Leading Learning Process, Themes and Issues in International Contexts [Paperback]

The study of educational leadership makes little sense unless it is in relation to who the leaders are, how they are leading, what is being led, and with what effect. Based on the premise that learning is at the heart of leadership and that leaders themselves should be learners, the Leadership for Learning series explores the connections between educational leadership, policy, curriculum, human resources and accountability. Each book in the series approaches its subject matter through a three-fold structure of process, themes and impact.

Series Editors - Clive Dimmock, Mark Brundrett and Les Bell

The notion that school transformation is dependent on exceptional leaders is increasingly seen as unrealistic and unsustainable. Instead, the idea of distributed leadership, which promotes the view that all stakeholders have complementary leadership roles to play in enhancing student learning, is now being promoted as a more useful framework for understanding schools and how they might be changed.

Subscribing to the notion of distributed leadership, ODonoghue and Clarke identify two key groups: the leaders oflearning and the leaders for learning. The leaders oflearning  and the focus of this book  are those working at the school level to improve the quality of learning in the classroom, such as teachers, principals, pupils and involved members of the local school community. The leaders forlearning are the policy-makers and administrators whose support is crucial. The authors argue that in order to be effective leaders, both groups require an understanding of:

• Broad trends in contemporary leadership theory
• Recent views on learning theory
• The importance of teachers engaging continually in learning about their practice
• The significance of cl³«