In a 2021 research paper, two academic researchers conducted a meta-analysis of over 50 high-quality research studies that investigated what autonomy-supportive instruction looked like in classrooms around the world. They found that “the skillful enactment of seven autonomy-satisfying instructional behaviors serve[d] two purposes.” It helped to support intrinsic motivation and support internalisation of content.
From the abstract:
“The findings from 51 autonomy-supportive teaching interventions (including 38 randomised control trials) collectively show that (1) teachers can learn how to become more autonomy supportive during instruction (autonomy-supportive teaching is malleable) and, once learned, (2) this greater autonomy-supportive teaching produces a wide range of educationally important student, teacher, and classroom climate benefits.”
In today’s newsletter, I outline the seven autonomy-supportive instructional behaviours (ASIB), with the assurance that the more effectively you implement these into your classroom practice and experience, the more satisfaction and quality you’ll experience in your day-to-day teaching.
ASIB #1 – Take the Student’s Perspective
Perspective taking is the active consideration of others’ mental states and subjective experiences. In the case of instruction, perspective taking is the teacher seeing and experiencing classroom events as if he or
she were the students (rather than the teacher).
Getting into students’ heads doesn’t have to be complicated. Sometimes it’s formal – an exit slip at the end of class where kids take two minutes to jot down what landed, what confused them, or what they’d like more of. Sometimes it’s as simple as asking, “What did you think of that?” and actually listening to the answer.
The goal is to understand what students are thinking and feeling about the learning. Ask questions. Invite them to push back. Create space for them to tell you what’s working and what isn’t. A teacher who regularly opens that door builds a very different classroom culture to one who never does.
The next two ASIBs are focused on supporting intrinsic motivation (or at least moving to identified or even integrated motivation).
ASIB #2 – Invite Students to Pursue Their Interests
Curriculum demands can sometimes make this challenging, but there’s more room to move than you might imagine.
As a university student I often approached my tutors and lecturers and asked permission to write essays on topics that interested me more than the topics offered in the assessment outlines. If I could demonstrate that my topic of interest met the learning objectives, I was often given the green light. And… I was engaged. I typically scored high distinctions!
Teacher can provide students with interesting activities, introduce a learning activity and ask students what they find to be most interesting about that activity, suggest where students might find interesting things to explore and engage, and invite students to pursue their personal interests. Not every subject has this flexibility, but many do.
When teachers invite students to pursue their personal interests, students tend to (1) feel like origins (rather than pawns), (2) feel that their behavior is self-authoured, (3) experience volition, (4) experience a sense of ownership over their behavior, and (5) engage in lessons with an authentic sense of wanting to do them.
ASIB #3 – Present Learning Activities in Need-Satisfying Ways
In my upcoming newsletters I’ll describe what need-satisfaction is, and why it matters in a classroom and school. For now just know that there are three basic psychological needs: relationship/connection, competence/progress, and autonomy/volition. When we present learning activities in ways that support these needs, students identify the value in them and go for it.
The easiest way to practice ASIB #3 is to offer choice. When that’s not feasible, or to really ramp up your ASIBs, teachers might ask students to collaborate with peers (ideally with some choice… we’ve all seen how group-work can backfire), or give them the chance to approach a task they have some competence in but that will stretch them just that little bit further.
One more revolutionary idea: A thoughtful school leader at one of Sydney’s most prestigious schools described the direction they’re taking with reporting. Students will no longer receive grades. Rather, they’ll experience a continuous assessment process where they’re shown the progress they’ve made since commencing the subject, and then the next steps to achieve greater mastery. Rather than being evaluative, this process informs the student of their present competence and offers a glimpse of future progress – a wonderfully need-supportive approach (if I’ve understood it correctly).
Our next four ASIBs support internalisation of content:
ASIB #4 – Provide Explanatory Rationales
Teachers regularly ask students to do things that students see as uninteresting and unimportant (e.g., follow safety procedures, doublecheck their work… learn surds). When students do not understand or appreciate the ‘why’ behind the request, compliance is generally low. They view the request as arbitrary or as meaningless busywork. To provide explanatory rationales, the teacher reveals the “hidden value” and “personal relevance” within the request.
Situated expectancy value theory (SEVT; Wigfield & Eccles, 2020), says that explaining utility value helps students develop an initial sense of value and personal relevance for that task. We move students to ‘identified regulation’ when… they understand the value, purpose, or relevance of something.
And – somewhat uncomfortably – we need to recognise that not everything in the curriculum has a good rationale. Or that even if it does, it won’t work for every student because some kids aren’t interested in it. It might be relevant for some but not all students.
ASIB #5 – Acknowledge Negative Feelings
In Term One this year, I visited a school in Melbourne. I had two student talks scheduled (Yrs 7-9 and then Yrs 10-12), plus a staff session and a parent night. During the senior student presentation, something unusual occurred. Several students placed their heads on one another’s shoulders and “went to sleep”.
I give good talks. This is NOT normal. And… I was challenged. How should I respond?
I paused. Waited some more. Exercised patience. And eventually all eyes were on me. It was a LONG gap.
“Some of you guys aren’t really engaged in this talk. You’re closing your eyes and going to sleep”, I began. And then I acknowledged their negative feelings. “I’m not mad. In fact, if I was in your situation and a guy like me showed up to talk to everyone, I’d probably do the same thing. No hard feelings.”
Now I had their attention. “I know I can share some really useful stuff for you today. But it has to matter to you. There’s no point in me standing up here waffling about things you don’t care about.” Then I extended an invitation. “I’m going to give you two minutes to chat with each other about what I can share that’s helpful.” I pointed at the kids who’d been ‘asleep’ and affirmed, “You guys, I’m specifically coming to you. But I want feedback from everyone. Let’s make this last 25 minutes as helpful as possible.”
The answers were thoughtful. The non-participants offered ideas. And we had an incredible talk that resulted in a group of about 15 boys hanging back and asking more questions about leveling up, being healthy models of masculinity, and more.
ASIB #6 – Rely on Invitational Language
Command and control undermines motivation and regulation. Force creates resistance.
Reeve and Cheon found that when teachers asked students (as I did above) to consider, think about, or evaluate something and find a way forward, their motivation and engagement increase.
ASIB #7 – Display Patience
According to the researchers, this “means giving students the time and space they need to work at their own pace and in their own way, and allowing students’ thinking, answers, behaviors, performances, and internalisation attempts to exist in an unfinished state.”
It’s what you do so often.
Great news! That’s the seven autonomy-supportive instructional behaviours. They’re not costly. They’re easy to implement. And they are empirically shown to improve classroom climate, academic performance, and both teacher and student satisfaction.
- Which of the seven behaviours do you already do well — and which one, if you’re honest, do you avoid or underuse? What would it look like to lean into that one this week?
- Think about the last time a student disengaged, switched off, or pushed back. Which of these seven behaviours might have changed that moment — and is it too late to go back and try?
- If your students were asked right now whether your classroom feels like a place where their perspective matters, what would they say? And how do you know?
Next newsletter, I’ll get super-practical and outline a handful of autonomy-supportive and controlling classroom behaviours.
