Leadership for learning in schools in the twenty-first century

Learning occurs at all levels in school and leadership for learning is an integral part of the school and that for learning to happen, there must be trust, autonomy and high level of teacher professionalism with a strong professional learning community. This chapter synthesizes information from various studies of principal instructional leadership since its inception in the 1980s, its subjection to the various changes that happen in schools during the accountability era and school-based management period, as well as the rising and waning of various theories, to show how it is influenced leading to its evolution into 'leadership for learning' which is also known as 'leading learning'. The original model of instructional leadership is initially described and how the subsequent transformational leadership, distributed leadership, and teacher leadership are incorporated into the original instructional leadership theory to produce an integrated leadership for learning were also elaborated. This chapter re-visits the belief and importance placed on school leadership in addition to its crucial role in students' academic achievement and school improvement. Based on reviews of earlier leadership theories, more insights into leadership across different contexts and professional activities can illustrate some of the benefits of such an approach.