Taiwanese elementary school English teachers' perception of teacher leadership

Abstract

This study used documents, interviews, and questionnaires to explore 10 Taiwanese elementary school English teachers’ perceptions of teacher leaders and leadership and to what extent their background influenced their perceptions of leadership. The conceputal framework was developed based on the component of teacher leaderships, principles for leadership and domains of leaderships. The study had the following major findings. First, participants unanimously agreed on the perceptions of leaders in terms of teaching as an important profession, the influence of institutions on teacher leaders, and teacher leaders’ roles in decision making. Secondly, participants disagreed in their perceptions about balancing between being teachers and teacher leaders and teacher leaders’ roles in school-wide plans. Next, English teachers’ age, school size, and years of teaching experience were the major factors for such discrepancies. Arousing English teachers' awareness of instructional leadership is crucial in the language teacher education.