Chapter 6: The Importance of Relationships

Relationship Indicators

Warm and caring relationships with teachers are recognized as a protective factor for young children and are correlated with a child’s continued positive academic gains and prosocial engagement (Chen et al., 2020). As illustrated in the opening vignette, children who feel a strong positive bond with their teacher become attuned to the teachers’ interactional cues and are more comfortable navigating classroom expectations. This creates a warm environment in which children are poised and ready to accept academic challenges. Positive relationships between teachers and children must be intentionally developed, monitored, and nurtured over time. Educators may encounter evaluative tools that analyze the warmth of relationship interactions between teacher and child. One widely used evaluative tool is the Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS), which may inform educators’ work with students. One evaluative domain in CLASS is the emotional support domain, which measures positive climate, negative climate, teacher sensitivity, and regard for student perspective (Pianta, La Paro, & Hamre, 2008).

Attachment theory offers a supportive framework for teachers to reflect on when they are looking to develop and sustain positive relationships with students (see Chapter 2). Children’s attachment behaviors can be indications of secure or insecure relationships between teacher and child (Veríssimo et al., 2017). Children with secure attachment experiences generally leverage the following skills in school settings: manage not knowing, ask for help when needed, cope with mistakes, accept they may still be learning things that peers already know, and persist through challenging tasks (Geddes, 2017). Most children will possess a strong enough sense of secure attachment to navigate typical classroom challenges. Teachers can strategically develop positive relationships with children who display insecure attachment patterns with consistent support, demonstrations of positive regard, and responsiveness.

One important characteristic of positive teacher-student relationships is closeness. Closeness is generated when teachers remain attentive to students and responsive to student needs by extending meaningful and timely support (Rimm-Kaufman & Sandilos, 2015). Students who experience closeness with teachers “attain higher levels of achievement than those students with more conflict in their relationships” (Rimm-Kaufman & Sandilos, 2015, para. 1). Teacher closeness in kindergarten correlates with positive social skill development and enactment throughout the elementary and middle school years (Berry & O’Connor, 2010). Closeness is also associated with positive achievements in reading across elementary school years (McCormick & O’Conner, 2015).

Relatedly, the degree of conflict teachers and children experience either enhances or erodes relationships. Even at a very young age, children are aware of the negative nature of their interactions with their teachers (Li, Bergin, & Olsen, 2022). High degrees of conflict, low levels of teacher responsiveness, limited attachment bonds, and high levels of student dependency have a negative impact on a child’s school engagement habits. Poor teacher-student relationship bonds are correlated with negative externalizing behaviors, such as aggression, school/task avoidance, and class disruptions (García-Rodríguez, Iriarte-Redín, & Reparaz-Abaitua, 2023). For some children, this might look like vomiting after arriving at school, while other children may cope with an unstable bond with their teacher by being hesitant to verbally engage. Children’s internalized behaviors, such as depression and anxiety, are also associated with poor relationship bonds with teachers (García-Rodríguez, Iriarte-Redín, & Reparaz-Abaitua, 2023).

Encouragingly, strong positive relationships with teachers can mitigate difficult attachment histories (Sabol & Pianta, 2012). It is important for teachers to recognize relationship patterns that negatively affect children’s social, emotional, and academic development. When teachers recognize harmful relationship patterns, they can work to replace ineffective responses to children’s behaviors with more prosocial relationship patterns. For example, to encourage children who are reluctant to speak, the teacher can invite them to use facial expressions or gestures to indicate their ideas.

Children’s social emotional skills are exercised across development domains and influence how they respond to environmental requests at any given time (Edwards, 2018). Educators need to recognize children’s expressions to effectively guide children on their developmental journeys. As positive relational bonds between teachers and children develop, children become more attuned to cues from the teacher offering guidance and support. When children understand they are in the presence of a caring adult, their ability to meaningfully engage in class experiences also increases (Joseph & Strain, 2010).

Trust and Relationships

To build positive relationships, trust is necessary to guide children’s development (Howes & Ritchie, 2002). Trust is a salient element positively uniting children, teachers, and families. Teachers work with intentionality to develop effective relationships with children over time to ensure that they can progress through school in academically, socially, and emotionally meaningful ways. Reciprocal relationships established among teachers, children, and families have a lasting impact on children’s social and emotional development and academic success (Kelty & Wakabayaski, 2020). Trust among all members of the relationship triad is necessary for teachers to nurture learners’ active engagement in the classroom community (see Figure 6.1).

Families want to trust that teachers (1) know their child, (2) will nurture positive emotional bonds, and (3) will create academically robust and emotionally safe learning environments. Each child needs to feel they are a valuable member of the classroom community. Children need to trust that their teacher is a person they can rely on to take care of them and support them on their learning journeys. When learners trust their teacher, they feel safe and are able to learn, grow, and take risks to advance their developing academic knowledge and skills (Delahooke, 2019). Peers within the classroom community need to feel connected to one another and with the adults who engage with them regularly.

Teachers also need to initiate and sustain these interacting trust-based relationships to ensure children create meaningful connections to their class community and engage in instructional experiences. In fact, teachers hold the greatest agency for unconditionally extending trust to all members of the child-teacher-family triad. Teachers extend trust to families when they retain strengths-based perspectives of all family members and assume the family is engaging with their child and school community in relevant and just ways. It is also important to monitor how implicitly held biases may influence our perceptions of a family’s trustworthiness. When an educator’s beliefs or values do not necessarily align with families’ practices, questioning motivations can lead to feelings of mistrust, which can affect the way a teacher interacts with the child or family. Teachers, however, do not have to withdraw trust from the relationship (Tschannen-Moran, 2014). Seeking more information, increasing communication, and using empathic listening with families and children can nurture trusting, strengths-based mindsets. In some instances, we might discover information that helps us understand families’ choices. In other situations, however, we will not know or understand some of the decisions that families are making. Even in these instances, we can extend trust. Relationships require extending trust to others and expecting that trust will be reciprocated. Teachers possess the power to cultivate a climate of trust between their students and family members.

Culturally Responsive Practices

Embracing culturally responsive practices (Gay, 2002) and “creating a caring, equitable community of engaged learners” (NAEYC, 2019, p. 2) are foundational perspectives to establish positive relationships with young learners. Chapter 4 explored how teachers’ cultural backgrounds influence the ways they interact and engage with children and respond to children’s overt actions. Applying cultural lenses to the routines, practices, and interactions teachers use with children also serves to develop positive relationships with children. Building on children’s funds of knowledge, what they already know and understand, honors the experiences children bring with them to the classroom community. For example, children and families who speak a language other than English at home bring to the school environment a wealth of linguistic assets that are not always recognized within school contexts. In situations in which a teacher is not fluent in the child’s language, taking time to learn, use, and integrate keywords and phrases into practice with all children in the classroom is a culturally affirming act. Encouraging children to use their home language as they learn to integrate English into their linguistic repertoire is also a culturally sustaining practice (García, Johnson, & Seltzer, 2017).

Another example of promoting inclusivity to deepen relationships would be the care we take when communicating concerns about behavior with families. It can be hard to reach out to families when a significant challenging behavior manifests in the classroom. Sympathetically, teachers are concerned about how the family will receive the information. Families can shut down, deflect, or otherwise dismiss a teacher’s concern if they feel their parenting practices are being judged or if they believe their child is being unfairly accused. In some situations, however, a teacher will need to engage families in difficult conversations. For instance, if a two-year-old repeatedly bites others or a second grader frequently runs out of the classroom, teachers will be required to reach out to families after each occurrence.

Repeated messages regarding their child’s behavior can be overwhelming for families and strain home-school relationships. These interactions often put families on the defensive because they are focused on the negative behavior. If, however, these conversations center on the emotional care offered to the child first, and then communicate a possible plan for helping the child engage in the future, the underlying message communicated to the family is that the teacher continues to value the child as an important member of the learning community. Instead of focusing on future punitive measures (e.g., time out, suspension, expulsion) teachers can use a problem-solving lens that preserves the relationship with the family and communicates a unified strengths-based solution to move forward together. Table 6.1 offers an example of how a teacher can plan specific language to use when initiating a challenging conversation. As you read through the prompting phrases, notice how they strive to express concern for the student’s well-being, ongoing development, and open collaboration with the family.

Pressure Points on Relationships

In addition to the proactive strategies teachers can take to foster positive relationships, it is wise to plan for conflict to arise. As we discussed in Chapter 1, well-managed learning communities will still encounter problems and disruptions. When disruptions occur and affect the flow of learning, it is natural for teachers to become frustrated. Disruptions can be caused by external factors, such as a fire alarm, a school assembly, or a visit from a special guest. Internal factors might include lengthy transitions from one experience to the next or when a child or children become emotionally overwhelmed in a situation and behave in ways that impede engagement and progression.

Teachers hold agency to respond to internal disruptions to learning in a variety of ways. How a teacher responds will have an impact on relationships. In some moments, a child’s actions challenge routines and expectations. In these cases, leaning into strategies that retain a positive relationship with the child becomes more critical. Bayly (2020) recommends avoiding coercive interactions and suggests integrating practices that preserve relational bonds:

Responding with punishment, like sending a child to time-out, may seem to be effective in the short-term, but children do not learn new behaviors through punishment and this often leads to additional challenging behaviors. Instead, try something like a “time-in” where you sit with the child to discuss the situation and how they’re feeling. (p. 2)

Honoring children’s feelings and seeking to understand why the child is upset, shifts the focus away from the overt behavior and toward the root cause of the behavior. This approach preserves the relationship, while also addressing challenging behaviors.

When developing new relationships and nurturing current relationships, it is important for teachers to remain mindful of their own emotional responses (as explored in Chapter 4). Research examining the relationship between teachers’ perceptions of the child and warmth of their relationship strongly correlates with the child’s academic and social-emotional performance in school (Chen et al., 2020). Reflecting on and eliminating bias is a central practice for teachers working to establish productive relationships with children (Gordon, 2018; Pianta & Stuhlman, 2004). When teachers practice pausing to recognize when feelings of annoyance or frustration surface, they are better able to respond and act with empathy when a child’s behavior falls outside of what the teacher expects or desires. Pausing to reframe language and thought patterns that position children as “difficult,” “frustrating,” or “bad” is important. Such labels are a signal that indicate intentional time is needed to nurture or repair the relationship.

Educators and children alike recognize the absurdity of Todd’s situation. Sachar’s use of dark humor is effective because it reveals elements of truth about relationship dynamics observable in every classroom. Todd’s experiences as a full member of the classroom community is diminished every time Mrs. Jewls reprimands him publicly. These relational-wealth withdrawals weaken positive teacher-child relationships.

Preserving and Repairing Relationships

Some children will need more intentional support to establish and maintain a positive relationship because of the number of pressure points discussed earlier. Returning to the money jar analogy, children who exhibit challenging behaviors tend to accumulate more withdrawals on their relational wealth reservoir. A number of actions put stress on student-teacher relationships. Anything that humiliates, shames, ostracizes, and excludes the child strains the teacher-child relationship. Additionally, when we repeatedly call out a child in front of the class or remind a child to stay on task, the deposits in a child’s reservoir are depleted. Children’s perceptions of interactions may also differ. What seems to be a less impactful reminder to a teacher can sometimes cause one child to feel more embarrassed than another classmate would feel in the same interaction. A key part of nurturing relationships is really knowing children and also having the ability to repair the situation when something goes wrong.

Students who struggle to engage productively in the classroom community tend to have fewer deposits and more withdrawals. If a child is not receiving the deposits of praise, affirmation, and opportunities to feel mastery, then the withdrawals are all the more powerful. In addition, children notice how teachers engage with each student in the classroom and this also influences their peer relationships.

Influences on Peer Relationships

Because trust between teacher and child forms the foundation for success in the classroom, students must believe they are trustworthy. Each child needs to know their teachers and other children in the classroom believe they are a valuable member of the learning community. This trusting foundation permeates the classroom environment and promotes positive peer engagements, which builds positive peer relationships. When children feel safe, they take risks in the classroom, voice ideas, try new experiences, and enter into collaborative relationships with peers. Conversely, as children’s trust declines, they will shift into behavior patterns designed for self-protection. In these cases, children will limit their social risk-taking and withdraw from opportunities to share their thinking or engage in experiences they perceive to be beyond their abilities.

Teachers play a prominent role in promoting positive relationships between children. Nurturing an ethos that unequivocally situates every child as a valuable member of the community is important. This means guarding against classroom management practices that encourage children to start “policing” each other’s behaviors. For instance, in the vignette with Sarah Beth, the teacher could have continually called her out publicly to keep her on task. Over time, it is likely that other children in the classroom would also seek to control Sarah Beth’s behaviors by mimicking the teacher’s tone and verbiage. This pattern creates a power disparity between Sarah Beth and her classmates. As a result, these practices undermine a climate of trust and impede the teacher’s efforts to promote strong positive relationships between children. As the vignette illustrates, however, it is possible to address off-task and unproductive behaviors while also maintaining relationships within the classroom community.

Although teachers mindfully work to nurture positive relationships with children, children can still withdraw from learning communities in overt and covert ways. Overt expressions, such as throwing materials, verbally refusing to engage, or putting one’s head down and falling asleep are hard to miss. Although potentially shocking in some cases, these behaviors indicate the child will benefit from additional supports to successfully move forward. Covert expressions may be more difficult to recognize. For example, to avoid a learning task, a child may spend a lot of time talking with peers (or teachers) about a learning experience, but never quite manage to complete the task. Another child might busily sharpen (and resharpen) their pencil, an action that is important for completing the task at hand, but somehow time slips away and again the learning task is never completed. These overt and covert expressions are examples of task avoidance strategies that can be frustrating for teachers. In reality, these expressions signal a mismatch between what a child feels capable of completing at that particular moment in time and the perceived learning and engagement expectations (Greene, 2018). If the mismatch is not addressed, these behaviors can lead to isolation, exclusion, and frustration, negatively affecting peer relationships.

Continued use of overt or covert task avoidance strategies will cause the child to fall behind, which will have social consequences. Additionally, this type of behavior subverts the child’s agency in the class, positioning them as incapable of engaging as a member of the learning community. If peers begin to marginalize any member of the community by characterizing them as incapable or labeling them as a troublemaker, this exclusionary action can become a socially acceptable practice. Peer marginalization not only affects the child who is initially ostracized but also communicates to all members of the learning community that they cannot trust peers to respond to them in socially sensitive and empathic ways. This cycle of marginalization, however, does not need to become a socially modeled or accepted practice. A thoughtful and responsive teacher can embrace practices of inclusivity that support and sustain positive peer relationships.

Strategies to Develop Positive Peer Relationships

Teachers are in a distinct position to support children’s social and emotional regulation skills and to nurture positive peer relationships. Establishing predictable, nonpunitive responses to help children mitigate and manage social conflicts when they arise is important for nurturing and repairing peer relational bonds (Joseph & Strain, 2010). To engage with each other effectively as peers, children also need to be able to recognize their needs and articulate their feelings. We will share more about supporting children’s emotions in Chapter 7 and discuss more strategies for addressing challenging behavior in Chapter 9. For the purposes of this chapter, when peer conflicts arise, it is important to talk about the issue and help students engage in collaborative problem-solving to work through differences. We might choose to separate children to prevent a further provocation, but this is not a long-term solution. Separating children indefinitely prevents them from developing necessary skills to mitigate social problems they may encounter in the future. A wise teacher will continue to bring children together (who might have previously struggled to interact successfully) with supports so that the children learn to develop meaningful relationships.

The pedagogical experiences teachers leverage to engage learners also influences peer relationships. For example, competitive learning games linked to the memorization of rote facts (e.g., spelling bees and math fact speed drills) are anxiety producing for some learners and need to be considered carefully. Students who feel insecure with an emerging skill may feel embarrassed if they make a mistake publicly that lets down their team or results in getting kicked out of a game early, which leaves them to watch from the sideline as others continue. Although competition for some children may trigger uncomfortable emotions and affect their engagement and sense of academic safety, other children are highly motivated and feel energized when engaging in healthy competition with individuals they trust. Accordingly, teachers mindfully consider how connected and safe individual children feel taking risks within the classroom. By layering intentionally designed collaborative, small-group, and paired experiences, children can benefit from interactive social opportunities while simultaneously building academic skills and nurturing valuable social peer connections (Ostrosky & Meadan, 2010).

Teachers can integrate a number of strategies to support students in developing positive peer relationships during structured and unstructured times throughout the school day. Table 6.3 offers some practices to promote relationships between peers to establish positive relational bonds across the classroom community. The suggested practices underscore the active role teachers play in guiding children to consider how they are navigating their social worlds.

Teachers play an active role in promoting positive peer relationships. The examples provided in Table 6.3 illustrate how educators can create opportunities for learners to engage in socially and emotionally rewarding ways. When students consistently see their teacher recognize and respect each child as a unique, complex human being, a culture of dignity spreads and the cycles of trust expand to peer relationships.

Trust and Making Children’s Classroom Experiences Visible

Families’ engagement in school communities increases when a trusting relationship exists between home and school (Santiago et al., 2016). Teachers encourage trust when families perceive them as competent and as acting in child-centric ways (Niedlich et al., 2021). When teachers create equitable and engaging learning environments for children and offer intentional supports, children express a positive regard for their teacher. In high-trust environments, learners feel safe to take risks, grapple with new content, and integrate new skills. Teachers reinforce trusting relationships when they create learning environments with high-academic expectations. The term academic optimism links (1) a culture of trust, (2) high levels of academic challenge, and (3) teacher efficacy as the three school factors that together lead to learners’ achievement (Tschannen-Moran, 2014). In environments in which children and families trust their teacher, children demonstrate meaningful academic gains (Lerkkanen & Pakarinen, 2021).

When educators share strengths-based insight regarding children’s distinct experiences learning and engaging at school, families gain confidence about how well the educator knows, attends to, and intentionally connects with their child. Describing children’s creativity, compassion, and cognitive growth offers families evidence of the intentional teaching that is occurring on a regular basis. Sharing evidence (e.g., portfolios, writing samples, videos, and photos) of children’s learning experiences with families as celebrations and illustrations of cognitive growth is an important practice for early educators.

Learning stories are strengths-based assessment practices used “to observe children in their natural play-based learning environments, capturing snapshots of authentic learning and growth in different domains” (Escamilla, Alanís, & Meier, 2023, p. 2). To create a learning story, teachers use multimodal tools to capture children’s developmental expressions (cognitive, social, emotional, physical, and linguistic) (Carr & Lee, 2012). Then, the teacher adds commentary to highlight the specific developmental actions or habits of mind (e.g., curiosity, persistence, flexible thinking) the child demonstrates in the recordings or image sequences. Learning stories are then shared with the child’s family, and the family is offered a space to respond, further honoring the child’s growth.

In addition to learning stories, a number of other practices can make children’s experiences visible to families. For example, teachers can integrate student-led conferences, assessment portfolios, documentation panels, and use an online communication platform (e.g., ClassDojo, Remind, Seesaw, TalkingPoints) to share specific messages throughout the school day. Strategies for engaging with families vary over the course of the year depending on purpose and demonstrated needs. Each engagement practice presents an opportunity for strengthening and reinforcing a climate of trust with families. The teachers’ ability to design specific relationship-building practices and reflect on their effectiveness nurtures a family-centric mindset that sustains a climate of trust.

Practices for Promoting Meaningful Engagement

Educators committed to nurturing relationships with families recognize that, “traditional models of ‘parent involvement’ or ‘parent education’ are one-sided approaches that fail to give educators the knowledge or insights they need to provide learning experiences that are fully responsive to each child’s needs and experiences” (NAEYC, 2020, para. 2). In reciprocal relationships, members are emotionally invested and are committed to supporting and collaborating with other group members to ensure that the relationship is successful. Reciprocity represents a meaningful exchange, in which the assets and knowledge both parties possess is honored. Valuing perspectives is what makes relationships meaningful. From an ecological perspective, the reciprocal relationships between families and teachers exist within the mesosystem in which the integration of meaningful family engagement practices creates a positive support system for children (Santiago et al., 2016). NAEYC (2020) outlines seven practices for early educators to engage in to establish and sustain meaningful, reciprocal relationships with families (see Table 6.4.).

Because nurturing family relationships is an ongoing practice, teachers (and schools) will use a variety of different strategies to maintain meaningful connectivity with families. Hoffman et al. (2024) delineate practices (reflected in Table 6.5) frequently leveraged by schools and teachers to connect with families. Each practice can serve as an important bridge between home and school. These practices serve as levers for beginning, recalibrating, or strengthening relationships. Reflecting on how relationships are unfolding is valuable because circumstances and people change over time. Just because a practice is implemented, it does not mean the practice is effective or that it will remain effective for the entire trajectory of the relationship. Articulating specific relationship goals, identifying relevant practices for meeting those goals, and monitoring effectiveness in achieving intended goals is important for establishing and nurturing positive home and school relationships. Categorizing the ways teachers engage with families is helpful when analyzing the opportunities schools use to develop meaningful relationships.

To connect with families, teachers integrate a number of high-touch and low-touch practices. High-touch practices like calling home the first week of school, family-teacher conferences, back-to-school night, and child interest surveys can create meaningful moments of connection between teachers and family members. These experiences initiate opportunities for building intentional relationships with family members and create spaces for families to share information about their child with educators. Low-touch practices like a weekly newsletter may work to keep families informed and are most effective when coupled with high-touch practices. These examples of high-touch and low-touch connections remain superficial unless they are consistently coupled with opportunities for families to meaningfully interact with the teacher regarding their child’s experiences at school.

Relationship patterns need to be nurtured with families and children every time a child engages with a new teacher at the start of a school year or when families move into new school contexts. Times of transition for families and children are already emotionally demanding. As families enter into new spaces, they will be negotiating and encountering new people who will influence their families’ habits and routines. The rules shaping educational systems change from context to context, and it is important to support families’ understandings of how they may accomplish tasks as their engagement pattern may differ from the previous setting their child participated in (e.g., communicating with teachers, paying for lunch, conducting an early pickup, submitting immunization records, engaging in the special education process).

Remaining sensitive to families’ needs, especially during times of transition or family changes (e.g., preschool to kindergarten, school district to school district, deployment of a family member), sends the message that schools and teachers are empathetic partners and can be trusted to explain established routines, practices, and community supports. Additionally, the relevance of routines for families changes over time. What is important for one family to know may not be pertinent to all families. For example, families may need guidance knowing how to access the school counselor to gain additional support when their child exhibits signs of anxiety after the passing of a grandparent or in response to the absence of a family member fulfilling extended work-related responsibilities. Developing meaningful relationships with families helps educators make sense of family structures and remain sensitive to their needs.