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This paper presents findings from a single site case study of a school in a rural part of Malaysia. Based on data collected through semi-structured interviews of the principal, teachers, students and parents, and observations, document scanning and field notes, the study attempts to identify the context under which the school operates, the core practices of the school principal and the enactment of these core practices. The data analysis was carried out through data reduction resulting in initial themes which were further refined several times until consensus was achieved. The themes were then discussed under the light of theories resulting in the final categories. The findings reveal that personal traits of the principal and her strength of building strong coalitions enabled her to successfully meet her contextual challenges. In conclusion, we argue that leadership practices are multidimensional and although successful principals draw from the similar repertoire of core practices, they enact these core practices in response to their own unique contexts to bring success. The findings would provide important insights for principals and future researchers who might be interested in conducting similar studies to enrich the successful school leadership literature from Malaysian context.

Purpose-Howard Gardners' concept of multiple intelligence (MI) offers an alternative perspective on intelligence which highlights the importance of acknowledging learner diversity, individual talents and the development of human potentials. MI has been used as a basis for the construction of modular enrichment activities to facilitate the development of human potential among boarding school students. This study examines (1) the effects of such activities on students of different multiple intelligence profiles and (2) the teachers' views of the MI based module and activities. Methodology-The study employs a quasi-experimental design with pre-and post-tests administered before and after treatment of the modular enrichment activities. Two groups of students from two Mara Junior Science Colleges (MRSM) in Malaysia participated in the study as the control and treatment groups. McKenzie's multiple intelligences instrument was used as the pre-and post-test measure. A semi-structured interview protocol was used to obtain teachers' views of the enrichment activities. Findings-The study found that the MI post-test was favourable towards the treatment group. Students in the treatment group improved on each multiple intelligence profile compared with students in the control group. The qualitative analysis of the interview

Motivation for reading is a desire and act to read for some cognitive and social reasons, which activate the readers to carry out their interaction with written materials for success and mastery in a subject.  Reading motivation is a serious contributor to reading accomplishment and has the potential to stimulate reading skills development. However, the Pakistani context pursues learning motivation in e potential to promote reading skills development h (L2) learning motivation. Pakistani researchers have been seeking L2 (English) motivation. Based on secondary data sources and using qualitative data methods such as thematic analysis, this paper aims to focus on the need for English (L2) reading motivation. This paper has been divided into three sections. The first section deals with exploring learning motivation; the second deals with the scope of reading motivation in Pakistan. The third section tries to recommend some useful suggestions for the conduct of studies in reading motivation in Pakistan.

This is an advance summary of a forthcoming article in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education. Please check back later for the full article. The quality of education in any country rests on school communities as a whole. However, the real implementers of innovations and changes in curriculum are teachers. Teachers, as practitioners, are the ones most often held accountable for successes and failures in educating schoolchildren. The way to facilitate teachers in handling challenges and keeping up with curriculum renewals is through constant support in the form of continuous professional development (CPD) by means of action research. Action research as CPD has been viewed as a critical platform for advocating change, which is the outcome of teachers’ ability and autonomy to lead in making informed decisions about their own practices. Given its usefulness, action research is found well established, vastly practiced, and widely published in the Western countries. This has raised the question of the spread of action research as CPD in the Southeast Asian region. Preliminary analysis reveals that in some Southeast Asian countries, such as Timor Leste, there is limited literature on action research, while in countries such as Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand, action research has been well documented. At the same time, there’s an emerging trend in Southeast Asian countries to adopt different models of action research. In Malaysia, for instance, action research has been primarily classroom based, whereas in Indonesia, a critical and community-based approach to action research seems to be prevalent. This suggests that the kinds of action research conducted in the different Southeast Asian countries may reflect variations in cultural, economic, and geographic landscapes. Given the importance of action research to teacher practitioners and school leaders, and in providing an identity to the action research approaches conducted in Southeast Asia, the historical trail of action research presents a window to the nature of CPD concerns of each country, as well as the successes and challenges of conducting action research as CPD for sustained impact.