The purpose of this study is to construct the conceptual framework of teacher leadership. The definite questions of this study are as follow.
① What are the situations in which teacher leadership is needed, and how can the necessity of teacher lea...
The purpose of this study is to construct the conceptual framework of teacher leadership. The definite questions of this study are as follow.
① What are the situations in which teacher leadership is needed, and how can the necessity of teacher leadership be presented?
② What are the theories which can be the bases of establishment of teacher leadership concept? What are the criteria of making the concept? And what are the concept of teacher leadership which can be presented according to these concept criteria?
③ What are the factors which accelerate or impede teacher leadership, and the suggestions?
The way of this study is the theoretical study through the related literature analysis. The result of this study is as follows
First, the teacher leadership is needed in the three situations of educational reform, professional request and the change of school structure. Teacher leadership is surely necessary to succeed in the educational reform, to establish profession of teaching, and to make an efficient school.
Second, the theories which are the bases of establishment of teacher leadership concept are teacher development theory, transformational leadership theory, and leadership theory in education. The criteria of making the concept are found to be the purpose, the content, the subject, and the object. On the bases of these criteria, the concept of teacher leadership can be defined that teacher leadership means proper influence on students, students' parents, teachers, school administrators, and the community by teachers with specific qualities to accelerate the change of students' lives.
To make the definition concrete, the purpose of teacher leadership is the change of students' lives through the several activities and roles of lead teacher. In addition, a lead teacher accelerates these students' lives efficiently. The content of teacher leadership is expressed as the influence of a lead teacher and presented as follows. That is, challenging the process, inspiring a shared vision, enabling others to act, modeling the way, encouraging the heart. The proper influence is made on the bases of the characteristics of the leading object(age, sex, interest, role, and etc.) and the professional judgement under suitable circumstances. In a broad sense, all teachers are leaders, but with regard to the quality of leadership, the subject of teacher leadership is the teacher who can show required specific qualities. The object of teacher leadership is students, which is enlarged to students' parents, principals, teachers, and communities.
Third, teacher leadership can be utilized through the study on the types of teacher leadership. Through these studies, the following suggestions can be found in the fields of teacher consciousness, teacher education, teacher culture, and school management. The reformation of teacher consciousness is the most important part of teacher leadership program. That is, the core purpose of teacher leadership program can be regarded as the leadership role through the reformation of teacher consciousness. The prior education of teachers and the curriculum for the incumbent teachers have to include the field related with teacher leadership and for this, the various interactive relations through the organization of learning group among teachers. Because the reflection of teachers' development and interests is an important element on which success and failure of teacher education depends. And, the culture of teachers which has conservative tendency has to be changed to the culture of learning community oriented, and it is necessary to set up systematic condition for learning community. The suggestions in the field of school management are related with the argument about restructure. That is, the more autonomy has to be given to teachers for the restructure of teacher organization, time schedule, and school culture.
This study is the theoretical study on the teacher leadership, so tools must be developed to estimate the actions of teacher leadership. And it is necessary to develop the teacher leadership programs which are suitable to our country and the effectiveness of those programs must be verified.