From instructional leadership to instructional quality: The critical role of teacher academic optimism

Extensive research evidence confirms the importance of principal instructional leadership in fostering teacher professional learning, yet few studies have explored its effect on teacher instructional quality, a critical indicator of teacher effectiveness and a proximal predictor of student achievement. This study aims to examine the effect of instructional leadership on different aspects of teacher instructional quality and to investigate the mediation of teacher academic optimism in this effect. Using snowball sampling, 755 primary school teachers in China participated in an online survey. The results of structure equation modelling and bootstrapping analysis revealed that instructional leadership significantly influenced teacher instructional quality via teacher academic optimism. Specifically, academic emphasis mediated the effect of instructional leadership on cognitive activation and learning support, trust in parents and students only mediated its effect on classroom management, and teacher efficacy mediated its effect on all three dimensions of instructional quality. The practical implications are also discussed. Copyright © 2025 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.