Petagogy for Cultivating Agency

Academic unit or major

Teacher education courses

Instructor(s)

Hiroki Yamaji

Class Format

Exercise (Face-to-face)

Media-enhanced courses

-

Day of week/Period
(Classrooms)

7-8 Wed

Class

-

Course Code

LAT.A416

Number of credits

010

Course offered

2025

Offered quarter

2Q

Syllabus updated

Mar 19, 2025

Language

Japanese

Syllabus

Course overview and goals

Agency has been identified as a core 21st-century competency (OECD, 2019). The recent enactment of the Basic Act for Children and the revision of the Student Guidance Essentials may be addressed from the perspective of agency development. This class will begin with an understanding of agency (a concept that fairly overlaps with self-directedness) and elucidate the factors that inhibit or promote agency by examining various aspects of interpersonal culture in schools. We will then explore ways to foster agency from environmental, individual, and curricular perspectives. Each session will include opportunities for class participants to reflect on their relevant experiences and homework practice, reinterpret them in terms of agency, and consider alternative actions. At the end of the course, each participant shall give a summary presentation.

Course description and aims

The objective of this course is threefold: (1) To understand how teacher-student relationship in school education should change in the future; (2) To envision how to foster learner agency based on learned content and reflection on one's school experiences; and (3) To explore more flexible options of one's interpersonal relation and emotional regulation through homework practice.

Keywords

agency, interpersonal culture, 21st-century competency, conflict management, social and emotional learning

Competencies

• Specialist skills
• Intercultural skills
• Communication skills
• Critical thinking skills
• Practical and/or problem-solving skills

Class flow

This course is offered in Japanese.
As indicated in the "Course description and aims" section, there will be a pre-assignment related to the content of each class, so please check with T2Scholar and come prepared to class. There will also be a post-assignment for each class, which must be submitted by the deadline.

Course schedule/Objectives

Study advice (preparation and review)

Textbook(s)

None

Reference books, course materials, etc.

Shirai, S. (2020). OECD Education2030プロジェクトが描く教育の未来 [The future of education as envisioned by the OECD Education2030 project]. Minerva Shobo.
Tomano, K. (2022). 校則が変わる、生徒が変わる、学校が変わる [School rules change, students change, schools change]. Gakuji Shuppan.
Nozawa, S. (2017). 大学生のための交渉術入門 [An introduction to negotiation skills for college students]. Keio University Press.
Durlak, J. A., Domitrovich, C. E., & Mahoney, J. L. (Eds.). (2025). Handbook of social and emotional learning (2nd ed.). New York: Guilford.

Evaluation methods and criteria

Achievement of the course objectives is to be assessed as follows.
Pre-assignments, contribution to each class (cooperative learning), and post-assignments will be evaluated from the first through sixth sessions (72/100). In addition, a summary presentation and discussion in the seventh session, and a final essay based on post-assignments will be evaluated (28/100). Students who fail to submit all post-assignments will not earn credit.

Related courses

• None

Prerequisites

None

Contact information (e-mail and phone) Notice : Please replace from ”[at]” to ”@”(half-width character).

Students who need to contact Dr. Yamaji should contact Dr. Murota, the liaison faculty member.
Note that the reply to the email may not arrive on the same day.
murota[at]ila.isct.ac.jp

Office hours

Being an adjunct professor, Dr. Yamaji will answer questions only in class.