Teachers perceptions of Primary School Head Teachers' instructional leadership behaviour: The case of selected Primary Schools of Mufumbwe District

Abstract

The focus of this study was to explore primary school teachers’ perceptions of their head teachers’ instructional leadership and how these perceptions may be affected by teachers’ own particular experiential factors, such as school location, school size, teacher’s gender, work experience and age. Data for this quantitative study was gathered using a questionnaire which was a synthesis of Hallinger & Murphy (1985), Murphy (1990) and Weber’s (1996) work. The framework for the instrument consisted of 27 items representing three dimensions of instructional leadership: ‘defining and communicating the school goals’; ‘monitoring and providing feedback on the teaching and learning processes’; and ‘promoting school-wide professional development’. The instrument was distributed to 150 primary school teachers who were randomly sampled from 16 out of 44 primary schools in Mufumbwe district. Teachers included in the sample represented rural/remote areas, and small/medium/large schools. Participants completed and returned 149 surveys, representing a 99.3% return rate. Sixty seven (44.7%) teacher respondents were male while 82 (54.7%) were female. Nonparametric statistical tests (Kruskal-Wallis and Mann-Whitney U) were used to analyze the data. The results showed statistically significant differences in the level of teachers’ perceptions of their head teachers’ instructional leadership in terms of: school location:- teachers from rural schools responded more favorably than teachers from remote schools, implying that head teachers in rural schools of Mufumbwe district are demonstrating instructional leadership behaviors than their counterpart in remote schools; school size:- teachers from large schools responded more favorably than those from small schools, implying that head teachers from these large schools are demonstrating instructional leadership behavior than those from small schools in Mufumbwe district; and teacher’s gender:- female teachers responded more favorably than male teachers, implying that head teachers are demonstrating their instructional leadership according to female teachers. Through these same tests, the results showed no statistically significant difference in the level of teachers’ perceptions of their head teachers’ instructional leadership in terms of: teacher’s age and teacher’s work experience. Indications from these findings can be useful to universities and colleges involved in training of head teachers in instructional leadership, furthermore, the findings will be more useful to all head teachers in Mufumbwe district and also other supervisors from DEBS office and Provincial officers to include the rural-remote divide in their routine monitoring of the education system and effectiveness of the head teachers.