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Using a modified conceptual lens with four dimensions, the case study surveyed 14 elementary school principals. Findings show principals gained insight into many leadership practices but often could not implement them due to upper-grade academic performance pressures. Principals also requested stronger district and state support to improve their leadership of Pre-K and K.",{"@graph":69,"@context":122},[70,84,105],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":40,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/principals-instructional-leadership-and-support-needs-in-prekindergarten-and-kindergarten-a-case-study-in-texas/590223/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/principals-instructional-leadership-and-support-needs-in-prekindergarten-and-kindergarten-a-case-study-in-texas/590223.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Adam","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-11-03","2026-10-15",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":34},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",{"@type":106,"mainEntity":107},"FAQPage",[108,114,118],{"name":109,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":111},"What was the focus of the case study in Texas?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"The study examined how principals position prekindergarten and kindergarten programs within their instructional leadership and what district leaders could do to support those efforts.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"How many principals participated, and where were they located?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"Fourteen elementary school principals participated, all working in Texas.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"Why did principals often struggle to enact their leadership visions?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"They frequently did not enact their visions because of academic performance pressures in the upper grades.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":124,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":126,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":128,"site_id":62},590223,1792160909,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":131},{"doc_id":128,"user_id":132,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":133,"doc_module":4,"category_id":39,"category_name":40,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":134,"file_id":135,"file_url":136,"file_type":137,"file_size":138,"view_count":34,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":46,"language":139,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":140,"faqs":141,"seo_title":142,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":143,"read_time":31,"preview_page_count":4},1374404737137,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_155a257f0dc6eb9ab79c44ca47cae57d","AERA Open  \nJanuary-December 2024, Vol. 10, No. 1, pp. 1–20 DOI: 10. 1177/23328584241288834  \nArticle reuse guidelines: [sagepub.com/journals-permissions](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)[ ](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)© The Author(s) 2024. [https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero](https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero)  \nPrincipals’ Instructional Leadership and Support Needs in Prekindergarten and Kindergarten: A Case Study in Texas  \nChristopher P. Brown  \nPedro Reyes  \nLauren C. McKenzie  \nDavid E. DeMatthews  \nSarah L. Woulfin  \nUniversity of Texas, Austin  \nIn states that fund public prekindergarten and kindergarten in elementary schools, principals are central to ensuring these programs support children’s learning and development. Yet few studies explore how principals position these programs within their instructional leadership and what they perceive should be done by district leaders to support their efforts to lead these programs. This case study investigated these issues with a sample of elementary school principals (N = 14) working in Texas. Using a modified conceptual lens that categorizes four essential dimensions of instructional leadership for prekindergarten and kindergarten, we found that principals possessed insight into many of these leadership practices but often did not enact these visions due to the academic performance pressures of the upper grades. Furthermore, principals wanted additional support from their district and state administrators to lead their prekindergarten and kindergarten programs better. Such findings illuminate several opportunities to strengthen principals’ instructional leadership of prekindergarten and kindergarten.  \nKeywords: early childhood, principals, elementary schools, leadership, case studies, qualitative research, instructional leadership, ECE leadership, pre-kindergarten, kindergarten  \nHigh-quality early childhood education (ECE) programs in the United States positively impact the learning and development of young children, particularly those from lowincome backgrounds (Connors et al., 2021; Horm et al., 2022; McCoy et al., 2017). Forty-four states and the District of Columbia now fund some form of public prekindergarten (Pre-K) for 3-and 4-year-olds, and all states and the District of Columbia at least partially fund some kindergarten (K) programs for 5-year-old students (Education Commission of the States [ECS], 2023) . Policymakers in many states, including Texas, locate state-funded Pre-K programs primarily in public elementary schools so that they are staffed by state-certified teachers (Friedman-Krauss et al., 2021) . Some scholars question the effectiveness of state Pre-K programs (Farran & Lipsey, 2016) and whether state Pre-K programs should solely be implemented within the elementary school structure (Witte, 2011) . Witte, for instance, contends that programs like Pre-K should be choice-based. If there“was to be any government-subsidized early education at all. . . parents would be able to choose from a wide variety of approaches,” which is an issue we did not examine in this study (2011, p. 132) . Despite these challenges, ECE advocates continue to promote the inclusion of Pre-K programs in elementary schools as a pathway to not only to improve  \nstudent learning but also to ensure that Pre-K and K become an integral part of school (Brown & Gasko, 2012; García et al., 2021; Graue et al., 2016) .  \nPrincipals are vital to ensuring the success of Pre-K and K programs within elementary schools (e.g., Leithwood et al., 2020) . For example, through analyzing data from six studies that included more than 22,000 principals in four states and two urban school districts, Grissom et al. (2021) found that principals’ contribution to student achievement on standardized assessments, which typically begin in the third grade, was “nearly as large as the average effects of teachers identified in similar studies. Principals’ effects, however, are larger in scope because th","cbCaiv6yj25uo5gF","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaiv6yj25uo5gF","pdf",960137,"English","# Introduction\n# Study purpose and conceptual lens\n# Findings on instructional leadership and support needs\n# Background on public Pre-K and kindergarten programs","[{\"question\":\"What was the focus of the case study in Texas?\",\"answer\":\"The study examined how principals position prekindergarten and kindergarten programs within their instructional leadership and what district leaders could do to support those efforts.\"},{\"question\":\"How many principals participated, and where were they located?\",\"answer\":\"Fourteen elementary school principals participated, all working in Texas.\"},{\"question\":\"Why did principals often struggle to enact their leadership visions?\",\"answer\":\"They frequently did not enact their visions because of academic performance pressures in the upper grades.\"}]","Principals’ Instructional Leadership and Support Needs in Prekindergarten and Kindergarten: A Case Study in Texas | PDF",1792069108]