Development and validation of School Reflective Leadership scale

The purpose of this study was to develop and validate the reflective leadership assessment instruments at schools. Literature review suggests, although reflective learning is not new knowledge, reflective leadership is a novel approach at school management and leadership, and in few studies in this field have not established valid tools for revealing this concept at schools. Extensive research literature review, the dimensions and statements of the principals’ reflective leadership scale were stablished based on Castelli’s (2012) reflective leadership model, and the data was compiled with the participation of 327 secondary teachers. Along with the face and content validity assessment of the itemsand dimensions by educational management practitioners, teachers and applying their views, participant's comments on the ambiguity, repetition, and relationship of the statements with the concepts and dimensions through the implementation of the scale in pilot study were applied. Results of exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis show that 29 items are in five factors: sense of safeness, openness, purpose, challenging beliefs and feedback provide reflective leadership measurement tools. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was calculated for each factor and the total reliabilityy was estimated 0.97. This study is a pioneer research in measuring principals’ reflective leadership at schools. Reflective leadership is a fundamental factor in the positivist paradigm shift to interpretation at Iranian schools. Research findings for education practitioner will be useful in assessing and deploying reflective leadership at schools.