REPOSITIONING TEACHERS' CONTINUOUS PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT THROUGH PROFESSIONAL LEARNING COMMUNITIES: THE ROLE OF EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP BEHAVIOUR
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.66811/eije.vol1.no1.87Keywords:
educational leadership behaviour; continuous professional development; professional learning communities; teacher professional learning; teacher effectiveness; school improvementAbstract
This conceptual analysis examines how educational leadership behaviour can reposition teachers’ continuous professional development through professional learning communities in Nigeria. It responds to a persistent problem in teacher development: participation in workshops and centrally organised training does not necessarily produce sustained instructional improvement when schools provide little time, feedback, collegial inquiry or leadership support for implementation. Contemporary scholarship, Nigerian policy evidence and recent meta-analytic research were synthesised around educational leadership behaviour, continuous professional development, professional learning communities, teacher learning and school improvement. Distributed Leadership Theory, Transformational Leadership Theory, Communities of Practice Theory and Adult Learning Theory provide complementary explanations. The analysis shows that leadership behaviour shapes the organisational and relational conditions for professional learning; PLCs connect formal CPD with classroom implementation through collaborative inquiry; trust, protected time and distributed responsibility sustain PLC quality; and professional development affects teaching more reliably when cooperation, coaching, self-regulation and follow-through accompany training. A Leadership-Supported PLC-CPD model is proposed in which leadership creates enabling conditions, PLCs organise inquiry, CPD develops professional knowledge and classroom application provides the route to teacher effectiveness and school improvement. The article concludes that repositioning CPD in Nigeria requires institutional change at school and system levels, not simply more training events.
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