Building Student Agency and Self Determination
I am an Upper Primary school teacher and in my past role I taught at a Government Primary School in the leafy green Southeastern suburbs of Melbourne. I had an extensive teaching history at the school and knew that, historically, student voice and self-determination was implemented in a limited capacity, and within teacher determined confines. I had begun exploring student voice and agency through professional development and readings and knew that authenticity, a perceived need for change, andstudent buy in were key factors in successfully facilitating student self-determination.
The absence of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander knowledge systems, cultural representation and language in the school and community provided the catalyst for a group of students from the senior years to create whole school, student-led change. The experience I had whilst working with these students, and teaching, learning, and unlearning with and from them, is one of the most formative and rewarding experiences of my teaching career.
In the beginning.
I extended an offer to any student of Year 4, 5 or 6 to participate in a Student Committee to address how we, as a school, might begin to address the complex and important inclusion of Indigenous voices, history and culture in a meaningful way.
Both I and the students recognised the patchy and inconsistent ways in which Indigenous knowledgesystems, culture, history and practices were represented within classrooms school-wide.
As one Year 6 student said at our inaugural meeting: “we say we’d like to acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the land on which we live at Assembly every Monday, but how do we actually do that?” “What does acknowledge even mean?” another student added.
Therein was lit a fire. The group began questioning, wondering and challenging . each other, and the status quo. What were the systems and structures currently in place? Who had put them there? And, most importantly, where was the Indigenous representation?
The group began a process of suggesting and rejecting possible names for themselves, finally coming to one that received a group consensus: The WVC (Wurundjeri Voice Committee). They wanted to join with Traditional Custodians and add their student voice to the voice that had been missing in their Primary School on Wurundjeri land.
Building my own capacity, to facilitate the capacity building of my students
I began to read up on ideas about student voice, student agency and student participation. The resources available through Social Education Victoria and VicSRC were invaluable, and this broad definition felt particularly useful in helping the student group and me work through what it is we wanted to do:
'Student voice is an umbrella term we use when we talk about anything that includes students in decision making, from the classroom level right up to the systems level'. (VicSRC, Getting Started with Student Voice: A quick guide for educators)
We wanted to address both classroom based, and also systemic change. This would involve looking at the fabric of our school and unpicking it in an effort to sew in a direct path for student voice and action.
We decided that the first thing we needed was space: a space that would enable conversations to occur in a free, respectful and intentional manner. I looked to Martin Renton’s ‘Challenging learning through questioning’ andimplemented his ‘Rules for Talk’. We established ‘norms’ for our discussions: what did we want to see, hear and feel happen in this time?
The group established that ‘wait time’ was important, as was everyone having the opportunity to have their say.
Renton describes the purpose of 'Permissive Wait-Time' as 'literally to 'give permission' for your studentsto continue a dialogue...this approach means stepping back from direct involvement and allowing yourstudents time to explore their own questions and perspectives in open dialogue'. (Renton, M. Challenging learning through questioning, Corwin, 2020).
I also introduced the concept of ‘building on others' ideas' during discussion and the students embracedthis. In one of the student questionnaires (that I conducted throughout this process) students respondedthat we build on others’ ideas to: 'create a bigger discussion from one small idea' and to 'complement andadd to each others' thoughts and ideas to make it the best we can be'.
All questions are not equal
The process of supporting the WVC from idea inception to action seemed to be dependent on my own ability to effectively question and clarify the aims and intentions of the group.
Again, through my reading of Martin Renton, I learned of the importance of effective questioning practices and that, through this, students can learn to set meaningful goals, problem solve, persevere and see success.
Even as I began to explore purposeful questioning, I could see that sometimes this also meant that thequestioning did not come from me at all. In stepping back and enacting ‘Permissive Wait-Time’, I allowed students time to explore their own questions and perspectives in an open dialogue. I dipped back into the conversation to rejoin with a paraphrase of something a student said that could propel the discussion forward, offer a new insight or move to an action.
My role as teacher
I had to challenge my own thinking, existing practice and redefine my role. I could provide resources, provocationsand opportunities, but the ‘heavy lifting’ would all be done by the students. The WVC were the guiding coalition, and to support them I needed to be responsive in my role. This involved, in part, facilitating meetings with key stakeholders, such as the school leadership team, the School Council president, and an artist from Wurundjeri Country. I also facilitated processes that assisted the group to move forward.
For example, I helped scaffold the WVC’s planning to bring an idea to action and solidify its purpose. We established a ‘Statement of Commitment’, which was a vision statement that explained, in the students’ own language, who we were and what we stood for, and we created outcomes that were linked to and ledback to this document.
Actions and outcomes
The WVC student committee began with the students in existing leadership roles: the ‘House group’ Captains and Vice Captains, the School Captain and Vice-Captain. I had the opportunity to discuss elevating and celebrating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspectives, culture, and ways of knowing with students across the upper primary years in my capacity as a teacher. I offered students who responded with passion and engagement, invitations to committee meetings. Once the ball began rolling, students spoke to each other; the Art Captains were invited in their role to discuss the mural and House Logo projects; the students responsible for the school newsletter wanted to join the committee to better understand the process and planned projects. I also facilitated processes that assisted the group to move forward.
Playground talk influenced other students who had thus far not been included or given opportunity to directly lead or guide school change, to join the committee and contribute.
Students would approach me on yard duty, or on my way to or from the carpark, to try and find out what it was this group of students were actually doing. Sometimes my response would be: "why don’t you come along to a meeting and see?" Numbers swelled to around 35 students.
The WVC set their sights on a series of actions and began planning to achieve them. At meetings, students led the proceedings to assign working groups to different projects they had determined they wanted actioned and worked out their sequence. Each action led to the next, and at each stage the group were required to think, challenge and discuss deeply.
When the committee was deep in the brainstorming phase of discussion and ideas were flowing, they challenged each other respectfully and held each other accountable to the norms we had set up at the start of the process.Successful projects built a sense of purpose and confidence within the students of the committee and their ideas grew bolder and bigger. There were moments of collective joy and a tangible sense of pride as students walked the school grounds and took in the visual changes they had implemented.
The Big Project
The school had long established ‘House Groups’, and these four groups in the primary colours of red, blue, green and yellow were used to group students for different activities. Students already competed for their House in whole school athletic carnivals, and students could ‘win’ points for their house through good behaviour or other means.
At one meeting I proffered a question for discussion: "does our current House Group system have meaning? How could we make it so?" The responses snowballed, students built on each other's suggestions and ideas until a new, big project began to form:
The House Group system could be revised: each House could be renamed in Woiwurrung language, native animals could be chosen to represent each House and a logo drawn up, reflecting the animal and incorporating elements of traditional Wurundjeri art.
I had a final provocation to offer the WVC: "whilst we are working towards representing Aboriginalculture, language and knowledge systems in our school, do we have authentic voice andrepresentation?" This led to a meaty dialogue, in which the 11 and 12 year olds present thoughtfully andarticulately discussed issues of privilege and power, visibility and representation.
I leant in, aware that this was a formative experience in my own teaching practice and not entirely surethat I was navigating it as fearlessly as my students
Build a support network
Part of my role involved building relationships external to the core group and recruiting supporters. The parentcommunity was key to this, including the parents who dropped their children to school early, or after dinner for WVC and School Council meetings. The School Council President and I would meet for early morning coffees and walks in which I would describe, in enthusiastic detail, the ideas and discussions the WVC had. I cannot emphasise enough how critical her support was in gaining traction and raising the funds required to see the WVC’s ideas through to fruition. Finally, the School Council, who supported the WVC in their final presentation and signed off on the funds necessary to bring in a Wurundjeri and Yorta Yorta artist to work with the students increating authentic and respectful representation in the logos they designed in collaboration for each House Group.
Reflection
There has been a legacy, created and left behind when those of the WVC who belonged to the Year 6 cohort graduated at the end of last year. Therein lies the heart of my reflection.
Is the legacy like a ceremonial garden in a school, planted with best intent and serving a lofty or honourablepurpose, now left to go to seed? With those who planted it now gone and those left to be its caretakers uncertain of the original intent and left without the time or means to nourish and tend to it properly?
I too have moved on from the school. In order for the new House Groups, the legacy of the WVC, tomaintain its purpose, and for it to strengthen the connection between Country, culture and community, it must be spoken about. Students, teachers, parents and the wider community must know about the conversations, learnings and understandings that proceeded it and they must build on them.
So I challenge myself: Where in my process did I build access points for that to happen? Where in that process did I create student voice and agency beyond that of the group I worked with? How was it embedded in a more longstanding capacity?
This will be my focus moving forward and until then I hope that new students will take up the mantle, and new teachers will feel moved to build their own guiding coalition and support them.
Emma Donaldson
Teacher, Melbourne Girls Grammar School
Contact: Emma.Donaldson@mggs.vic.edu.au
