In my teaching career, I was fortunate to spend time in lower, middle, and upper school classrooms. I guess I’m drawn to change, young adult novels, and loud bus rides because most of those years were with sixth through eighth graders. I appreciated the opportunity to observe agency across students, often the same students, as they navigated growth from elementary to high school. And I took note: a lot shifted in content and curriculum, but the foundations for student agency stayed constant.
Given all the world has thrown at us in the last four years, and all the ways (much admired) teaching communities have flexed and adapted, I’m reflecting deeply on what endures in our middle school classrooms. I’m observing the systemic approaches–regardless of changing technologies, grade levels, and initiatives–that ensure our students grow as agents of their own learning.
Prioritizing Belonging
The only starting point in students leading learning is establishing the conditions for belonging. “Students’ sense of belonging matters. It matters in promoting deeper learning and equity. It matters every day, in every classroom, in every school.” (Equity and Voice: How a Sense of Belonging Promotes Students’ Agency by Alison Lee and Meg Riordan) Cultivating belonging sets the conditions for students to feel safe enough to make choices, to take risks, and to drive next steps. And when students are taking those actions, belonging becomes self-sustaining; students themselves partner in fueling belonging-rich spaces. As educators, this means invitational spaces and intentional design: From participation, discussion, and collaboration norms to modeling vulnerability, building trust, and deepening self-reflection.
Moving Beyond ChoiceChoice boards and student selected topics are pedagogical moves with merit. And without the scaffolding of enduring systems, they become mere choices and not developed agency. In “Part 1: What Do You Mean When You Say ‘Student Agency?’”,
Jennifer Davis Poon shares three lastling components that shift students into the role of learning co-designers and not just choice-makers: Agency-empowered students set learning goals, initiate action towards those goals, and reflect on progress towards goals. Agency begins with students knowing their learning targets deeply and in having an active role in how they achieve them. As educators, we’re called to articulate meaningful skills with clarity, to plan for personalized learning pathways, and to develop valuable feedback ecosystems that invite students to tell their learning stories.
Embracing the Complexity
When we’re clear on what student-led learning is, we gain clarity on what it’s not. And it’s not tidy. It’s not one-size-fits-all. It doesn’t follow a linear trajectory. And it’s definitely not a checklist. It’s ongoing opportunities to converse, to seek student perspectives, to design, and to reflect. “[Agency] is a multi-faceted skill and disposition—invoking past, present, and future. It is students’ abilities to set advantageous goals, initiate action toward those goals, and reflect and redirect based on feedback, all the while internalizing the belief they can have agency” (Davis Poon). Designing for agency is perhaps the most important work we do in our middle schools. It is disruption and change resistant. It is a lens to leverage and respond to innovations–like AI–for what really matters. It is complex work, and it is valuable work.
Dr. Anindya Kundu defines agency as “a person’s capacity to leverage resources to create positive change in their lives.” Intentional, foundational moves to design for belonging, cultivate enduring systems, and embrace the complexity of human-centered approaches support our middle school students in growing as changemakers in an ever shifting world. And for middle school educators, wise people already used to being consistent in the midst of change (and keeping our senses of humor in the midst of loud bus rides), there’s no better time to nurture agency rich environments that ensure our students thrive.
Becky Green loves that she gets to learn from students and educators around the world as the Associate Director of Professional Learning with the Global Online Academy (GOA). Since 2016 she has coached, facilitated, designed, and led across their professional learning and student programs. But first and foremost, Becky is a middle school teacher having spent two decades in international and public school classrooms.
She cares deeply about ensuring students thrive beyond school walls, and whether it’s supporting transitions to competency-based learning, partnering purposefully with AI, facilitating portrait of a graduate processes, or reimagining learning design, Becky prioritizes joyful, relational, student-centered experiences.