Long-term effects of first-grade teachers on students’ achievement: a replication study

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study was to conduct a direct replication of the study of Bressoux and Bianco of 2004 regarding long-term effects of teachers in primary education on language and mathematics achievement of students. They found a short-term effect of the teacher in the same grade, but they did not find a long-term effect of the teacher of the previous grade. Our study replicates this study a decade later, in another country, and with a larger data set. We are specifically interested in the long-term effect of the first-grade teacher. Using a large-scale data set – in which more than 6,000 students were followed – and cross-classified models, we also found a short-term effect of the current teacher, but we did not find any long-term effects of the first-grade teacher 1 year later. Hence, the findings of Bressoux and Bianco were confirmed in this replication study.

KEYWORDS:

• Teacher effect
• long-term effect
• replication
• mathematics achievement
• language achievement

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Griet Vanwynsberghe

Griet Vanwynsberghe obtained her PhD at the Centre for Educational Effectiveness and Evaluation at the University of Leuven, Belgium. She is mainly interested in long-term effects of primary schools and teachers.

Gudrun Vanlaar

Gudrun Vanlaar is a post-doctoral researcher at the Centre for Educational Effectiveness and Evaluation at the University of Leuven, Belgium. She is mainly interested in effective educational practices for high-risk students.

Jan Van Damme

Jan Van Damme is emeritus professor at the Centre for Educational Effectiveness and Evaluation at the University of Leuven, Belgium. His research interests include educational effectiveness, evaluation, and the longitudinal study of students’ pathways through education.

Bieke De Fraine

Bieke De Fraine is an associate professor and head of the Centre for Educational Effectiveness and Evaluation at the University of Leuven. Her main research interests include longitudinal educational effectiveness studies and growth curve modelling.