School Leaders’ Sensemaking and Sensegiving

Judith M. Norris, Ed.D. (2017), Australian Catholic University, is Senior Lecturer of Educational Leadership Studies at that university. She has co-published with colleagues in educational leadership, blogging regularly for Master students and researching about and with school leaders.

"In closing, I want to express appreciation to Judith Norris for bringing attention to the complex, dynamic, and sometimes volatile demands placed on school leaders and for developing a theoretical model for principals to manage their often-competing professional expectations. [...] Norris’s synthesis of the psycho-social processes of sensemaking and sensegiving, and their integration with related leadership and behavioral theories, offers a framework for leaders to manage their challenging conditions." – Jennifer Martin Flewelling, Assistant Professor of education at Endicott College

• PrefaceAcknowledgmentsList of Figures, Tables and MemosList of AbbreviationsAbout the Author1 Background1 All in the Same Field1 The Need for This Book2 Purpose and Aims3 Metaphors4 Ecology and the Human Condition5 The Eucalyptus Tree—Its Attraction6 Australian Indigenous Peoples’ Reciprocity with Trees7 Going Forward2 Problem, Trigger, Conjectures1 The Underpinnings of the Model2 The Theoretical Model3 Core Category 1: Making Sense4 Core Category 2: Giving Sense5 Relationship between Making Sense and Giving Sense3 Problem Re-namers1 Sensemaking2 Sensegiving3 Sensebreaking4 School Leaders’ Sensemaking and Sensegiving in Accountable Times5 The Theory of Planned Behaviour6 Application of Leadership to the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB)7 Bringing the Re -namers Together4 Context: Not Everything, But Something1 Impact of Public Purpose on School Leaders’ Work2 Global Actors Impact on School Leaders’ Work3 National Actors Impact on School Leaders’ Work4 State and Jurisdictional Actors5 Secondary Schools in Australia: Changing Times6 Faith-Based: Dual Bind or Single Resolve?7 Principals’ Interpretations of Their Accountability: Clashing Times8 Policy to Practice Gap9 School Leader Identity Formation5 Educational Accountability: New Normal or Site of Struggle?1 Introducing Educational Accountability2 The New Normal: Site of Struggle?3 Typology of Accountability in Education4 Defining Educational Accountability5 Rationale for Accountability in Australian Schools6 The Mechanisms7 Accountability Stakes Drive into the Hearts of Educators8 Efffects of Educational Accountability on School Leaders6 ‘… Somehow Frame Accountability to Make Sense of It’1 Contextualising2 Prioritising Referents: Account for What, to Whom and How3 Anomaly: Terence Prioritises Performance Results4 Anomaly: Prioritising the DeCourcy Instrument of Analysis5 Anomaly: The School System Expectations6 Conceptualising7 The Lady of Light1 Sensegiving Acts: Persuading Teachers2 Anomaly: Principals Manage Demands by ‘Cherry Picking’3 Anomaly: Principals Manage Demands through Target Setting4 Sensegiving Acts: Enacting the Leader Learner Identity5 Sensegiving Acts: Creating Cultures of Coherence6 Anomaly: Aspiring for Grades as Brilliance7 Anomaly: Principals Set Performance Results as Targets8 Sense Leaders: Sammy, Charmaine, Barry, and Leonie8 Not How It Is, But How I See It Is1 Not How It Is, But How I See It Is2 Constraining, an Authoring Act3 School Leaders Framing Their External Demands9 Credibility, Persuasion and Coherence1 Persuasive Devices: Narratives, Metaphors and Mantras2 Sensegiving Act of Articulating a Vision for Learning3 Sensegiving Act of Modelling Expertise4 Sensegiving Act of Facilitating Professional Learning Conversations5 Sensegiving Act: Reconciliation6 Sensegiving Act: Leaders Creating Coherence7 School Leaders Give Sense by Articulating Perspective8 Two Moderating Factors of School Leaders’ Sensegiving9 Theoretical Relationship between Leaders’ Sensemaking andSensegiving10 Sense Leaders: Ready for Any Catastrophe1 Eucaus Announces Nation -Wide Testing2 The Theoretical ELM in Situ3 Contributing to Further Research4 Implications and Recommendations5 Researching into the Future6 A Metaphor for School Leaders’ Sensemaking and Sensegiving7 Closing RemarksReferencesIndex