Curriculum Management and Teacher Connectedness in South African Rural Secondary Schools

Abstract

Underpinned by Hallinger and Murphy’s (1985a) three-dimensional model of instructional leadership as the lens for analysis of the discourse, this chapter seeks to unravel the subject of curriculum management and teacher connectedness in South Africa’s rural secondary schools. The chapter explores the necessity for collaboration in curriculum management between members of the school management team (SMT) and post-level teachers in South Africa’s rural secondary schools. Among the key findings of this chapter are insights generated to help improve the reputation of curriculum management as it is practiced in South Africa’s rural secondary schools and by its educators as well as across the continent of Africa and globally. The findings also unravelled some of the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats that are not easily noticeable in many instructional leadership practices. In addition, the findings provide important insights to members of the SMT s and classroom practitioners on the six critical dimensions of instructional leadership: identifying the vision for their schools, articulating the vision, fostering the acceptance of group goals (teachers), providing individualised support, providing intellectual stimulation, and establishing appropriate and high-performance expectations. The conclusion arrived at is that many of the challenges facing members of the SMT s as instructional leaders in South African secondary schools as learning organisations cannot be understood by adopting a casual approach but require a systematic analysis if they are to be fully expunged from the school curriculum. The study recommends that South African rural secondary school principals as curriculum managers need to have strong synergies with their subordinate educators or teachers if they are to fully ensure effective curriculum leadership and management practices in the schools.