Education Commons^™

It’S Really About Relationships: Perceptions Of Teacher Autonomy And It’S Influence On Instruction, Nancy Harmening

College of Education Theses and Dissertations

There is growing concern over why so many U.S. teachers are leaving the profession before retirement. Researchers studying this phenomenon theorize how future attrition rates will be determined by working conditions that either foster or squelch teachers’ sense of professional autonomy. What is unclear from the literature is an understanding of specific intrinsic and extrinsic factors affecting this autonomy development during a critical period in teachers’ careers, years 5-15. This study highlights the specific factors that influence the professional autonomies of nine early childhood elementary public-school teachers’ and how their sense of their professional autonomies interact to affect their instructional …