A Knowledge Base For Teachers on Teacher-Student Relationships

Abstract

Teacher-student relationships are an important factor in effective learning environments and of specific importance in multicultural classrooms. This chapter presents some of the findings of a research programme that studied for more than 30 years teacher-student relationships. We first summarise the interpersonal perspective on the study of teaching and introduce an instrument to measure perceptions of the teacher-student relationship. Then we present results on the associations of teacher-student relationships and student outcomes, both cognitive and affective and explore how these associations differ for various ethnic groups. After a discussion on changes in the teacher-student relationships in time and developments over the teaching career we discuss common teacher problems in the relationships with their classes with a comparison of problems in mainstream and multicultural classrooms. Finally we delve into teacher-student interact ions that can be considered building blocks for the development of teacher-student relationships with an emphasis on the influence of coercive teacher behaviour in one lesson on teacher-student relationships in consecutive lessons.