or impose rigid structures, it stifles teacher creativity and innovation, making it nearly impossible for them to grant students real ownership of their learning. Balancing clear expectations for teacher and student roles and responsibilities with the intentional development of their staff. For leadership to trust their staff, staff must first trust their leadership, in order for students to benefit from classrooms designed by staff and supported by leadership to promote student agency and self-determination in their learning.
Example: A school leader regularly invites teachers to collaborate on curricular goals, setting broad objectives but leaving the specific methods up to the teachers. This shows trust in their professional judgment, while still maintaining a shared vision.
The message from leadership must be clear: just as we want students to engage in their learning process, we want teachers to feel empowered to take risks, experiment with new practices, and gradually balance control over student learning between staff and students.
2. Professional Development and Coaching for Teachers
In order for teachers to feel empowered, they need more than just permission—they need guidance and support. School leaders should not only set the expectation for more student-centered practices but should also provide ongoing professional development that equips teachers with the skills and strategies to facilitate student-led learning environments. Coaching, mentoring, and reflective practice should be integral components of this development process.
When teachers feel competent and supported in their own professional growth, they are more likely to replicate those conditions for their students. Garrison & Kanuka (2004) discuss how teachers’ experiences with professional autonomy shape their instructional approaches. If we want teachers to provide students with opportunities for self-direction, leaders must first ensure that teachers can internalize that agency in their own roles.
Example: A school district implements a coaching program where teachers receive regular, non-evaluative feedback on their attempts to incorporate student-centered practices. Leaders create a safe space for experimentation and reflection, providing support without judgment. This builds teacher confidence to deeply explore how to personalize and foster student autonomy in their classrooms.
3. Navigating Uncertainty: Leaders Must Model Comfort with Ambiguity
For both teachers and students, embracing agency means being comfortable with uncertainty. Leaders must model and support this mindset, encouraging teachers to experiment with learner-centered practices, even when outcomes are unpredictable. Roth et al. (2007) found that a lack of comfort with uncertainty among teachers often leads to restrictive practices, which then limit student autonomy. But if leaders demonstrate that ambiguity is a natural part of growth, teachers are more likely to take risks in their own classrooms.
Example: A principal hosts “open-door learning walks,” where they visit classrooms to observe innovative practices, praising efforts rather than focusing on outcomes. By showing that they value the process over perfection, they create a culture of experimentation that encourages teachers to try new approaches without fear of failure in the context of pursuing excellence in developing student self-determination as it relates to proficiency in course objectives.
When teachers see that leaders are comfortable with experimentation and uncertainty, they feel empowered to release control over to students, allowing them to experience real decision-making and problem-solving. The important aspect of embracing comfort in uncertainty in this way is how the learning process becomes the focus for developing student and teacher feedback loops and uses content related to a course objective to practice and master that process.
4. Leaders as Facilitators of Teacher Autonomy
Just as teachers must transition from the "Sage on the Stage" to the "Guide on the Side" in their classrooms, school leaders must become guides on the side for teachers. Leadership can create a culture in which teachers feel responsible for their own professional growth and empowered to shape their classroom environments aligned with the school's student-centered vision and mission. Williams et al. (2016) emphasized that when leaders adopt a facilitative approach, teachers are more likely to engage in practices that promote student agency, critical thinking, and independence.
Example: In schools where leadership takes a facilitative approach, teachers are provided time and resources to engage in effective professional learning communities. The role of school leaders is to remove barriers and allow teachers to explore instructional models that personalize and improve the student learning experience. This approach helps teachers internalize the very principles they are trying to instill in their students.
Leaders who empower teachers to take ownership of their practice model the type of learning environment they want to see replicated in classrooms, where students are trusted to take ownership of their learning.
5. Addressing Systemic Barriers: Advocacy for Teacher Empowerment
In many cases, teachers are eager to adopt learner-centered practices but feel trapped in systems that limit their professional agency. Whether due to mandates for scheduled common formative assessments ("CFAs"), strict pacing guides, or rigid administrative policies, these external pressures make it difficult for teachers to release control to students without feeling they are risking their careers or compromising their responsibilities.
School leaders must advocate for teachers at the district and policy levels, pushing back against overly prescriptive mandates that undermine teacher and student autonomy. Common assessments, for example, are often used to schedule student learning regardless of student readiness or mastery of concepts and skills as a means of tracking student progress over time. However, this prescriptive use of CFAs results in teachers dictating what students must learn to prepare for these scheduled assessments to the detriment of teacher creativity and student agency.
Example: A school leader brings together a group of teachers and administrators to discuss how common assessments can be implemented in a way that still allows for student-led projects and teacher discretion. By advocating for more flexible scheduling and shared student-teacher tracking individual progress with CFAs, leaders can help reduce the pressure teachers feel to conform to rigid, control-based practices.
6. Cultivating a Culture of Shared Responsibility
Finally, it is imperative that leaders proactively foster a culture where the shift toward learner-centered education is seen as a shared responsibility between teachers, students, and administrators. For student-led classrooms to thrive, school culture must support risk-taking, flexibility, and collaboration at every level. Within necessary frameworks and guidelines for the health and safety of staff and students, leadership must commit to continuously model, support, and advocate for both teacher and student autonomy as learners.
When teachers feel they have the agency to shape their classrooms, they are far more likely to extend that same trust and autonomy to their students over time. Pearce and Morrison (2011) found that when teachers feel restricted by their environment, they are less likely to provide students with opportunities for self-direction. Leadership must therefore create conditions where teacher empowerment is a priority, knowing that it directly impacts student outcomes.
Conclusion
If we want students to develop agency in the classroom, school leaders must first ensure that teachers have the agency to lead their own practice. By setting expectations, modeling autonomy, providing support through professional development, and advocating for more flexible systems, leaders can create environments where both teachers and students feel empowered to take ownership of their learning.
The responsibility for fostering student-led classrooms starts with school leadership. When teachers feel supported, trusted, and given the space to experiment and grow, they are in turn able to create environments where student agency can thrive. This chain of empowerment—from leaders to teachers to students—is essential for transforming our schools into spaces of autonomy, competence, and collaboration.
For more information on empowering teachers to foster student agency, read: "Rethinking 10 Traditional Practices: Shifting Away from Conventional Teaching Methods," Sep 13, 2024.
Additionally, explore self-directed learning environments in "A Creative Solution for Schools in a Post-Pandemic Environment (PART 1 of 3)," Aug 1, 2021.
Greg Mullen
September 28, 2024
References
Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (1985). Intrinsic motivation and self-determination in human behavior. New York, NY: Plenum.
Garrison, D. R., & Kanuka, H. (2004). Blended learning: Uncovering its transformative potential in higher education. The Internet and Higher Education, 7(2), 95-105. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2004.02.001
Roth, G., Assor, A., Kanat-Maymon, Y., & Kaplan, H. (2007). Autonomous motivation for teaching: How self-determined teaching may lead to self-determined learning. Journal of Educational Psychology, 99(4), 761-774. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.99.4.761
Williams, K. C., Williams, C. C., & Bloom, D. (2016). Facilitating student autonomy through flexible teaching methods. Teaching and Teacher Education, 56, 72-80. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2016.02.001
Pearce, J., & Morrison, C. (2011). Teacher autonomy: Its relationship to intrinsic motivation and impact on innovative teaching practices. Australian Educational Researcher, 38(3), 293-309. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13384-011-0024-0