Exploring Head Teacher Leadership as Instructional Resource for Staff: Stories from a School of South Asia

Abstract

At present, head teachers’ role as an instructional resource for the staff has been given a great emphasis to be carried out worldwide. However, a number of false practices of head teachers are often narrated by the school staffs which have hindered the creation of a motivating working environment. Hence, this paper aims at exploring what experiences the head teacher and teacher have assembled in the course of head teacher leadership practices as an instructional resource for the staff. The paper is based on narrative inquiry where a head teacher and the teacher from the same school were selected purposively as research participants for in-depth interview. From prolonged engagement with the participants, this study explored that head teacher leadership practice which was expected to act as an instructional resource for the staff was found counter-practiced though they narrated their awareness about the discourse. These pitfalls were narrated so considering the head teacher leadership’s major engagement in administrative tasks rather than in instruction pedagogy, instruction practice and CAS evaluation and implementation as inculcated by the three indicators of Step II of Effective Instructional Leadership. Moreover, failure of the head teacher to monitor and supervise the team’s performance was also recounted. Hence, the study implies the practices of head teacher leadership as an instructional resource for the staff as inevitable to help school prosper and strive towards excellence in teaching and learning setting.