Child-perceived teacher emotional support, its relations with teaching practices, and task persistence

Abstract

This study examined relations between child-reported teacher emotional support, teaching practices, and children’s task-persistent learning behaviour. The study was carried out in Estonia, where a students’ first teacher advances with his/her students and teaches all primary subjects in the first 3 years of schooling. In total, 660 sixth-grade children reported about their first teacher’s emotional support. Teachers’ child-centred and teacher-directed practices were observed with the Early Childhood Classroom Observation Measure (ECCOM); results included 38 teachers in Grade 1, and 37 in Grade 3. Within the same grades, teachers reported on their affection for students, as well as their behavioural and psychological control over students. Teachers also evaluated each of their student’s task persistence. As shown by ECCOM results, retrospective student-reported teacher emotional support tended to be positively related to child-centred practises, and negatively related to teacher-directed practises in Grade 3, while also negatively related to teacher-reported psychological control in Grade 1. Although higher perceived emotional support was related with more persistent learning behaviour on an individual level, general task persistence was predicted primarily by teacher-reported practices at the classroom level.