Ross Brooker, Bob Elliott, Ian Macpherson, Greg Thurlow, Lynn Burnett

Paper presented as a part of the Symposium: Researching curriculum leadership in new times: Insights into theorising and researching teachers’ curriculum leadership in changing contexts. Australian Association for Research in Education Annual Conference, Brisbane, November 30 - Dec 4, 1997

Introduction

This paper reports on some preliminary findings from the most recent phase of our work in exploring the phenomenon of teacher curriculum leadership in school settings. Earlier phases of the two year study (with both quantitative and qualitative dimensions) have focused on the extent to which teachers engaged in curriculum leadership activity and on the factors which are significant in influencing their involvement. These findings have been reported elsewhere in detail (Elliott, Brooker, Macpherson and McInman, in press; Macpherson, Brooker, Aspland, Elliott, 1996) but the following provides a brief overview.

In the first phase of the study, 1500 teachers and administrators responded to a questionnaire about their levels of engagement in curriculum leadership. Sixty percent (60%) of respondents indicated that they participated either not at all or to a limited extent. There was, however, a considerable difference between the level of engagement reported by administrators (principals, deputies, heads of department etc.) and that reported by classroom teachers. While 85% of administrators indicated that they participated in curriculum leadership extensively, only 29% of classroom teachers participated to the same extent (Elliott, Brooker, Macpherson and McInman, in press)

In addition to levels of participation, the earlier phases of the study further sought to identify aspects of schools which would encourage higher levels of participation by teachers. Two specific questions were investigated:

What are the clusters of ideas related to school contexts that shape teachers’ curriculum leadership actions?

What are the relationships between school contextual factors and teachers personal characteristics?

The findings in relation to the first question revealed that there were three clusters of items which are significant for teachers engagement in curriculum leadership activity. These refer to the ways in which curriculum is conceived in the school (Images of Curriculum), the way in which the school is organised (Organisational Structures) and the ways in which teachers interact in the school (Social Dynamics). A fourth cluster of items was related to the personal characteristics of teachers (e.g. confidence; feelings of empowerment and encouragement; trust of others; risk taking). These clusters may be thought of as mediational means which influence teacher curriculum leadership actions. They are structured through the collective actions of everyone in that school and contain historical and infrastructural elements. (Elliott, Brooker, Macpherson and McInman, in press).

In relation to the second question, the findings indicated that there was an interrelationship or reciprocity within the four factors. The case studies, in particular, confirmed that the four factors act as a loosely interrelated set of factors each of which contributes to a disposition towards curriculum leadership actions. Curriculum leadership actions were mediated by at least three school contextual factors and a set of personal factors which obviously relate to the contextual factors and each individual’s history. The three contextual factors are the result of the history and culture of the school and they create, as well as limit, opportunities for leadership action. The nature of these interrelationships were found to be peculiar to each instance of curriculum leadership action and was a function of the context and participants.

When conditions in the school are such that the organisational structures, the social dynamics and images of curriculum are empowering for the teachers and they feel confident, valued and trusted then that teacher is likely to engage in significant levels of curriculum leadership action. Of course, there is an interplay of these factors such that, for example, when a teacher feels confident, valued and trusted the teacher is likely to engage in leadership action to create favourable organisations, interpersonal relationships and images of curriculum. Likewise when such school factors are appropriate they encourage feelings of confidence, value and trust. In this sense it is not a linear causative explanation of curriculum leadership action that is proposed here. Instead, it is one with dynamic relationships involving selves, cultures and action.

Leadership, in these terms, may be thought of as being influenced by the factors relating to the context and the self. Particular teachers may be more likely to engage in curriculum leadership actions if they perceive favourable contexts and are personally disposed to those contexts. How one perceives a context and one’s relationship with that context shapes a view of what is possible and not possible for the self in that context. The question, "What views do teachers have of themselves in relation to their present engagement in curriculum leadership action in their context both now and in the future?", was the focus for investigation in this later phase of the study.

Teacher’s views of themselves as curriculum leaders.

How one acts in any particular context depends on structures of the self that incorporate attributes of the context and one’s abilities. Such structures of the self are called by various terms depending on the academic field of inquiry. The terminology used here to refer to such structures of the self is self-schemas (Cross and Markus, 1994). As Markus (1977) noted, considerably earlier:

Self-schemas are cognitive generalisations about the self, derived from past experience, that organise and guide the processing of self-related information contained in the individual’s social experience. (p. 64).

Adopting the view that a dynamic self-concept mediates and regulates behaviour (Markus & Wurf, 1987), one way of investigating teachers’ views of themselves as curriculum leaders is to examine their self-knowledge in a way which considers individuals’ conceptions of the self at present and future possibilities for the self (Markus, 1990). Such an examination addresses mediated behaviour, motivations and decision making (see Wolters, Garcia and Pintrich, 1995) which is consistent with the conceptualisation of teacher leadership outlined above. Thus, self-schemata are cognitive generalisations about the self which have been constructed through past actions and are embedded in past experiences and teachers may have self schemata in relation to their capability and relevant knowledge set within the relevant context (Shilling, 1992)

Adopting such a position for the study, teachers’ participation in curriculum leadership is investigated as activity which is shaped by their view of themselves as leaders and what they believe curriculum leadership to be. Levels of teacher participation in curriculum leadership may be hypothesised as being related to the clarity with which they conceive their leadership role as one associated with the facilitation of learning within and beyond the classroom. The clarity with which teachers perceive themselves in leadership roles can be considered in terms of their having "schematic and aschematic selves" (Cross and Markus, 1994). Teachers classified as being schematic have clear images about their roles while aschematic teachers believe they are not capable and do not regard allied activities as appropriate.

Thus, teachers may be seen to participate in curriculum leadership to the extent that they feel they have a good understanding of what can and should be achieved by them as leaders, the extent to which they feel capable of such undertaking and how important leadership activity is to their self evaluation. Such a position invites a number of questions about teacher leadership. For example:

To what extent do teachers hold schematic images of themselves as leaders? and

To what extent do they participate in activities for which they do not hold schematic images?

Questions such as the above which explore the schematic images for leadership held by teachers were addressed through a large scale qualitative study in Queensland Australia.

The study

Teachers’ schemas about curriculum leadership, their levels of engagement with particular activities and their perceived levels of confidence and competence concerning these activities were the subject of a large scale survey of teachers in government funded schools in Queensland, Australia.

The items for the questionnaire were constructed through a grid formation in which three aspects of curriculum were assumed viz. planning, implementing and assessing and three domains of curriculum action were hypothesised viz. classroom, school and community. For each cell in the grid, actions that could possibly be conceived as teacher curriculum leadership actions for teachers were identified and sixty-six items were trialed with two groups of teachers. Based on feedback from the groups about the meaningfulness of items and the length of the questionnaire a final version of the instrument consisting of thirty-six items was produced.

The following scales were used for gathering data:

Concerning beliefs about whether the activity is an example of teacher curriculum leadership teachers were asked to respond as strongly disagree (1), through unsure (3) to strongly agree (5). Concerning levels of current participation they responded as never (1) through to very frequently (5) and the extent to which they desired future engagement they responded as strongly avoid (1) through to strongly engage (5). They were also asked to indicate if they felt confident about engaging in the action (yes or no) and whether they felt competent about engagement (yes or no).

The sample of teachers in the study was a random stratified sample of teachers, stratified in terms of size, level and location. They were asked to indicate whether they believed each of the identified thirty six activities was an example of curriculum leadership, the extent to which they participated in the activity and whether they wished to participate in the future.

This paper reports on the data from 400 of these teachers- the data that were available at the time of writing the paper. It is believed that these teachers form a representative sample of the teachers in Queensland and that there will be little if any difference between the results reported here and those from the full sample. The number of 400 is sufficiently large to enable all the statistics reported here to be undertaken.

In the first instance the responses to the question asking the teachers to indicate the whether they agreed the activities were examples of curriculum leadership were factor analysed. Using strategies outlined by Burnett and Dart (1997) and Fanshawe and Burnett (1991) maximum likelihood and oblimin rotations were employed and three clusters of activities were identified, each with seven items. The scales, with names are listed in Table 2 below.

Table 2.

These sub-scales were then taken as the focus of analysis. For example, the sum of scores about levels of participation for the seven items in the school level leadership activities was taken as a measure of participation in teacher curriculum leadership in that domain. Using such synthesised measures, levels of current participation, and desire to participate in leadership in the future, in each of the three domains of classroom, school and extra curricula/ community were investigated. The levels of participation in curriculum leadership activities and the desire to participate in such activities in the future are reported in Table 3.

Table 3

Levels of participation and desire to participate in curriculum leadership activity

Perhaps it is not surprising that teachers report that they participate more often (and consistently so) in leadership activities associated with their classroom. The differences between engagement in the classroom domain and other domains is statistically significant and such difference may be because their traditional role has been within the classroom where they can clearly see the links between their actions and students. As previously noted by Katzenmeyer and Moller (1996), teachers are reluctant to be involved in leadership activities until they understand the notion of leadership as "touching students’ future" (p.3).

Concerning these data it is surprising, however, that the engagement and desire to engage in teacher curriculum leadership in the future in the domains of the school and extra curricula/ community are ordered in the way they are. The data indicate that there is more participation in the extra curricula/ community domain than at the school level. Again, however such differences may be explainable in terms of the types of activities considered in these domains. In the extra curricula/ community domain there appear to be more activities associated with teacher-student contacts.

The question about whether teachers hold schematic images of themselves as leaders in the domains indicated above is a difficult one to answer from the data. The process to investigate this involved counting the number of items in the scale where the teacher ticked the item as "unsure". Thus, a teacher who indicated that he/she was "unsure" whether all seven of the items concerned with teacher curriculum leadership in the school domain were, in fact, examples of teacher curriculum leadership in that domain would be regarded as having an "aschematic" self schema. On the other hand if a teacher indicated that he/she was unsure about none of the items then he/she would be regarded as having a highly "schematic" self schema. Varying degrees of clarity with regard to self schemas between these extremes were indicted by the number of items ticked as "unsure".

Using these measures of "schematic"/ "aschematic" selves, the number of teachers with different degrees of schematic selves were investigated. Table 4, and the accompanying graph (Figure 1), indicate the number of teachers in the sample indicating such varying measures.

These data indicate that significantly more teachers have schematic selves concerning teacher curriculum leadership as it pertains to the classroom domain than either of the other two domains. This may be because of the traditional hegemony of leadership that has existed in schools- one which focuses on roles of the administrative team in the school.

Such a finding is significant in the current context of devolved responsibilities to schools. What also needs to be devolved to schools are responsibilities which enable a more distributed image of leadership to emerge. In such a distributed image teachers may be more confident to develop self-schemas of leadership in all domains of professional responsibility.

The above analysis indicates that a number of teachers have limited schematic selves for leadership beyond their own classroom and that teachers participate in such leadership to a limited extent. The analysis does not indicate whether there are specific links between schematic selves and engagement in leadership activity and it is to this point that the analysis now turns.

The relationship between degree of schematic self and levels of participation in curriculum leadership was examined by considering a set of cross tabulations for these variables. Concerning degree of schematic self three scale points were used viz low (measures 1 or 2 in Table4/ Fig 1), medium (measures 3, 4 or 5) and high (measures 6 or 7). Levels of participation were determined such that the sample was divided into approximately three equal partitions, again referred to as low, medium and high. Tables 5, 6 and 7 provide the data for the domains of classroom, school and extra curricula/ community respectively.

Table 5: Degree of schematic self v extent of participation

in leadership in the classroom domain

Level of participation
Degree of schematic self	Low	Medium	High	Total
Low	4	0	0	4
Medium	21	18	8	47
High	99	114	119	332
Total	124	132	127	382

Table 6: Degree of schematic self v extent of participation

in leadership in the school domain

Level of participation
Degree of schematic self	Low	Medium	High	Total
Low	3	2	0	5
Medium	42	37	12	91
High	75	103	107	285
Total	120	142	119	381

Table 7: Degree of schematic self v extent of participation

in leadership in the extra-curricula/ community domain

Level of participation
Degree of schematic self	Low	Medium	High	Total
Low	17	2	4	23
Medium	50	50	32	132
High	62	70	102	234
Total	129	122	138	389

In each case the relationship between level of participation and degree of schematic self is highly significant (p<.001) using a Chi-square test. This suggests that those who have highly schematic self-schemas concerning teacher curriculum leadership are more likely to be engaging in higher levels of curriculum leadership activities, irrespective of the domain to which that leadership applies. Similarly, those who have "aschematic" self-schemas are more likely to be engaged in low level activity in the area.

Of course such analysis cannot address the question of causality. In other words there is no evidence that the degree of schematic self actually is a reason which explains varying levels of leadership activity in the domains investigated.

Implications for principal and teacher development.

This research has implications for teacher development that are pertinent for both principals and teachers in schools. It is clear that there is a differential involvement in leadership activities between teachers and principals and further, this differential is more marked in the domains of the school and the community- compared with that of the classroom. Such findings are consonant with Evers and Lakomski’s (1996) conclusions that current conceptions of school leadership, where leadership is "seen as mainly residing in the role of principal or vice-principal", are not adequate for contemporary school contexts and are promising more than they can deliver (p.71).

It seems that principals need to project a view of leadership which extends beyond themselves to one where there is a density of leadership within the school. The literature is clear that a diversity of leadership at the school is essential in order to bring about changes that are part of the rhetoric in all educational systems across the world. The view of leadership which principals need to project is one which relates leadership to the context of the school, regards it as a phenomenon of the school and recognises the unique characteristics of that school. (Macpherson, Brooker, Aspland & Elliott, 1996).

The research reported here suggests that traditional roles of teacher and principal have created a hegemony of leadership which is problematic for changing school environments. While teachers may feel reasonably comfortable with leadership associated with their classrooms, many do not report having appropriate self-schemas for leadership outside that domain. Given that the evidence reported here indicates a reasonably close relationship between engagement in leadership activities and well defined self-schemas, it is imperative that teacher development occur which provides them with such images.

This requires more than propositional knowledge about leadership being transmitted to teachers. They need to be able to see themselves in possible roles for themselves. Opportunities must be available for them to do this and, as part of this opportunity, development of personal qualities is extremely relevant. Our evidence is that development of qualities such as openness, commitment, trust, confidence and sense of responsibility (Elliott, Brooker, Thurlow & McInman, 1996) in each teacher is essential in fostering a density of leadership in each school. In other words, central to teachers developing appropriate possible selves with regard to leadership in contemporary school settings is a social context where personal qualities can be developed. This seems the unique responsibility of the principal and the administration team.

In considering the development of teachers in their initial experiences, Calderhead and Sharrock (1977) argue that "it was also important for several of the students to feel as though they were teachers. Being a teacher and feeling like a teacher…" (p.184). What is being argued in this paper is an extension of this idea for teachers as a whole in a school site in relation to their extended role. In a sense, teachers need to feel as though they are leaders and this can only occur if they have schematic-schemas of themselves as leaders- in other words well articulated possible selves.

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