Teacher-child interactions in early childhood education and its effects on social and language development

ABSTRACT

The present study investigated the relationship between teacher-child interaction quality and children’s social-emotional and language development. Also considered was the level/status of classroom quality in preschool setting. Classroom Assessment Scoring System Pre-K (CLASS Pre-K), the Devereux Early Childhood Assessment (DECA-P2), and Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT-IV) were used to collect data from 177 children and 55 teachers in preschool centres of Arba Minch town, Ethiopia. Emotional support, classroom organization, and instructional support were not significantly correlated with children’s social-emotional and language development. An average level of classroom quality was observed in emotional support domain while classroom organization and instructional support were each rated at the low end. The findings reveal a need for Ethiopian preschool teachers to improve the quality of classroom organization and instructional support in order to promote children’s optimal development. Limitations and future research directions are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Teacher-child interactions
• classroom quality
• preschool education
• social development
• language development

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Jilin Provincial Experimental Teaching Demonstration of Psychology.

Notes on contributors

Yohannes Tigro Tilbe

Yohannes Tigro Tilbe is a PhD candidate in Developmental and Educational Psychology in the College of Psychology at Northeast Normal University, People’s Republic of China.

Xiaosong Gai

Xiaosong Gai is a Professor in the college of psychology in Northeast Normal University in China, engage in research fields in developmental psychology, especially in the areas of social-emotional learning and executive function in young children.