For example, Ms. Kimmie navigated similar tensions as she sought ways to maintain developmentally appropriate and culturally responsive instruction despite increasing pressure to prioritize test preparation. When she recognized that children who were proficient with mathematical computation during the bread and breakfast inquiry struggled to transfer those skills to a standardized assessment, she introduced scaffolded learning experiences and retaught key concepts using recipes as culturally meaningful instructional contexts. Ms. Kimmie documented children’ s growth in mathematical operations and reasoning using different assessment types across contexts that feature math.
The Ethical Imperative: To Do No Harm
Together, these examples underscore that reclaiming agency is not solely about resisting mandates. Viewed through a critical lens, reclaiming agency is about reclaiming the moral and relational core of intentional teaching— creating spaces where diverse children and families are seen, valued, and empowered( Freire 1993; NAEYC 2020). When teachers are able to respond to children’ s interests and backgrounds and design learning experiences that foster joyful and active engagement, children experience stronger language development, increased participation, and deeper connections to their learning( Hirsh-Pasek et al. 2020; NAEYC 2020).
Recent scholarship also reinforces this urgency related to teacher agency. Park and Paulick( 2024) frame home visits as a form of culturally sustaining pedagogy, emphasizing that teacher agency must be structurally supported to resist deficit narratives as teachers interact with and learn from children and families. Similarly, Paulick and colleagues( 2024) highlight how building rapport with children and families requires teachers to navigate and reassert agency amid restrictive conditions. These findings affirm our call to restore agency as a cornerstone of equity-centered practice— both within classrooms and across educational systems.
Shallow critiques of teacher agency often accompany prescriptive curricular demands that aim to make delivering instruction to a“ generic” child“ teacher-proof”( Eisner 1985; Priestley et al. 2015). The examples we provide, including the specific cases of Mr. Omar and Ms. Kimmie, highlight the complexities of agency in relation to the identity and practice of teachers with students within particular learning and ecological contexts. Cultivating teacher agency through a critical lens intentionally resists prescriptive approaches to teaching and learning that offer quick fixes or one-size-fits-all solutions. Instead, teacher agency is recognized as complex yet supported through manageable and systemic approaches that guide praxis, such as the“ What?, So What?, What Now?” protocol and layered levels of agency.
We support the development of teacher agency as a tool for co-constructing learning experiences and meaning with children, acknowledging its gravity, complexity, and opportunities for children, adults, and systems. This depends on developing and supporting teacher agency through a critical lens— encouraging educators to reflect on how power, identity, and inequities shape teaching and learning— and acting on those insights, such as in the following ways:
› Critically prepared teachers exhibit greater confidence and are better able to make autonomous decisions through thoughtful curriculum planning that reflects a strong pedagogical stance. They are empowered to align decisions with child-centered practices and to resist one-size-fits-all mandates or performative teacher agency ideologies that continue to suppress or diminish educators’ pedagogical decision-making power( Nezhad & Stolz 2025). For example, Mr. Omar revised the Who Belongs Here lesson to build on children’ s questions about hats and cultural traditions rather than relying solely on the prescribed text.
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