Written by Ildar Iliazov, Head of Projects and Marketing at Light Group of Schools, Kenya, and a COBIS Regional Ambassador

There is a temptation in school leadership to look for improvement in the most visible places: a new curriculum plan, a new assessment system, a digital platform, or a new strategic priority. These things matter. But they rarely change schools by themselves.

The deeper work of leadership is less dramatic and often less visible. It is the patient development of the adults who shape learning every day. The school leaders do not simply introduce initiatives. They build the conditions in which teachers can keep getting better.

Todd Whitaker has argued that effective school leaders do two important things: they hire good teachers and help them continue to improve. The challenge is not knowing that teacher growth matters. The challenge is designing the conditions that make it happen.

Teacher learning does not happen simply because a school holds a training session, writes a new policy, or announces an improvement target. Like students, teachers need time, feedback, confidence, support and opportunities to practise.

For leaders, the real question is not whether teacher growth matters, but how to create the conditions where it becomes part of daily practice.

In our school, we have learned that teacher learning becomes more sustainable when leaders focus on three things: practice, specific feedback and professional curiosity.

1. Give teachers time to practise, not just training

Most schools provide professional development. The problem is that professional development often ends when the workshop ends.

Teachers may leave a session full of ideas, but ideas only become habits through practice. Early attempts can feel clumsy. A teacher may understand a new approach in theory, but still find it difficult to use confidently in a real classroom with real students.

This is where leaders need to be careful. If we introduce a new strategy and expect instant confidence, we create pressure rather than growth. Teachers need encouragement and space, not just instruction.

We saw this when we introduced a new approach to classroom questioning. Instead of presenting it once and expecting teachers to apply it individually, we created small, mixed-department peer groups. Teachers visited each other’s lessons informally and met afterwards for short reflective conversations.

The focus was narrow and manageable: how do we encourage students to think more deeply before answering?

One teacher tried extending wait time. Another experimented with follow-up questions. Another asked students to build on each other’s answers before the teacher stepped in.

This built on a wider shift we had already made in our school: moving classroom observations away from performance monitoring and towards professional partnership. It also reflected our belief that professional networks are not an optional extra; they are part of how school improvement becomes sustainable.

None of these changes was dramatic on its own. But over time, they changed the quality of classroom dialogue. Teachers became more willing to experiment because the process felt safe. They were not being judged for immediate perfection. They were being supported to improve.

The leadership lesson was simple: training introduces an idea, but practice makes it real.

2. Make feedback specific enough to act on

Feedback is one of the most powerful tools for professional growth, but only when it helps the person know what to do next.

John Hattie and Helen Timperley describe effective feedback as helping learners answer three questions: Where am I going? How am I going? What should I do next?

Although their work is often applied to students, the same principle applies to teachers. Too often, feedback to teachers remains too general: “Use more questioning”, “Differentiate better”, or “Make the lesson more student-centred”.

The advice may be correct, but it is not always useful. A teacher can agree with it and still leave the conversation unsure what to change tomorrow morning.

We tried to improve this by making feedback smaller, sharper and more actionable.

After observing questioning in a lesson, the conversation was not, “You need to ask better questions”. It became: “In your next lesson, try extending wait time after the first student response, then ask one follow-up question before moving on”.

That difference matters. The first version sounds like judgement. The second gives a next step.

The same applies to differentiation. Instead of saying, “You need to differentiate more”, a leader might say: “For the next lesson, prepare one extension question for students who finish early and one sentence starter for students who need support beginning their answer”.

This kind of feedback does not reduce teacher professionalism. It protects it. It makes improvement manageable enough to try.

It also changes the tone of leadership conversations. Teachers leave knowing what to test. Leaders can follow up supportively. The conversation becomes less about evaluation and more about learning.

The leadership lesson is that feedback should not only describe performance. It should help teachers see the next possible move.

3. Create curiosity before expecting compliance

Teachers do not change practice simply because they are told that a method is effective. Adults change when they become interested enough to try, supported enough to continue and safe enough to make mistakes.

This is where Kirsti Lonka’s work on engaging learning is useful. She reminds us that learning is not only a technical process. It is emotional, social and connected to curiosity.

That is true for teachers as much as for students.

We saw this when we tried to strengthen student-led learning. At first, some teachers saw it as another instructional demand. The phrase itself sounded large and slightly abstract.

So instead of asking everyone to change immediately, we began with one question in professional learning groups: What happens when students do more of the thinking in the lesson?

That question shifted the conversation.

One teacher redesigned a discussion task so students had to prepare arguments before speaking. Another reduced teacher explanation time and used prompts instead. Another asked students to generate questions at the beginning of the lesson and then used those questions to guide discussion.

The change did not begin with compliance. It began with curiosity.

Over time, teachers were no longer asking, “Do I have to do this?” They were asking, “How can I make this work with my class?”

That difference is important. Compliance may create short-term implementation, but curiosity creates ownership.

The leadership lesson is that teachers are more likely to change when they are invited into a professional question, not only handed an instruction.

The quiet work of leadership

Teacher growth does not happen through pressure alone. It happens through the combination of challenge, safety and meaningful support.

Whenever leaders introduce a new improvement priority, they can ask three practical questions: Have we given teachers enough time to practise? Is our feedback specific enough to act on? Have we created curiosity, or only compliance?

These questions do not require a new programme. They require a different leadership habit.
Improving a school is not only about changing systems. It is about helping the adults in the building become more confident, reflective and connected.

When teachers grow in that way, student learning has a stronger foundation.

That is the quiet work of leadership, and it may be the work that matters most.