Promoting student agency is an emerging priority in education. Supervisory teaching is a potentially useful approach for supporting agency development. This approach includes two characteristics, namely, tutorial learning conversations between the teacher and a group of one to four students, and students learning independently for extended periods of time. Supervisory teaching lessons in three primary-school classrooms were observed over a period of five months and teachers were interviewed as part of the data collection process. Five key factors were found to support students to have more agency in their learning: independence and ownership, scaffolding, students as teachers, joyfulness, and reflection. The findings point toward several factors observed within supervisory teaching that led to greater student agency, including individualised learning conversations, allowing students control over their learning, the benefit of reduced structure in the learning environment, and the fact that joyfulness in learning is a significant factor in elevating student agency.

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In recent times play-based learning has become more prevalent in New Zealand primary schools. The notion of learner agency has also emerged as a priority for educators. Learner agency is underpinned by a strong foundation of theory that has the potential to find synergies with play-based learning. Based on research across three primary school classrooms, this paper conceptualises learner agency as occurring on three separate levels in the classroom—type of learning, direction of learning, and evaluation of learning. It is the evaluation of learning where play-based educators may benefit the most from an agentic perspective. It is suggested that primary classroom teachers seeking to evaluate play-based learning should adopt a dialogic approach to evaluation based on asking questions that are focused on the four key properties of agency, which are: ideas, planning, action, and self-reflection.