A CAUSAL RELATIONSHIP MODEL OF FACTORS AFFECTING THE PROFESSIONAL LEARNING COMMUNITY IN PRIMARY SCHOOLS UNDER THE OFFICE OF THE BASIC EDUCATION COMMISSION IN THE NORTHEAST OF THAILAND

Abstract

The purposes of this research were 1) to study the causal relationship model of factors affecting the Professional Learning Community of primary schools 2) to examine the consistency of the causal relationship model of factors that affect is the Professional Learning Community of primary schools with empirical data conducting. The research divided into two phases. The phase 1 was to defining the conceptual research framework by analyzing documents and related research interviews with seven experts and three outstanding schools. Moreover, the phase 2 was investigating research hypotheses data collection. The sample group consisted of primary school principals and primary school teachers under and the amount 626 people were selected by multi-stage random sampling. The data were analyzed by frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, and the Pearson product-moment correlation coefficient and analyze the causal relationship model. The research findings were as follows: 1) Factors affecting the Professional Learning Community of primary schools, consisting of 5 factors which are Climate and culture, School structure, Transformational leadership, Vision and mission and Personnel and teams. 2) The developed model is consistent with the empirical data. The statistical values are as follows: χ² = 158.37, p-value = 0.21, df = 145, χ²/df = 1.09, RMSEA = 0.01, GFI = 0.98, AGFI = 0.95. From the path analysis is as follows: The direct effect found that Personnel and teams had the most direct effect on being the Professional Learning Community of the school, followed by School structure. The indirect effect found that Climate and culture indirectly influence the community on being the Professional Learning Community of the school. Moreover, the total effect found that Climate and culture had the most influence on being the Professional Learning Community of the school, followed by Personnel and team, School structure and transformational leadership respective. When considering the prediction coefficient (R²) of the four causal factors, they can jointly explain the variance of being the Professional Learning Community of the primary schools at 40.00 percent