Joint action among teachers appears to depend on the teachers' perceptions of their interdependence and the presence of opportunities for joint action. An urban middle school had been organized into teams on several levels with strong support from the principal. Three situations that altered these operating procedures provided evidence that…

Teaching has endured largely as an assemblage of entrepreneurial individuals whose autonomy is grounded in norms of privacy and noninterference and is sustained by the very organization of teaching work. This article examines prominent forms of collegiality and discusses their prospects for altering the fundamental conditions of privacy in…

In this 2-year study, the assumptions and methods of role theory were employed to guide the description and analysis of instructional leadership among secondary school principals. This paper reports selected findings from the first year's work--a focused ethnographic study of instructional leadership patterns in five secondary schools--based on…

Beginning with an illustrative exercise in audience participation, this keynote address contends that effective staff development requires shared commitment, a shared language for describing and analyzing the problems of teaching and learning, and awareness that big ideas are realized through small tactics. These general precepts are clarified…

A two-year qualitative study of mathematics and English teachers in two urban comprehensive high schools investigated how teacher community serves as resource for teacher development and school reform. A school engaged in whole-school reform sustained high teacher commitment and school-level community by constituting professional community…

This study examined instructional leadership in eight diverse secondary schools in four urban, suburban, and small-city school districts in one western state. The aim was to gain access to a set of schools that provided both variety in instructional leadership and diversity in school size, organization, grade level, faculty and student…