Investigation of the Relationship between Transformational Leadership Style and Teachers' Successful Online Teaching during Covid-19

Abstract

The Corona pandemic has engendered drastic change throughout the world and schools in most countries have, relatively quickly, been required to transfer from frontal traditional learning to online learning. The research investigated the relationship between transformational leadership style and teaching mediated by school communications and moderated by sector (Jewish and Arab) in education systems in Israel during the Corona pandemic. 331 Jewish and Arab teachers participated in the research, expressing attitudes on the principals' leadership, the quality of school communications and the success of their online teaching during the Corona crisis. A positive correlation was found between principals' transformational leadership style and the success of online teaching, and the quality of communications in the school mediated this correlation. It was also found that the Jewish teachers reported more successes in online teaching and that the indirect correlation between transformational leadership and successful online teaching, through the quality of school communications, was moderated by population sector, so that it was stronger among Jewish teachers in comparison to Arab teachers. These findings have significant implications to improve organisational effectiveness, especially in the transition to online learning, and especially regarding the cultural uniqueness of different sectors. © 2021 Eskisehir Osmangazi University. All rights reserved.