Principal Instructional Leadership: Chinese PIMRS Development and Validation

Abstract

Considered as the most noticeable leadership approach in improving teaching and learning capacities of schools, instructional leadership begins attracting another wave of research attention. However, empirical evidence on instructional leadership practice of Chinese samples is rare in both English and Chinese literature, leaving the question of how Chinese principals practice instructional leadership largely unanswered. The authors aimed to develop a Chinese version of the Principal Instructional Management Rating Scale (PIMRS). This study consists of three phases. In phase 1, PIMRS was adapted based on Qian et al.’s (2017) recent work on instructional leadership practices in China, and then semistructured interviews with 15 primary school principals were conducted to verify the dimensionality and items of the adapted PIMRS. In phase 2, based on data collected from 159 principals and teachers, a Chinese PIMRS was validated and further modified. In phase 3, drawing on survey data collected from 1,100 principals and teachers, construct-level, item-level, and criterion-related validity of the final revised Chinese PIMRS was established. The results provide strong evidence that the adapted PIMRS can better represent Chinese principal instructional leadership.