Human agency is significant to the understanding of professional identities and actions. It is through human agency that individuals can become powerful in changing or authoring their own identities. Stemming from a larger narrative inquiry focused on understanding the professional identities of public preschool teachers, this paper draws on cultural models theory to explore identity, agency and professional practice through the lived stories of CeCe, an African-American public preschool teacher from the United States. Findings demonstrate the influence of CeCe’s lived experiences to her developing sense of human agency and highlight the importance of critical incidents and voice to identity and human agency.

This article presents the findings from a case study focused on understanding how cultural models of education are brought together in dialogue to re-imagine education. The use of cultural models theory provided a useful framework for exploring how teachers, leaders, children, and families at Westside Primary School orchestrated multiple perspectives to re-imagine their figured world as culturally responsive. Findings suggest the principles from two cultural models of education – Reggio Emilia and a pedagogical framework called the Nunga Way, informed by local Australian Aboriginal First Nations peoples – were significant for local culturally responsive pedagogy.

Educational reforms across the globe have had implications for the work of preschool teachers and thus their professional identities. This article draws on a feminist discourse lens to examine data collected from a recent narrative inquiry focused on understanding the professional identities of five public preschool teachers in the USA. This analysis identifies two discourses (the discourse of professionalism and the discourse of the caregiver), bringing to light the discursive tensions that existed within this context, and examines how dominate discourses construct a double bind that leaves preschool teachers with conflicting identities as they navigate professional expectations.

Early childhood education contexts are complex and diverse and thus require leadership approaches that connect with the values and beliefs of that field. Currently the research on leadership in early childhood education is limited and it would benefit from research into innovative approaches employed in very different but comparable locations. This article presents findings from a cross-case analysis exploring the role of leadership in two early childhood education settings: a university laboratory school in the United States of America and a public school in Australia. Drawing on cultural models theory, we argue that co-constructing leadership in context is a useful alternative to traditional hierarchical approaches to leadership. Each site’s co-construction of leadership provided an opportunity for leadership to be developed organically and to be shared amongst the community of learners. The findings demonstrate how co-constructed leadership promotes a democratic environment for all members of a learning community.