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Conditions of Work

Day writes about the importance of self-confidence, professional learning cultures, policy contexts, conditions for teaching and learning in the classroom, school cultures, committed leadership and leadership development.

Day argues that adequate workplace conditions are central to job effectiveness and teacher satisfaction. Day refers to an Australian study by Grundy and Bonser that investigated school development planning, accountability, financial planning, shared decision making, participatory management, student learning, school development and teamwork. Although collaboration and participatory decision making were supported in principle, the extent and quality of participation ranged widely. Factors known to promote collegiality, such as reducing hierarchies and collaborative cultures, were not necessarily implemented hand-in-hand with decentralisation policies. Day calls upon Hargreave's term 'contrived collegiality' to describe administratively regulated, implementation-oriented forms of participation (Hargreaves, 1994, cited in Day, 1999).

Day also writes about classroom conditions, in particular the influence of class size upon teachers' abilities to facilitate learning. He lists six essential conditions for facilitating student learning:

authentic relationships
rules and boundaries
planning, resources and preparation
teacher's repertoire
pedagogic relationships
reflection on teaching.

(Hopkins, West, & Beresford, 1998, cited in Day, 1999)

Day cites a number of studies (Glass & Smith, 1978; Slavin, 1989; Robinson, 1990; Mosteller, 1995; Galton & colleagues, 1996) to argue that a large class size militates against achieving these six essential conditions. In larger classes, teachers spend more time in critical control and behaviour management and less time in interaction and feedback with students. Day also refers to studies that show that increases in class size lead to increases in the hours that teachers work, and greater stress and burnout.

Day argues that school cultures affect the ability of teachers to engage in their own learning.

Culture is about people in the organizational (sic) setting and is characterized (sic) by the ways in which values, beliefs, prejudices and behaviour are played out within the micropolitical processes of school life. (p. 78)

Once again, he refers to the work of Hargreaves (1992; 1994, cited in Day, 1999, pp. 78-81), who identified the broad (school) cultural forms of:

individualism (teaching alone behind closed doors)
balkanisation (isolated individuals and groups)
collaboration (spontaneous, voluntary, development-oriented, discretionary)
contrived collegiality (compulsory working together).

Hargreaves also draws our attention to the work of Stoll and Fink (1996, cited in Day, 1999, p. 82), who proposed a typology of school cultures.

Typology of school cultures

Day points out that the culture of a school is brought about by its leaders, who need to address both cognitive and affective goals.

Head teachers need to be both managers, designing and implementing plans, focusing upon task achievement, dealing with structure and systems, with the immediate future and status quo, and leaders who articulate a vision, promote shared ownership, and engage in evolutionary planning (Louis & Miles, 1990), dealing with culture, the long-term and change. (p. 83)

Leaders need to provide learner support for teachers through induction and integration; exposure and osmosis; self-directed learning; and structured personal support for learning (p. 84). Day refers to recent research in England by Tampoe (1998, cited in Day, 1999, p. 86) that identifies liberating leadership as that which releases the empowerment within individuals, rather than empowering them per se.

References

Day, C. (1999) 'Teachers' conditions of work: Classrooms, cultures and leadership. ' In Day, C. (Ed.) Developing teachers: The challenges of lifelong learning. Educational Change and Development Series. Bristol: Falmer Press. ED 434 878.