This is a professional development learning module for pre-service or in-service teachers to guide them in providing autonomous-supportive learning for students.
Autonomy, Self-Determination Theory, Teacher Professional Development, Motivation, Engagement, Student Achievement
As Mary Kalantzis describes didactic teaching in the EPS 431 Administrative Update Three, "In these classroom settings, students learn to get used to a balance of agency in which they are relatively powerless to make knowledge themselves or to act autonomously" (2019). Didactic education tends to focus on the teacher rather than the students, and requires controlling teacher behaviors in class management to do so. However, according to Edward Deci and Richard Ryan's (1985) Self-Determination Theory, it is students' autonomy that is paramount to successful learning. Autonomy is one of the three basic human needs within their SDT "macro" theory of human motivation (Deci & Ryan, 1985, p. 7), and it is the concept as defined in SDT that this learning module will focus upon. The objective of this Learning Module is to provide a six-session training for pre-service or in-service teachers about how they can create autonomous-supportive classes for their students. This can either be presented as a one-day professional development training, or through a series of shorter separate staff meeting sessions.
Autonomy in SDT does not mean students work alone on their own, or that they merely follow teacher's controlled routines independently (Yu, et al., 2018). Autonomy means students have volition or choice in their learning and in how they demonstrate their knowledge (Davidson & Beck, 2019; Lee et al., 2015). Autonomy also means that students' opinions and expressions of frustration and confusion are acknowledged rather than disciplined (Reeve, 2009). Autonomy has been empirically proven to enhance better learner engagement and increased achievement (Haya, K. 2018; Niemiec & Ryan 2009; Lee et al., 2015; Reeve, 2009).
However, many of these module participants may still idealize and/or maintain teacher-centered controlling didactic classrooms, because that is how they were taught to deliver content and manage students (Kansanen & Meri, 1999). With this understanding, it is imperative to work with teachers to examine their materials and routines in order to help them provide autonomous-supportive learning environments (Areepattamannil et al., 2018). To exemplify a student-centered autonomous teaching style, the module will itself be taught with this autonomous-supportive methodology. This means that participants with have choices in content material as well as in how they will demonstrate their learning (Reeve, 2009). It also means that the expression of diverse, even contradictory, opinions will be accepted rather than criticized (Reeve, 2009).
I went through this process myself, since my instruction was almost wholly didactic for the first years of teaching; and for much of my 26-year career as a classroom teacher, administrative evaluators expected a traditional, very controlled classroom, which I knew how to easily present. Over time, however, my classes and those of my colleagues emphasized growing student autonomy, and consistently with research, this change resulted in far higher student engagement and student achievement than in previously controlled environments. Administrators who were very skeptical of the autonomous-supportive approach became its strong supporters, and our district overall emphasized student-centered learning, to become one of the highest performing, multiple-award-winning districts in the state. Yet, as a former teacher's union president for many years, I don't doubt that some instructors might be reluctant to re-examine their teaching practices to emphasize student autonomy rather than teacher control (Kansanen & Meri 1999). Many of us were like that initially. It is absolutely essential that these lessons are presented in an autonomous-supportive methodology that allows frank expressions and honest discussions when confusion, frustration, or concerns arise. Teachers cannot be expected to change their practices according to external pressures (Areepattamannil, 2018): they, like their students, need to see the rationale of how this can improve their instructional goals and be given opportunities to learn through autonomous volition. It's important that this learning module is not hypocritical in its methodology.
Many studies have shown that providing a rationale for why the lesson is relevant to learners is one key to establishing autonomous-supportive classrooms (Lee et al., 2015), so it's important to include these aspects at the start of this training for participants as well. Teachers taking the training will understand that autonomous-supportive behaviors will help their students' engagement and achievement, according to vast empirical research collected internationally (Reeve, 2009). Teachers can therefore better understand why changes in teacher-centered didactic classrooms should be encouraged.
The structure of this module will 1) define what autonomy means within Self-Determination Theory; 2) explain what the research-proven benefits of student-centered autonomous classrooms are; 3) provide basic examples of autonomous-supportive teacher behaviors, and 4) demonstrate why these are more effective for student engagement and achievement than contrasting, or amotivational, controlling classrooms; 5) help teachers identify ways in which classes can be adapted to provide greater autonomous support; and 6) encourage teachers to analyze their own behaviors to find ways in which they can provide greater autonomous support for their students.
I have created video presentations specifically to begin each lesson to overview the focused topic, supported with research. While I do not expect every video in the module to be previewed by the module administrators, it is important to watch these short introductory videos in order to know the content and help guide module participants. Please note that research used in each video is referenced at the end of the video, as well as in the references section of this module.
Within the context of autonomy as it is defined by Self-Determination Theory, these are the goals of this learning module:
While I recommend the instructor of this module look within the specific district's teacher evaluation tools and/or board policies to find particular stardards that relate to this inservice material, in order to make it more meaningful to participants, this training module also supports the National Board Certification of Teaching Standards' Standard IV: Teaching Environoment, which states "Accomplished generalists establish a caring, stimulating, inclusive, and safe community for learning where students take intellectual risks and work independently and collaboratively" (National Board for Professional Teaching Standards, 2001, p. 29).
Before we begin, please take this short survey by clicking on the link HERE.
Again, here is the LINK to participants' survey.
Next, please watch our Introductory Video, "What is Autonomy?" This video was created specifically for this learning module to define autonomy as it pertains to Edward Deci and Richard Ryan's Self Determination Theory (1985) with educational references.
Autonomous-supportive classrooms come in many forms. Below are just some examples. Choose one that interests you, or find another example of an autonomous-supportive pedagogy. Feel free to find more resources on your own or with a partner, and share what you've learned with other participants in this group. Please refer back to the concepts in the introductory video, like volition, student-centered learning, and expressive support, to help others understand how these forms of teaching support autonomous learning, and how they might be applicable to students in your learning environment.
Maker-Spaces
Project Based Learning
Collaborative Learning
The brief introductory lesson begins with a survey to establish participants' previous experiences with autonomous-supportive teaching and their existing knowledge base of autonomy as part of Deci & Ryan's Self-Determination Theory. The direct link for this survey is https://forms.gle/a6pM3UN221qCkYEW7, but it can be reached within the Student View or accessed by clicking HERE.
You will be able to quickly see your participants' responses on this spreadsheet when they have submitted them HERE, at this link., so you know how many are familiar with Deci & Ryan's Self-Determination Theory, how much teaching experience they have, and what their preliminary concepts of autonomy are. A commonly found misconception regarding this term is that it's confused with independent learning (i.e. when students are silent and alone) instead of learning based upon student choice and volition (Yu et al., 2018). Note that research regarding this theory as it's applied to education is much more prominent internationally in recent years, and was not as widely taught in earlier decades (Yu et al, 2018). Viewing these results will allow you as an instructor to know what participants' experiences and opinions are now, and you can later compare these results to the post-module survey assessment.
After participants have submitted their surveys, they should watch the brief introductory video, which has been created especially for this learning module by me to introduce and define the concept of autonomy according to Self-Determination Theory research.
After this introduction, participants who are unfamiliar with what SDT autonomous learning environments are like can begin to form an impression by seeing some of the common forms these classrooms take, such as MakerSpaces, Project Based Learning, and Collaborative Learning. These examples differ in some of their settings and procedures, but they are all autonomous-supportive options. We ask participants to view one or more of these short introductory videos and describe the methodology briefly to the group. Participants are also welcome to search for other autonomy supportive teaching ideas. When they have all finished reporting to the group, ask participants to describe the commonalities of these ideas. Responses will range, but some ideas are that they are student-centered, invoke students' personal interests, provide options for them to demonstrate and/or present their learning, and allow student expression. Please use the data from the survey responses to ask teachers with more experience in autonomous-supportive teaching to share their insights and suggestions with participants who are less familiar with the concepts.
While the goals for this last activity of the introduction are to provide a larger, overall idea of what autonomous-supportive learning environments can look like, we are not expecting participants to make huge changes in the instructional settings and formats of their courses yet, with the exception of more experienced autonomous-supportive teachers, who may wish to use this training time to do so. The next lesson refocuses on the daily habits teachers can inculcate to begin encouraging student autonomy.
In this lesson, participants will refocus on the research-proven benefits of autonomous-supportive teaching, as well as review some of the basic instructional behaviors that provide supportive classroom environments.
Please begin by watching our short second video, "Autonomous-Supportive Teachers." This video was created specifically for this learning module to summarize three categories of teacher instructional behaviors that support student autonomy in classrooms, with educational references.
After viewing the video, collaborate together to answer these questions:
How can instructions be given to provide students with more autonomy?
What autonomous-supportive options can teachers provide in assignments?
How do autonomous-supportive teachers handle students' confusion and frustration?
Show this introductory video and then ask participants to list some example behaviors autonomous-supportive instruction uses.
Allow participants to collaborate together to answer these questions:
How can instructions be given to provide students with more autonomy?
What autonomous-supportive options can teachers provide in assignments?
How do autonomous-supportive teachers handle students' confusion and frustration?
Unfortunately, it's not simply that autonomous-supportive teachers enhance student engagement and achievement: teachers who instead use controlling behaviors (which in Deci & Ryan's Self-Determination Theory are called 'amotivational' (Reeve, 2009; Yu et al., 2018)) can actually discourage engagement and achievement (Reeve, 2009; Lee at al, 2015; Yu et al., 2018;Areepattamannil, et al., 2018). These teachers usually do not intend to negatively affect students, but their focus on teaching is much more centered on their classroom control and arbitrary disciplinary needs than on student autonomy (Niemiec and Ryan 2009).
This lesson focuses on one such probably well-intended ultra-controlling teacher, as a discussion prompt to help module participants recognize controlling teacher behavior.
Warm-up Activity:
The following scenario has been developed by Deci et al. (1981) to assess autonomous teacher behaviors for research purposes (Deci et al., 1981; Reeve et al., 1999). We'll use it as a discussion example.
Jim is an average student who has been working at grade level. During the past two weeks, he has appeared listless and has not been participating during reading group. The work he does is accurate, but he has not been completing assignments. A phone conversation with his mother revealed no useful information. The most appropriate thing for Jim’s teacher to do is:
(MC) 1. She should impress upon him the importance of finishing his assignments since he needs to learn this material for his own good.
(HA) 2: Let him know that he doesn’t have to finish all of his work now and see if she can help him work out the cause of the listlessness.
(HC) 3. Make him stay after school until the day’s assignments are done.
(MA) 4. Let him see how he compares with the other children in terms of his assignments and encourage him to catch up with others.
(Deci, et. al., 1981, p. 644)
Practice in Recognizing Controlling Behaviors
Contrary to autonomous-supportive teachers, research has found that controlling teachers obstruct motivation, or (in Self-Determination Theory's terms) "amotivate" them (Reeve, 2009; Yu et al., 2018). Controlling behaviors focus on the teacher's idiosyncratic and often arbitrary measurements of disciplinary control rather than students' personalities or interests, and negatively effect student engagement and achievement (Yu et al., 2018; Areepattamannil, et al., 2018; Reeve, 2009; Lee at al., 2015).
Watch at least 10 minutes of the video below, or more if you prefer. What controlling gestures and movements to you see? What controlling instructions do you hear? Please add your observances by inserting a text box, Word art, image, or comment to the linked Google group response document HERE.
In this lesson, teachers will learn how to identify specific controlling didactic instructional practices, both in lesson materials, such as assignments, as well as within daily classroom management styles, by examining a variety of sample assignments and teaching behaviors. They will learn how to recognize and amend these routines with research-driven activities to enhance student autonomy instead.
For the warm-up activity:
The scale for responses given here is:
HC = Highly Controlling; MC = Moderately Controlling; MA = Moderately Autonomous; HA=Highly Autonomous (Deci, et al., 1981, p. 643).
Therefore, in order from Most Controlling to Most Autonomous, the responses are:
(HC) 3. Make him stay after school until the day’s assignments are done.
(MC) 1. She should impress upon him the importance of finishing his assignments since he needs to learn this material for his own good.
(MA) 4. Let him see how he compares with the other children in terms of his assignments and encourage him to catch up with others.
(HA) 2: Let him know that he doesn’t have to finish all of his work now and see if she can help him work out the cause of the listlessness.
Next, we have a lesson example of truly epitomizes controlling teacher behavior. The goal in watching this video is to help participants recognize the various gestures, movements, commands, instructions, and expressions controlling teachers use. While they are watching or afterwards, they should open the document linked just above the video to add their observances collectively. When they click the link given, they will see an editable Google Drawing that looks like the image below, on which to collaborate. They are free to change the graphic design of this if they wish, as the inserted shape callouts are only there as examples.
Some controlling behaviors they may notice are the many times the teacher emphasizes that students must be completely silent, his stringent specifications of the binders and pencil pouches they must get, the seats he assigns, the words he tells them they must say, the clapping patterns they must copy, the timing and methods they must use to hand in papers, etc. There are many examples to choose from here, since this instructor is extremely controlling.
While there are even more controlling behaviors seen as the video goes on, participants may not choose to watch the entire lesson.
After this collaborative activity, ask participants for specific suggestions on what this example controlling teacher could do differently to be more autonomous-supportive.
In this lesson, we encourage participants to choose one of their own upcoming lessons to revise in an effort to make it more autonomous supportive. Participants are encouraged to work with partners, if possible, so they can help each other and suggest possibilities.
This is an example autonomous assignment.
Now, let's see if we can put some of our analysis in action, using one of our own upcoming lessons. How can we provide more autonomy for students in the way the lesson is instructed or assessment is assigned?
Work together with a partner or group to brainstorm ideas with each other. Revise or enrich a forthcoming lesson for each participant to use with students. Arrange an opportunity for your partner to observe you teach the lesson in order to give you feedback, using the rubric below.
Click the PDF icon below for a printable version of this rubric.
In this lesson, teachers will choose one of their own lesson plans with supporting materials to amend for increased autonomous-supportive instruction. They will self-evaluate their own methodology and identify areas to focus on within their own instruction to increase autonomous-supportive behaviors. Please encourage them to work with partners to provide suggestions for each other on revisions or enrichments they can make.
Note that as required by the parameters of this lesson module, a rubric is included. However, for practical purposes, this activity should be optional for participants, since some schools have very strict procedures regarding teaching observations.
This lesson should ideally take place after the rest of the module, when the participants have had the chance to use their autonomous-supportive lesson with students. However, if the timeframe doesn't allow for that, it can also be an evaluative assessment of the module. Where possible, also talk with administrators to stress autonomy as one factor to focus on in their observations and evaluations to help encourage this instructional development.
To help reflect on your development as an autonomous-supportive teacher, please consider the aspects presented in the following video.
Please complete the brief evaluation on this link.
Participants will review the basic behaviors of autonomous-supportive teachers in a concluding video and then complete a brief survey about what they've learned.
The link for this concluding survey is here.
You can read and create analytic tools for participant responses here.
If time allows, please encourage participants to share their perspectives on using autonomous-supportive behaviors with their students.
The following section offers additional, more detailed enrichment opportunities for participants interested in learning more about autonomous-supportive teaching and the Self-Determination Theory.
For interested participants, here are some additional free resources to help strengthen autonomous-supportive teaching.
The full text of the e-book co-edited by one of the co-founders of the Self-Determination Theory, Richard Ryan, on encouraging learning autonomy, is available by clicking the PDF link below. (Note: this is a UIUC library resource, provided freely to University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign students.)
Here is a lecture from Cambridge University for teachers.
Here is a free course on Self-Determination Theory, which can also be taken for an official certificate. It is taught by Richard Ryan.
In conclusion, teacher participants will be given an assortment of resources and activities to use to help them further progress in providing autonomous-supportive classrooms.
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Areepattamannil, S., Freeman, J. & Klinger, D. A. (2018). A qualitative study of Indian and Indian immigrant adolescents’ perceptions of the factors affecting their engagement and performance in school. Social Psychology of Education, 21(2), 383-407. doi: 10.1007/s11218-017-9420-z
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Chia, L.W., Keng, J.W.C., Ryan, R.M. (2016). Building autonomous learners: Perspectives from research and practice using self-determination theory [E-book]. Retrieved from https://link-springer-com.proxy2.library.illinois.edu/content/pdf/10.1007%2F978-981-287-630-0.pdf
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Deci, E. & Ryan, R. (1985). Intrinsic Motivation and Self-Determination in Human Behavior. Retrieved from https://link-springer-com.proxy2.library.illinois.edu/content/pdf/10.1007%2F978-1-4899-2271-7.pdf
Deci, E. L., Schwartz, A. J., Sheinman, L. Ryan, R. M. (1981). An instrument to assess adults' orientations toward control versus autonomy with children: Reflections on intrinsic motivation and perceived competence. Journal of Educational Psychology, 73(5), 642-650. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/0022-0663.73.5.642
Edutopia. (2018). Learning Problem Solving and Growth Mindset in a Makerspace [Video File]. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/oQvcbLmNfok
Galla, M. (2019, September 28). Autonomous Teacher Behaviors [Video file]. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/2fC2pFf7LBM
Galla, M. (2019, September 28). Learning Module: Introduction "What is Autonomy?"[Video file]. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/AjnfTKmbo_Y
Galla, M. (2019, September 28). Sample Autonomous Lesson [Video file]. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/2IiycLSM6YA
Galla, M. (2019, September 29). Self Evaluation for Autonomous Support [Video file]. Retrieved from https://youtu.be/_6xw6T2OgXU
Haya, Kaplan. (2018). Teachers’ autonomy support, autonomy suppression and conditional negative regard as predictors of optimal learning experience among high-achieving Bedouin students. Social Psychology of Education 21(1), 223-255. doi: 10.1007/s11218-017-9405-y
Kalantzis, M. (2019, September 5). 3. Didactic Education: The Modern Past. Retrieved from https://cgscholar.com/community/community_profiles/community-54087/community_updates/99958
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National Board for Professional Teaching Standards. (2001). NBPTS Early Adolescence Teaching Standards [eReader version]. Retrieved from https://www.nbpts.org/wp-content/uploads/EA_Gen_2Ed.pdf
Niemiec, C. P. & Ryan, R. M. (2009). Autonomy, competence, and relatedness in the classroom: Applying self-determination theory to educational practice. Theory and Research in Education, 7(2), 133-144. Retrieved from https://journals-sagepub-com.proxy2.library.illinois.edu/doi/pdf/10.1177/1477878509104318
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Reeve, J. (2009). Why teachers adopt a controlling motivating style toward students and how they can become more autonomy supportive. Educational Psychologist, 44(3),159–175. https://doi-org.proxy2.library.illinois.edu/10.1080/00461520903028990
Reeve, J., Bolt, E., & Cai, Y. (1999). Autonomy-supportive teachers: How they teach and motivate students. Journal of Educational Psychology 91(3), 537-548. Retrieved from https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/f30c/0a522140d4a7d5288c60b429789647eab0b5.pdf
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