Browsing by Subject "transformative agency"
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(2016)The study analyzed the types and development of transformative agency of teachers in a Change Laboratory intervention in a teacher training school. Theoretical framework is based on activity theoretical research on transformative agency to which the study aims to add new knowledge. Change Laboratory is an activity theoretical method for developing work and organizations. The data for the study consists of three Change Laboratory intervention meetings conducted at the Viikki teacher training school in spring 2015. There were six meetings out of which this study focuses on the first, third and sixth meeting. The transcribed data was analyzed by using qualitative techniques, namely thematic analysis and activity theoretical framework for the identification of the types and development of transformative agency (Haapasaari, Engeström & Kerosuo, 2014). The analysis was enriched by depicting tensions in the development of transformative agency reflecting the dialectics of agency (Rainio & Hilppö, 2016). Quantification was also used to describe the data. Five types of transformative agency depicted by Haapasaari et al. (2014) were found in this data: resisting the change and initiatives, critical analysis of the current activity, explicating new possibilities in the activity, envisioning and developing new models or patterns in the activity, and committing to concrete actions. In the first meeting the most common types were resistance and critical analysis, in the third meeting there were high amount of explicating new possibilities in the activity and envisioning and developing new models or patterns in the activity, and in the sixth meeting the most common type was envisioning and developing new models or patterns in the activity. Based on the data, a new type of transformative agency was also proposed: casting faith in the joint developing. In the speaking turns representing transformative agency, the amount of collectively produced turns increased during the process being highest in the sixth meeting where the participants collectively visualized a new compass model of shared pedagogical leadership. The tensions in the speech reflected the dialectics of agency between the need of belonging and separability and between the need of autonomity and control. The compass model was interpreted to be an attempt to seek for a solution to these tensions.
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(2020)New digital learning environments challenge traditional learning concepts by emphasizing student agency and collaboration (Ito, 2013; Kumpulainen, Kajamaa & Rajala, 2018). This study addresses the expressions of students’ transformative agency, and the role of tools in its emergence, in a novel design and making environment called the FUSE Studio. Research on trans-formative agency has traditionally focused on intervention research related to adults, and in particular on working life, and there has been little research on students’ transformative agency (Kajamaa & Kumpulainen, 2019). The types of transformative agency identified by Haapasaari and colleagues (2016) were used as the theoretical frame of reference for the study (Haapasaari, Engeström & Kerosuo, 2016). In addition, the concepts of the social object of Kumpulainen and Kajamaa (2019) and the double stimulation of Vygotsky (1978) were utilized when analyzing the role of tools (Kumpulainen & Kajamaa 2019; Vygotsky 1978). The data consisted of 75 hours of video material collected by filming the work of 9–12-year-old students (N=94) in the novel design and making environment in the fall of 2016. The data were analyzed using the types of transformative agency (resisting, criticizing, explicating new possibilities or potentials in the activity, envisioning new patterns or models of the activity, committing to new actions, and taking consequential actions to change the activity) of Haapasaari and colleagues (2016) as reference. The role of tools in mediating students’ transformative agency was analyzed in connection to the features of the types of transformative agency identified in the first research question. Expressions of students' transformative agency were found in the data for all six types. Students’ agentive actions were expressed both verbally and physically, often using the tools in the challenges. Students’ transformative agency manifested itself both in opposing activities, which manifested as playing or disruptive behavior, and in creating new activities that pursued students' own interests, which manifested as extending the challenges. The tools inspired and facilitated the emergence of students' transformative agency.Students use both verbal and bodily expressions to break away from the given frame of action set by the learning environment. Working with tools both inspires and facilitates students’ efforts of breaking away, which some-times leads to unexpected design and making activities.
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