Definition of terms

1.8 Definition of terms.

Leadership.

The most important aspect of management are leadership (Weihrich, et al, 2008). In the past 70 years, there are more than 65 different approaches that have been developed to effective leadership (Fleishman et al, 1991). There is no single definition of leadership that universally accepted. The definition is broad concept. Leadership have been defined the ability of one person to influence other towards the achievement goals (Yuki, 1994). Besides that, leadership means that function knowing yourself , having vision, build trust among college and ranking effective action to realize your own leadership potential (Bennis, 1989, p. 7).

Principal.

Principal means that a central part of being great leader is cultivating others. Principal is the leader and manager of the school but they need experience and knowledge (The Wallace Foundation, 2013).

Teacher.

Teachers are leader with those individual who are “committed to continuous learning for themselves and their colleagues… use thinking as a tool to examine complex organizational problems and work towards reconstructing their teaching practice to include roles as servant leaders and change agents in their organizations” (Childs,2005).

Student achievements.

The level of proficiency one has achieved in an academic area as defined by a summative cumulative high stakes test. This term used interchangeably with academic achievement.

Transformational leadership.

According to Jung and Avolio (2000) stated that transformational leadership assumption that people follow a person who inspire them and the followers accept and internalize the values expressed by the leaders. Transformational leadership also are participative leadership style that defined as transforming values and priorities of subordinate whereby the leader motivates them to perform better beyond the expectations(Yuki,1999).

Transactional leadership.

Transactional leadership have been characterize as exchange process between leader and followers. It also calls “carrot and stick” which means rewards and punishment. Transactional leadership work with follower current needs and wants to satisfy follower’s needs once agreed upon performance level are achieved (Jung & Avolio, 2000). Other than that the definition of transactional leadership are identifies specific followers expectation and provides rewards in exchange for followers performance (Bass, 1985)

Limitation of study

1.7 Limitation of the study.

There are many types of leadership style that can be motivates. This research will mainly focus on the transformational and transactional leadership style on of teacher towards student achievements. This research is limiting itself on the scenario to identify the leadership style. Student achievements would be change according to the variables. Other than that, there are some limitation faces by researcher. This study relied upon the teacher’s leadership style towards students achievements. The teachers may be limited by their understanding of the scope leadership style.

Further the limitation also about the population and respondent. This study was conducted at Sekolah Menengah Tun Perak, Muar. So I will be a limitation of lack of accurate finding because small volume of respondent. Normally each respondent will give different opinions.

Then, lack of experience. The researcher do not has enough experience to conduct this study. It is because this is first time that the researcher gets the opportunities to conduct this research. Many word and term that researcher is not familiar. For instance book, journal article and also internet that he researcher use to complete this research.

Lastly, cooperation from respondent. The researcher had faced a few difficulties in obtaining respondents cooperation. Some of respondent refuse to answer questionnaire given to them and did not give their full cooperation. There is also minor problem of which respondent when some of the respondent answers the questionnaire without knowing the requirement of the respondents.

Scope of Study

1.6 Scope of study.

The scopes of the study that have been decide by researcher at Sekolah Menengah Tun Perak, Muar. The main focus of this study to know what leadership style and student achievement. This research had been concluded in order to identify leadership style on students’ achievement in that school. The total populations of respondent among the teachers are 150. However, the researcher have been chosen from the total of teachers by using Convenience sampling of 100 respondents were used to answer the questionnaire and also carry out comment and suggestion. 

Significance of Study

1.5 Significance of the study.

In general, leadership style will directly affect the achievement of the school. Leadership is the quality that a person have. The best leadership are transformational and transactional because this leadership style are affected by moral and personal development, training and education.

This study focus on transformational and transactional leadership style on student achievements. This research will cover in Sekolah Menengah Tun Perak, Muar. This study will be beneficial for principal, teachers, students and all respective parties in the organization. The significant of this study will focus on teacher. Teacher is the one important employee in the organizations. They also play a role model to students and other people. From this study, researchers want to know perception of teacher about leadership style on student achievements.  It will provide opportunity and better understanding about leadership style and quality that can be practiced in the classroom. It also will encourage students engagements in the class and student will enjoy learning session as well as participative actively in the class room.

Besides that, in every school there must have one leader that we call principals. Principals important in one organization in school. They have their power to making decisions and motivate their followers. Principals also must know what type of leadership that they use to approach teachers to work together to achieve the common goals of the school. It also assist leader to establish their own leadership style to suits needs and want to increase students achievements. 

Research Questions and Research Objective

1.3 Research objective.

      1.   To identify whether transformational leadership style can affect student achievement or not.

      2.  To determine whether transactional leadership style can affect student achievement or not.

      3.  To identify which leadership style that gives the greatest influence on student achievements at              school.

1.4 Research questions.

      1.  Do transformational leadership styles can affect student achievements?

      2.  Do transactional leadership styles affect student achievements?

      3.  What type leadership style has the greatest influence can affect student achievements?

Problem Statement

1.2  Problem statement.

Leadership issues have been profoundly describes nowadays because it always be one of the subject of discussion among the stakeholder. They feel difficult on pertaining leadership style.  It is an endless debated topic whereby a number of theories have been developed to describe leadership in the organizations (Bennis & Namus, 1985).

Most of the research makes research about school principal and least research about teacher also being a leader in a classroom. However, recent research has already concern with the leadership of people who have other roles in school organizations such as teachers. An examination on various individuals leadership style should be conducted to give clear overview of school leadership as whole.  (Cheng , 1994b; Ogawa & Bossert 1995; Pounder Ogawa & Adams, 1998; Deal & Peterson, 1999, Harris & Mujis, 2003, Pashiardis, 2004).

However second issues are more complex which due to opposite finding concerning effect leadership on student achievements conducted by several scholars. Some research stated that there no relationship between leadership style and student achievements. The issues are some of students do not complete their task or homework that has been given and they like to delay their work. So as a leader in a class, teacher has to use wise approach to make sure can influence their students. It can give big impact if the student do not to their work so the achievement of the school will be low and not achieve the mission and vision of the company. With today focus, it has become more important to find the most effective and efficient to manage in school.

Due to No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act have been implement on 2001 in America. It shows that how’s important education. At the core of the NCLB Act were a number measure designed to drive broad gains in student achievements and to hold states and school more accountable for student progress (U.S Department of Education, 2001). There a lot of element in NCLB for example teachers’ qualifications. By the end 2005-2006 school years, every teacher in core content area working in a public had to be highly qualified in each subject they taught. They also play role model as leader in that class. Good teachers will increase student achievement.

Sergiovanni and Starrat (1993) however agreed that no one best style of leadership could be identified but the effectiveness can be determined. Thus, it is unique leadership to a particular person to another. Leadership skills can be adopted by leaders from experience, training and formal education.

Journal and thesis for Background of study

1. Leadership style - https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_KlA6aj9QYyMXZ1NG9RRW9wTTA/view? 2. Principle Leadership style and student achievement with disabilities - https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_KlA6aj9QYyVkVBLUFuV0t3emc/view 3. A study to assess the relationship among student achievement, teachers motivation and incentive pay - https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_KlA6aj9QYyRm1IcG84TlB0ekU/view? 4. Teacher Perception on their Principal Leadership Style - https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_KlA6aj9QYyRkFhZWhyWXBGS0E/view? 5. Transformational vs Trasactional leadership theories : Evidence in Literature - https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_KlA6aj9QYyRkFhZWhyWXBGS0E/view? 6. Charismatic and Transformational leadership - https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_KlA6aj9QYySWhVdy1HQlJoUkU/view? 7. Leadership and Motivation - https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_KlA6aj9QYyYkl3VWJrdzM1MXM/view?

8. leadership style and student achievements - https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_KlA6aj9QYydEU1T1JlLV9MT2c/view?usp=sharing

Transformational and transactional leaderhip style of teacher affect student achievements. Background Study.

“ There are leaders and there are those lead. Leaders hold a position of power or influence. Those who lead inspire us.” -Quotes from Simon Sinek-

What meaning of leader? What leadership style that can motivate followers? In order to understand which leadership style that can make student achievement.  Based on the quotes above, leader are important in one organization. Leader will influence or motivates their followers. According to this journal which is Transformational vs. Transactional leadership said that the most important aspects of management is leadership. The wings of effective leadership nowadays are Great nation like United States of America, Britain and France (Weihrich, et al, 2008). According to Kouzes and Posner (1987) numerous studies on leadership produce approximately 350 definitions of the term. Principal is a leader and a position that have been given but some individual in that position does not mean that the leader able to gain influence over those they charged and leading. A success of one institutions can be measured by its administration and achievements and the leadership style (Subramaniam, 2011)

Establish relationship between leader and followers are important in one organization. For example principal with their teachers in school. Some of the teachers do not know what leadership styles are all about is. They are lack information about leadership style. According to Changemind Article. There are many approaches of leadership style based on theories and assumption. The approaches such as transformational, transactional, charismatic, situational and participative leadership. The leadership style will be use based on the combination of their beliefs, values and preferences. Leaders are those who can adapt their leader behavior to meet demand of their own unique environment (Blanchard & Hersey, 1970). There have two dimension of leadership. The fist dimension of leadership is relational and ,secondly the motivation leader and follower are keys to understanding and change (Burn’s, 1978).

Generally, all teachers in all schools, they must have spirit and motivation to do their job without stress or delay. We know that teacher in all school have many responsibilities in their carrier but do not mean that they can give excuse do not their work. Teachers is considered as school leaders in school, both primary and secondary but teachers have great influence on students as they have larger capacity in teaching, communicate and monitor students in the classroom setting. When a school cannot reach objectives of the organisations because school principal leadership problem (O’Driscoll & Beehr, 1994). Nevertheless, very least studies research involve teacher as a leader.

Based on a research conducted by Marzano, Waters, and McNulty (2005), they found that there has been far less research done on school leadership than one would assume would be the case in today’s society. Since the topic about leadership style, researcher wants to use transformational and transactional leadership style to know whether this leadership style can gives impact on student achievement.

Prof. Dr. Nor Aziah

Assalamualaikum....

I think it have been long days that I not update my blog...

so now 2015, I'm decide to continue my study in Master Education in Management and Leadership..
This is the first lecturer that I meet at the first class...
Her name Is Prof. Dr. Nur Aziah.
She teach me Research Methodology..
She's also very knowledgeable and sporing lecturer...
I post my picture with her to let you know about her..