Researchers from the University of Missouri and the University of Texas at Arlington noted that there is substantial research literature that indicates positive teacher-student relationships (TSRs) can lead to students’ academic achievement as evidenced by better grades and test scores. However, they wrote, there has been little research detailing how teachers may engage in higher quality teaching practices when they have positive relationships with students.
“It also influences teacher behavior, and we didn’t have data on that, but there is information that comes out of organizational psychology that in workspaces adults tend to be more productive and produce higher quality work when they have really positive relationships in the work environment,” said Dr. Christi Bergin, a research professor at the University of Missouri College of Education and Human Development, the senior author on the study.
Dr. Christi Bergin
Seeking empirical evidence, researchers addressed that issue. Utilizing archival data from the teacher growth and evaluation system Network for Educator Effectiveness (NEE), researchers examined how teachers were rated on four complex, high-impact teaching practices: (a) cognitive engagement in the content, (b) problem-solving and critical thinking, (c) affective engagement in the content, and (d) instructional monitoring during the lesson. Bergin said that these are at times referred to as advanced or complex teaching practices and are often not seen because they are considered hard to do.
“There is pushback from some people who think that the soft skills that are involved in education aren’t that important,” said Bergin. “The answer is when you have positive relationships it motivates the students to be more engaged in learning, and now we know it also motivates the teachers to do the kinds of teaching practices that really matter in helping students learn.”
Dr. Roderick L. Carey, an assistant professor in the department of human development and family sciences at the University of Delaware, College of Education and Human Development, said the four high-impact teaching practices in the report are incredibly important, noting that the report referred to eliciting positive emotion from students during a lesson. He said it is important that teachers not cling to the historic tropes of the distant, sage-on-the stage teacher presenting or lecturing.
“What are some of the ways a teacher can inspire in the students the same kind of passion for the content that the teacher might have?” said Carey. “In order to do that, the teacher has to be vulnerable to the students. … ‘This is how I connect to this work.’ That human connection to the curriculum is something that teachers need to foreground.
“That’s the relationship piece,” he added. “If a teacher models how they relate to the work, then they can inspire kids to figure out the ways that they relate to the work.”
