Management Skills in Primary Schools

Les Bell

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2018
• eBook ISBN: 9781351041447
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Originally published in 1988. The qualities that identify a good school are high teaching standards and teacher morale, good levels of behaviour, successful pupil performance and a well-balanced provision of extra-curricular activities. Such schools are described as 'well-run' but the correlation between effectiveness and an explicit management strategy is not yet established. This book seeks to examine the role of management in the primary school and to identify those areas in which effective management practice can make a valuable contribution to school life for the benefit of both staff and pupils. It argues that although useful insights can be gained into school organisation from the scientific management perspective, the human relation approach to management has more to offer to those working in the primary sector. The focus is therefore on personal relationships. The importance of a clear sense of purpose is emphasised throughout, especially in view of the challenges which now face our primary schools.

Chapter 1

THE CONTEXT OF PRIMARY SCHOOL MANAGEMENT

The Manager in the Primary School

This book is for and about those teachers who have managerial responsibility in the primary school. It is intended to provide an analysis of those responsibilities and, at the same time, to offer practical guidelines for the development of effective strategies which might enable the primary school manager to cope with the increasing demands which confront most colleagues in primary schools today. The basic premise of the book is that most, if not all, teachers in our primary schools ought to have a direct and developing part to play in the management of the schools in which they work. Clearly the overall responsibility for the total organisation and administration of any school rests with the headteacher working through and with the governing body of the school. This situation is almost immutable and will remain so in spite of the changes contained in the 1986 Education Act, and those which are to be the subject of new legislation in 1987/88. Nevertheless, for reasons which will be examined later in this chapter, it is becoming increasingly clear that the whole staff of each primary school is expected to have collective responsibility for the content of the curriculum in their school, for the teaching methods adopted in their classrooms, and for the routine decisions which are taken about the education of the children in their care. This situation is the logical extension of the movement towards greater accountability in schools which began with the Great Debate and the green paper, Education in Schools: A Consultative Document (HMSO 1987b). It is also a theme developed at length by H.M. Inspectorate and summed up in their publication, Education Observed 3: Good Teachers (DES, 1985b) where it is argued that:

… teachers need to work together collectively to produce an atmosphere in the school which encourages children to respond in a positive and responsible fashion … The value of clear objectives for each lesson, and the need for pupils to understand these objectives are often demonstrated … References to the importance of professional team work occur frequently in school reports. Typical is the comment in a primary school report: “The members of staff work as a team so that they can offer leadership and guidance in areas of the curriculum that might present difficulties to individual teachers. In this way weaknesses and omissions are assessed and, as far as it is possible, remedied.” The Middle School Survey recorded the influence on the quality of work exerted by teachers with delegated responsibilities who were “involving colleagues in cooperative planning by working alongside teachers in the classroom, by identifying needs for in-service training and, in particular, by demonstrating through personal example what could be achieved.” These comments emphasise the importance of professional team work for maximum curricular strength and mutual support.

(DES 1985b, paras. 13–30)

These observations by H.M. Inspectorate are not merely descriptions of existing practices in those schools which have recently benefited from a general inspection, although accurate descriptions of practices observed since 1983, when reports made by H.M. Inspectors were first published they certainly are. These comments go further than describing existing practice since they provide us with an extensive working definition of what constitutes a model of good practice in our schools from the perspective of H.M. Inspectorate. These elements are what HMI regard as essential basic features in any well run and effective school. They constitute those features which, increasingly, H.M. Inspectors and their local counterparts, will expect to find in the schools which they visit. In many schools such practices can be found as a normal and well developed part of the life of the school. Other schools are at the point of developing their own individual responses to expectations such as these, while some schools have not yet crossed that particular threshold. It is clear, however, that whatever steps a school may have taken towards meeting the requirements which are implied in these observations, one of the inevitable consequences of moving in the direction indicated in Good Teachers (DES 1985b) is that the responsibility for managing the school devolves to the whole staff of that school to some significant degree and that, in such circumstances, they all must regard themselves as managers in their primary school.

This, then, is the context within which the management of our primary schools has to take place. This book will argue that all primary school teachers should play a full part in various aspects of the management of their school and that, increasingly, they will be expected so to do. The revision of teachers’ salary and career structure contained in The Education (School Teachers’ Pay and Conditions) Order (1987b), with its provision for a Main Professional Grade, and its commitment to Assessment and Performance Appraisal may or may not have facilitated this process. However, it would have resulted in each teacher having an individual job description specifying, the particular responsibilities of the job held in the school. These responsibilities for the MPG Teacher include, among other things:

Advising and co-operating with the head-teachers and other teachers … on the preparation and development of courses of study, teaching materials, teaching programmes, methods of teaching and assessment and pastoral arrangements…

Contributing to the selection for appointment and professional development of other teachers…

Co-ordinating or managing the work of other teachers.

Taking such part as may be required of him in the review, development and management of activities relating to the curriculum, organisation and pastoral functions of the school.

(DES, 1987b, Schedule 3, paras. 3.1–3.12, page 5)

The conditions of employment for headteachers identify an even more specific element of managerial activity. This activity includes representing the school in its relationships with the LEA and Governors, formulating the overall aims and objectives of the school, participating in the selection and appointment of staff, determining, organising and implementing an appropriate curriculum, reviewing the work and organisation of the school as well as evaluating standards of teaching and learning together with:

Providing information about the work and performance of the staff employed at the school where this is relevant to their future employment.

Supervising and participating in any arrangements within an agreed national framework for the appraisal of the performance of teachers who teach in the school.

Ensuring that all staff have access to advice and training appropriate to their needs…

(DES, 1987b, Schedule 1, Paras. 4.1–4.23, pages 2–3)

These responsibilities echo those descriptions of good practice which were identified by H.M. Inspectorate in Good Teachers (DES 1985b). With the possible exception of the explicit references to performance appraisal the essential features are almost identical, stressing as they do that teachers have a responsibility which is broader and more far-reaching than might be the case if their only concern was for the work which goes on within the classroom. (See Table 1) Such wider responsibility involves working more closely with colleagues for the benefit of all, especially the children. It also involves most teachers in the general management and organisation of the school in which they work. As Marland (1986) suggests:

In England and Wales, despite some recent centralist tendencies, a significant proportion of the key decisions are made within the school, often by teachers who hold ‘posts of responsibility’. This elevates the management skills of the teachers, as opposed to their pedagogical skills, into very great importance.

(Marland, 1986, p.1)

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Table 1 THE TASKS OF THE MANAGER IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS

GOOD TEACHERS (DES 1985b)	BAKER (DES 1987b)
Setting clear objectives	Advising and cooperating
Planning with colleagues	Selecting and appointing
Establishing a consistency of approach	Professional development
Providing leadership	Co-ordinating and managing
Giving guidance	Reviewing the curricular and pastoral functions
Assessing
Cooperating as a team	Appraising performance
Developing colleagues

The extent to which teachers recognise this and the degree to which they become involved in the work of their school above and beyond a direct concern for the pedagogical aspects of teaching depends, in part, on the organisation of their particular school. It also depends on the individual teacher’s understanding of the nature of management and of the relationship between management and the work of the teacher in the primary school. What management means within the broad context of primary school education, and how management practices may be identified within such an organisation, become the focal point of concern. To answer such questions, even with reference to the smallest primary school, is no easy matter since the concept of management and the application of management skills in schools raises a series of complex issues.

What has to be Managed?

Drucker (1968) drew our attention to the complexities of management when he divided the process of management into two specific tasks.

The manager has the task of creating a true whole that is larger than the sum of the parts, a productive entity that turns out more than the sum of the resources put into it … The second specific task of the manager is to harmonize in every decision and action the requirements of immediate and long-range future. He cannot sacrifice either without endangering the enterprise … He must, so to speak, keep his nose to the grindstone while lifting his eyes to the hills…

(Drucker 1968, pp. 408–9)

More recently Morgan, Hall and Mackay (1983) have suggested that those tasks which commonly face managers in a school setting can be subsumed under four headings; technical, conceptual, human relations and external relations. Technical tasks are those which are specific to the primary purpose of the school, that is the education of its pupils. Conceptual tasks includes those tasks which are directly concerned with the controlling and administration of the school such as the deployment of staff and other resources. As Field (1985) has pointed out, however, it is extremely difficult in practice to separate the technical (professional) aspects from the executive (administrative) aspects of these tasks. The human relationships element of these management tasks include the structuring of participation in decision-making and policy making as well as the provision which needs to be made for the development of the staff of the school. The external tasks draw our attention to the key boundary role which is often occupied by the head and the senior staff of any school. They control and direct the flow of information into the school and co-ordinate responses to that information. The increasing, but generally legitimate, interventions in the life of the school on the part of parents, governors, the local education authority and a host of other groups and individuals are also part of this aspect...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Tables
• FOREWORD
• ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
• 1 The Context of Primary School Management
• 2 Primary Schools and Their Management: An Example
• 3 Headship, Management and Leadership in the Primary School
• 4 Profiles, Descriptions and Specifications in the Primary School
• 5 The Selection and Appointment of Staff in the Primary School
• 6 Managing the Primary Team
• 7. The Primary School Staff Team: Its Priorities and their Management
• 8. Communication in the Primary School
• 9. Managing Change in the Primary School
• 10. Evaluation, Appraisal and Development in Primary Schools
• 11. MANAGING HEADSHIP IN THE PRIMARY SCHOOL
• References
• Index