Page 24 - Leadership Basics Educative Leadership

Encourage Questioning

Teachers should be encouraged to continually question their own work and openly seek feedback from
others on their work.
The expression, “Don’t fix it unless it’s broken” is contrary to what educative leaders want. Rather,
staff should be encouraged to seek new ways, to look for continuous improvement, and to question
even their best practices.

As stated above, because “routine is the death of consciousness” the educative leader constantly
encourages his or her staff to break with routines, to seek new ways of teaching and learning in their
classrooms.

 To encourage questioning by teachers, the educative leader can adopt any number of strategies,
for example:

 Create historical reflection: At meetings ask teachers to develop an anecdotal account of ‘the
way things used to be done around here before ...”

 Invite open inquiry: Establish a mechanism for teacher job rotation. For example, if you have
three teachers in the junior forms, they may rotate, taking each other’s class for a morning
session once per term.

 Hold your staff meetings in different teachers’ classrooms on a rotational basis, with each host
teacher talking about what their class has been doing in the last week.

 Pose questions on display posters and bulletin board signs, faculty memos or newsletters. The
goal of the questions should be to prompt reflection by teachers about their work. For example:

◆ “Is it possible to ask too many questions in class?”
◆ “Have you heard about the practice of classroom mediation?”

◆ “How much homework is too much for 15 years old boy?”
◆ “When did you last speak to the parents of the worst and best kids in your form?”

◆ “Will the introduction of ‘Accelerated Literacy’ practices improve your effectiveness as a
teacher”

◆ “Will reorganising the physical layout of the desks in your class room improve student
performance?”

◆ “Are students accountable for their own learning?”

22