PROFESSIONAL LEARNING COMMUNITIES in the early childhood education sector have been under-researched. The focus on collaborative learning, collective enquiry and shared leadership of such communities makes them worthy of study in order to establish their relevance to the sector. One of the foci of this research involving case studies of different models of professional learning communities was leadership. Findings suggested that the actions of the professional leader and the degree of relational trust present have an impact on the effectiveness of the professional learning communities.
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