CALIMBAHIN, Genevie-Abi M. Dr. Inero V. Ancho, Ph.D.

MAEd – CIN October 06, 2017

Foundations of Curriculum and Instruction
Journal Review on Instructional Leadership
Instructional leadership, as Debevoise (1984) defined, encompasses those actions that a
principal takes, or delegates to others, to promote growth in student learning. This has been a
dynamic and ever-developing area in the field of education, with many trends and issues emerging
through time. In this review, the researcher chose the following three journal articles on
Instructional Leadership dealing with three different aspects in the academe, namely: Teachers’
Organizational Commitment, Management of the Instructional Program, as well as Coaching
Protocols for Instructional Leadership. The first article, entitled “Relationship between the
Instructional Leadership Behaviors of High School Principals and Teachers’ Organizational
Commitment” by Erdogan and Sarikaya (2016) explores the relationship between the instructional
leadership behaviors of high school principals and teachers’ perceptions of organizational
commitment and identifies the extent to which instructional leadership behaviors predict
organizational commitment. The second, entitled “Instructional Leadership: The Role of Heads of
Schools in Managing the Instructional Programme” by Manaseh (2016) investigates the
instructional leadership practices engaged in by heads of secondary schools to enhance classroom
instruction and students learning, particularly the way they manage the school instructional
program. The last one, entitled “Double-loop Learning: a Coaching Protocol for Enhancing
Principal Instructional Leadership” by Houchens et. al (2012) examines the extent to which a
coaching protocol based on theories of practiced enhanced principals’ self-perceived capacity for
reflection and effective instructional leadership.
In the first article, it is revealed that the principals’ most displayed instructional leadership
behaviors involve the dimension of setting and sharing of school goals while the least displayed
involve the dimension of supporting and developing teachers. The second article on the other hand
confirms that without an effective management of the instructional program in favor of promoting
teachers’ classroom instruction and students’ learning, efforts to that effect are doomed to fail. The
third article suggests that principals value the structure, feedback and reflective dimensions of the
principal coaching protocol and found that their confidence level about certain instructional
leadership problems were greatly enhanced.
The researcher in reading these articles highly believes that these three areas in relation to
instructional leadership are pressing realities both in the local/national and international education
sectors. Indeed, teachers’ commitment are greatly influenced by the instructional leadership of
school heads. Such has an effect on the teachers’ instruction, which leads to students’ learning and
achievement being affected as well. True enough, because of these findings, there is a need for
principals to have consistent monitoring, coaching and giving of feedback on their performance as
the instructional leaders of the school. This actually gives holistic assessment and evaluation not
just to school heads, but also to schools themselves, which may result in the enhancement of
schools’ system and practices.

References: DeBevoise, W. (1984) Synthesis of Research on the Principal As Instructional Leader.

Houchens, G.W., Hurt, J., Stobaugh, R., & Keedy, J.L. (2012). Double-loop Learning: A Coaching Protocol for
Enhancing Principal Instructional Leadership. Qualitative Research in Education, 1(2), 135-178.
Manaseh, A.M. (2016). Instructional leadership: The role of heads of schools in managing the instructional programme.
International Journal of Educational Leadership and Management, 4(1), 30-47.
Sarikaya, N., & Erdogan, C. (2016). Relationship between the Instructional Leadership Behaviors of High School
Principals and Teachers’ Organizational Commitment. Journal of Education and Practice, 7(3), 72-82.