Improving classroom practices: the impact of leadership, school organizational conditions, and teacher factors

Schools are challenged to improve classroom practices as they are expected to enhance students’ motivation. While leadership, school organizational conditions and teacher factors are considered essential for improving classroom practices, more should be known about the interplay between school internal conditions and their development over time to explain teacher learning and change. This book describes a study that gains more insight into the impact of leadership, school organizational conditions and teacher factors on teachers’ classroom practices and students’ motivation to learn. As indicators of school-wide capacity for improvement, a model consisting of school internal conditions is used to relate changes in classroom practices to developments in schools’ capacity for improvement. In addition, the relative importance of teachers’ classroom practices for the motivation of students to learn is analyzed. The study outcomes show that school-wide capacity for improvement can be considered an important prerequisite for improving classroom practices and enhancing students’ motivation. Moreover, the results indicate that it seems a major challenge for schools to build and subsequently sustain their capacity to improve.
This dissertation increases our understanding of the nature, dynamics and effects of building school-wide capacity for improvement.