The effect of school principals' instructional leadership behaviors on teacher agency according to pre-school teachers' perceptions

The purpose of this research is to examine the efects of school principals' instructional leadership behaviors on teacher agency according to pre-school teachers' perceptions. This research covers the opinions of preschool teachers working in public kindergartens and primary schools in Antalya province (central districts) in the 2022-2023 academic year. A quantitative research method was used in this study. Data was collected from 385 pre-school teachers selected by the stratified sampling method from a pool of 930 preschool teachers who constituted the study population. The data of the study were collected with the Instructional Leadership Scale and the Teacher Agency Scale. In the analysis of the data, descriptive statistics, the t-test for independent samples, one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) for independent samples and structural equation modeling were used. There is a significant difference in pre-school teachers' perceptions of instructional leadership in terms of the school type variable. The instructional leadership perceptions of pre-school teachers working in kindergartens are higher than those working in primary schools. It was observed that there was no significant difference in the perceptions of instructional leadership in terms of the variable of professional seniority. There is a significant difference in pre-school teachers' perceptions of teacher agency in the learning effectiveness dimension in terms of the school type variable. Pre-school teachers working in kindergartens have higher teacher agency in the learning effectiveness dimension than those working in primary schools. Perceptions of teacher agency show a significant difference in terms of the variable of professional seniority. Pre-school teachers with professional seniority of 20 years and above have higher perceptions of teacher agency in the teaching effectiveness dimension than preschool teachers with professional seniority of 9 years and under. A low-level positive relationship between participating preschool teachers' perceptions of instructional leadership and teaching effectiveness, optimism, and constructive participation dimensions; It was observed that there was a moderate positive relationship with the learning effectiveness dimension. According to the findings of the study, a moderate and significant positive relationship was found between instructional leadership and teacher agency.