Radical Respect - Agency

Agency is the ability to make decisions that impact the world around us. In radically respectful relationships, the person holding the most power recognizes and honors the other’s inherent agency. Recognizing and honoring very young people’s agency is a form of radical respect, because Western social constructs assume that agency is something that must be learned.

When adults challenge the idea that agency must be learned and recognize very young people’s ability to impact their worlds, we begin to see how their unique movements and expressions affect the world around them. When we stop trying to control children’s experiences and start appreciating their inherent agency, we increase learning opportunities for everyone involved.

Many examples of agency occur when adults and children engage with nature together. An infant sits on the grass and points to a bird in the tree, and the adults accompanying them turn to notice the bird for the first time.  A toddler stomps in a puddle, and water sloshes on boots and dry soil. A preschooler stacks rocks, and another child adds to the stack. Each of these is an example of agency. The baby impacted the perceptions of the adults, the toddler changed the water and the soil, the preschool influenced a peer’s experience.

Very young people, given the opportunity, impact the world around them in marvelous ways. They embody wonder, honesty, patience, and joy. When we reject the assumption that agency is a learned skill, and begin recognizing and respecting children’s inherent agency, we liberate ourselves and our children to explore and create.

References

Duhn, I. (2015). Making agency matter: rethinking infant and toddler agency in educational discourse. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education, 36(6), 920–931. https://doi.org/10.1080/01596306.2014.918535