Challenges of classroom instruction practices

Tshwarelo Hosia | Monday August 25, 2025 10:50

More often than not, when the performance of a school has become a matter of grave concern, members of the community react by mobilising resources with the hope that once resources are available, everything will fall in place. The understanding is that the provision of adequate teaching and learning materials would set in motion a chain of positive and enabling conditions necessary to upgrade a chronically low-achieving school into a hub of academic excellence. But this is a fallacy.

While there is an iota of truth that the availability of resources is a vital factor in the matrix of producing good student learning outcomes, the presence of materials, nonetheless, does not guarantee good results. The overemphasis on resources has resulted in a situation where other critical factors do not receive a fair share of attention. The call for the pumping of more resources into a low-achieving school is not without any foundation. Community members do not act in a vacuum. They are moved by a plea for help from schools. Support is usually preceded by a school needs assessment. The assessment usually singles out a lack of resources as the main stumbling block to the achievement of good learning outcomes. Schools hardly go beyond merely requesting assistance in the form of duplicating machines, stationery, and sanitary towels for students, to name but a few. In response to this plea, a number of public schools continue to experience the spirit of benevolence from members of the community. The support is much appreciated as it fills a void, which leaves schools seriously limping. This is so because the provision of adequate resources is a vital element in the life of a school. However, making inadequacy of resources appear like the one single major problem is an understatement of the challenges bedevilling schools. There are more serious and deeper challenges of instructional practice and governance, which are critical in the matrix of producing improved student learning outcomes. Schools are hardly open about these matters. Instead, for some reason best known to them, when interacting with stakeholders, they tinker at the edges of the problem. Yet, research has shown that more investments into the development of school principals and teachers are required if schools are to gain some semblance of normalcy. The school principal and the teacher are the chief enablers of high student achievement levels. The fact of the matter is that problems bedevilling schools go beyond the mobilisation of physical resources.

A lot of school principals are deployed without proper grounding in their role as instructional leaders. This problem is often swept under the carpet. No principal can tell the world about his or her lack of readiness to navigate a school. Students are simply thrown into the deep end and given the daunting task of building a ship while sailing. It is a difficult undertaking, albeit not insurmountable. The principal duty of a school principal is to lead instruction.

The challenge is that not all principals understand what the creature called instructional leadership. Being an instructional leader does not mean having a technical understanding of each subject in the school curriculum. It means a constant interaction with data and teachers to determine performance trends of each subject teacher and department. School principals should not make the grave mistake of looking for a perfect teacher. A perfect and flawless teacher does not exist. Much as teachers are hired to teach, they are also students ready to learn and re-equip their vessels while sailing. Instructional leadership is essentially about development. A principal should learn as much as he or she would like teachers to learn. There should be nothing like a perfect principal or perfect teacher. All should regard themselves as leaders on a continuous learning curve. A principal-teacher professional relationship is one anchored on mutual support. Principals should accept that a good teacher is the one striving to get better than yesterday. A principal, therefore, must devise means and ways of further polishing and refining teachers to become the best versions of themselves.

Data about the performance of teachers should be collected periodically. Reliable data can be drawn during classroom instruction. This means that an instructional leader should be a friend of the classroom. Managing the performance of a teacher is best done during live teacher-student classroom interactions. The work of a principal, therefore, demands regular classroom visits. Any attempt to monitor teaching from the office without a feel of the classroom atmosphere can hardly yield desirable results. As far as it is possible, school principals should resist the temptation of preoccupying themselves with miscellaneous administrative tasks to the detriment of classroom work. An instructional leader would know that work in the classroom assumes primacy over other considerations. So when seeking external aid, school principals should also plead for help in teacher development. Identifying existing instructional gaps should be a top number one priority, which should never be sacrificed. The community should also bear with school principals when their visits cannot be entertained during teaching periods. Often, external clients do not appreciate the fact that a principal is a teacher who must spend more time in the classroom rather than elsewhere. All in all, the point is that potential sponsors of education should look beyond the provision of critical teaching and learning inputs. Teacher development as well as training of school principals, are areas worthy of exploration and investment.