teacher-agency
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- PaperTESOL Quarterly12 Jul 2026
Language Teacher Educator Identity, Wellbeing and Agency Nested in a Community of Practice: A Collaborative Autoethnography
Yasemin Tezgiden‐Cakcak, Aycan Demir‐Ayaz, Işıl Günseli Kaçar
Three language teacher educators in Türkiye used collaborative autoethnography to examine how their community of practice (CoP) helped them navigate identity tensions, boost wellbeing, and enact agency. The CoP provided a collegial space that supported professional empowerment and resilience within neoliberal academia. Findings reconceptualize identity, wellbeing, and agency as interdependent processes nested in a CoP.
Original abstract
In this collaborative autoethnography, we, as three university‐based language teacher educators in Türkiye, explore how our community of practice (CoP) acted as a catalyst in navigating our identity tensions, boosting our wellbeing and contributing to our agency. Grounded in Wenger's (2009) framework of CoP, we embarked on a critical journey of navigating the tensions between our aspired and assigned identities as teacher educators in a dialogic and reflective third space of a CoP. The collegial space of our CoP enabled us to enact our agency and nurtured our wellbeing, embracing us in a safety net of solidarity and empowering us professionally in neoliberal academia. Conceptualizing the identity–wellbeing–agency triangle as a mutual, recursive and interdependent process nested in a CoP, this study showcases how LTEs reclaim their legitimacy, nourish their wellbeing and enact their agency in a safe dialogic space. Such a reconceptualization may bring new insights to LTEs in different contexts.
- PaperLanguage Teaching Research9 Jul 2026
Exploring Teacher Agency in Conducting Peer Feedback Activities in English-as-a-Foreign-Language Writing: An Ecological Perspective
Yao Lu, Ying Gao, Tiantian Xu
Two EFL writing teachers exhibited contrasting patterns of agency in conducting peer feedback activities, with a novice teacher shifting from proactive to constrained agency and an experienced teacher moving from automatic to autonomous agency, shaped by temporal affordances and constraints linked to individual and contextual factors. The findings highlight the need for tailored support to enhance teacher agency in facilitating peer feedback.
Original abstract
Although the learning benefits of peer feedback in English-as-a-foreign-language writing instruction have been well recognized, the process and effects of peer feedback are largely reliant on teacher agency in conducting such activities. However, inadequate research has been conducted on this issue, leaving the dynamic features and causes of teacher agency in peer feedback largely unknown. Drawing on an ecological perspective, this comparative case study examined how two English-as-a-foreign-language teachers from two universities enacted agency in organizing peer feedback activities in their writing instructions. Multiple data including classroom observation, interviews and relevant teaching documents were collected and coded for themes. The study revealed that both teachers exerted dynamic agency in creating peer feedback experiences for students, but showed considerable differences before, during and after peer feedback. Overall, the novice teacher shifted from showing proactive agency to constrained agency, whereas the experienced teacher moved from demonstrating automatic agency to autonomous agency. This stark contrast was shaped by the synergism of different temporal affordances and constraints in relation to individual and contextual factors. The study highlights the need to provide tailored support to enhance teacher agency in dealing with possible challenges in facilitating students’ experiences with peer feedback.
- PaperRELC Journal24 Apr 2026
Negotiating teacher agency in English for Academic Purposes writing instruction: A case study of a Bangladeshi early-career teacher
Md Nabinur Rahman, Judith Hanks, Diana McCray, Loreto Aliaga-Salas
An exploratory case study of an early-career English for Academic Purposes instructor in Bangladesh reveals how teacher agency is enacted through situated pedagogical judgments such as curriculum pacing, epistemic mediation, and constraint-aligned instructional recalibration, rather than overt resistance or innovation. These judgments, shaped by past experiences, institutional constraints, and future concerns, often involve ethical ambivalence that enables student access to academic writing while reproducing institutional priorities. The study provides contextually grounded insights into early-career teacher practice in under-resourced South Asian higher education settings.
Original abstract
Research on teacher agency in language education has expanded, yet limited empirical attention has been given to how teacher agency is negotiated in the everyday teaching of academic writing, particularly by early-career instructors working in under-resourced higher education contexts. This exploratory single-case study examines how an early-career English for Academic Purposes instructor in Bangladesh negotiated teacher agency while teaching academic writing within a resource-constrained public university. Guided by an ecological perspective on teacher agency, data were generated through a classroom observation, three semi-structured interviews, a reflective diary and a student focus group, and analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. The findings show that teacher agency was enacted through situated pedagogical judgement, including curriculum pacing, epistemic mediation and constraint-aligned instructional recalibration, rather than through overt resistance or pedagogical innovation. These judgements were shaped by the interplay of past experiences, present institutional constraints and future-oriented professional concerns, and were often ethically ambivalent, simultaneously enabling student access to academic writing while reproducing institutional priorities. By foregrounding teacher agency as everyday, negotiated professionalism in English for Academic Purposes writing instruction, the study offers contextually grounded insights into early-career teacher practice in under-researched South Asian higher education settings and suggests the importance of supporting reflective, context-sensitive pedagogical judgement in English for Academic Purposes teacher education within resource-constrained environments.