The Relationship Between Internal Teacher Profiles and the Quality of Teacher-Child Interactions in Prekindergarten

ABSTRACT

This study investigates the relationship between internal teacher profiles and pre-K teacher-child interaction quality in the pre-K classroom. Two questions were addressed: (1) What internal profiles exist for pre-kindergarten (pre-K) teachers? and (2) Do internal profiles relate to observed structural and process quality in the pre-K classroom? Questionnaire and observational data were collected for 437 teachers as part of the National Center for Early Development’s State Wide Early Education Programs study. Four stable internal teacher profiles were found for pre-K teachers: efficacious facilitators, efficacious authoritarian, inefficacious facilitators, and dispirited authoritarian. Efficacious facilitators provided greater emotional support, classroom management, quality interactions, and provisions for children. Implications are discussed in terms of the importance of understanding the large variability currently seen in early education quality.

KEYWORDS:

• Early childhood educators
• preschool
• quantitative research
• teacher beliefs
• teacher-child interactions