Role Of The Headteacher In Instructional Supervision As Perceived By Teachers In Secondary Schools In Kitui District, Kitui County-Kenya

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the study was to investigate the role headteachers play in instructional supervision in order to improve on students’ academic achievement in Kitui District secondary school as it is perceived by their teachers. The objectives of the study included; to determine the role played by headteachers in instructional supervision as perceived by teachers, to explore strategies that headteachers can employ to improve on their instructional supervision, to investigate the challenges faced by headteachers in instructional supervision as perceived by teachers and to examine strategies of coping with challenges faced by headteachers in their endeavour to improve instructional supervision as perceived by teachers. Descriptive design was used to carry out the study. The target population were all the schools in the larger Kitui District. The sample consisted of 120 respondents consisting of 60 Heads of Departments and 60 class teachers who were randomly selected from 6 high performing school and 6 low performing schools. The data was collected using a questionnaire with similar items for both the HODs and teachers. Descriptive statistics such as frequencies and percentages were used to present the findings. This was done by use of SPSS package. The following were the findings of the study, the role played by headteacher in instructional supervision in secondary schools in Kitui district. About 62.6% of the teachers agreed that headteachers communicated confidently and provided necessary resources for learning. One of the strategies the headteachers employed as perceived by 69.7% teachers was eradicated cheating in examination among the students to a very high extent.About 97.0% of the teachers said there was failure of syllabus coverage. About 58.6% of the teachers felt that to some extent the headteacher encouraged new ideas, planned and executed new in-service courses for teacher professional growth. Another 60.6% of the teachers indicated riots as a challenge that affected the principals in improving instructional supervision. One the suggestion given by teachers (24.2%) on solutions was the government through TSC should employ more teachers. The following conclusions were drawn from the findings; the headteacher provided teaching and learning materials necessary resources for learning in the school. The headteachers eradicated cheating in examination among the students. The headteachers encourages teachers to attend workshops, bringing in new ideas and supports creativity, innovation and practice of new skills. Some of the suggestions given by the teachers were plans and executing new in-service courses for professional growth. The following recommendations were drawn from the findings; the headateachers maintained good standards of works to help to meet the set goals for their schools and were able to achieve the institutional set goals. The strategies put in place by the headteachers, is to employ the right strategies in to order assist in the improvement of instructional supervision. There is need for headteachers to support the teachers in their professional growth. Suggestions given by teachers in perceiving their headteachers to be strong instructional leaders were communicated through school goals and interacting with them during classroom performance. Hence allowing them to try new instructional strategies and clearly communicating a vision for the school.