The Influence Of Principal Instructional Leadership On Teachers’ Professional Learning Community

Since the concept of teacher professional learning community was put forward by American educator Hodder in 1997,the academic circle has taken “learning organization characterized by common goals,collaborative continuous learning and collective responsibility” as the ideal model of school reform.It is believed that teacher professional learning can significantly improve teacher teaching practice and student development level.The western studies have shown that the principal’s attention to and depth of school teaching will directly have an important impact on the teacher professional learning community.In other words,when the principal focuses on the two core businesses of “teacher teaching” and “student learning” and shows his excellent instructional leadership,it will have a positive effect on the teacher professional learning community in the school.However,there are few empirical studys in our country to carry out positive study on the relationship between them.Based on this,this study adopts mixed empirical research method to explore the influence of principal’s instructional leadership on teacher professional learning community.In addition,two variables of teacher trust and power distance are added into the research structure,trying to deepen the understanding of this problem from the perspective of “relationship” and “hierarchy”.First,through literature review,the paper proposes a theoretical model that principals’ instructional leadership positively affects teacher’ trust and promotes the development of teachers’ professional learning community,and postulated that power distance has a negative moderating effect on this positive influence.Based on the model,six research hypotheses were further proposed.On the basis of reference and adaptation of foreign scales,800 primary and secondary school teachers from Shanghai,Hunan,Shandong,Guizhou and other places were surveyed by convenient sampling,and 672 valid sample data were obtained.Then,SPSS.23 and Mplus.7 were used for data processing.Using descriptive statistics,independent sample T test,one-way variance analysis,regression equation model,Bootstrap mediation analysis and other statistical analysis methods,This paper presents the current situation of principals’ instructional leadership,teachers’ trust,teachers’ professional learning community and power distance,discusses the influence path of principals’ instructional leadership on teachers’ professional learning community,and focuses on the mediating role of teachers’ trust and the moderating role of teachers’ power distance.Finally,on the basis of data analysis,14 primary and secondary school teachers were selected for semi-structured interviews,and the interview results were used as explanatory evidence for the quantitative research results,so as to make up for the shortcomings of questionnaire survey.Through the analysis and discussion of the data,the research finds that:(1)the principal has strong instructional leadership,and the school’s mission planning is clear;The teacher professional learning communities have a high level of development and always pay attention to student development;Teachers generally trust their colleagues,but trust their principals is different.Teachers have higher power distance tendency,desire democracy but obey the principal’s leadership authority.(2)There are significant differences in the development of teacher professional learning community in gender and school stage;There are significant differences in teacher trust in school stage,position and school location.There are significant differences in teachers’ power distance tendency in gender,teaching age,whether they are class teachers,and position.(3)After controlling the influence of demographic variables such as gender,age,teaching age,professional title and position,the results of regression analysis show that the principal’s instructional leadershipand its sub-dimensions,management of curriculum and teaching and the creation of a positive atmosphere have a significant positive predictive effect on the teachers’ professional learning community.Principals’ instructional leadership and its dimensions have a significant positive predictive effect on teachers’ trust.Teacher trust and its dimensions have significant positive predictive effect on professional learning community.(4)Teacher trust and its sub-dimension trust colleagues play a significant mediating role between principals’ instructional leadership and teachers’ professional learning community.The indirect effect was calculated to be more than a quarter.(5)Power distance has a significant negative moderating effect on the positive influence of principals’ instructional leadership on teachers’ trust and the positive influence of principals’ instructional leadership on professional learning community.Based on the above research findings,this paper puts forward some suggestions to improve the principal’s instructional leadership and enhance the development of professional learning community from the perspectives of ethics,major and system.From the perspective of ethics,principals should practice moral leadership and pay attention to the development of "person" in the school;Actively reduce their own power distance,listen to the voice of teachers.From the perspective of major;principals should improve their professional ability through active learning and reflection,indepth teaching work,interschool cooperation,participation in collective learning and other ways.From the perspective of system,principals should improve the development level of the teacher professional community by perfecting the support system,optimizing the knowledge sharing system,and establishing the evaluation feedback and incentive system.