Washington, June 14: Some literacy skills are greater in pre-schoolers with confident teachers than those without, U.S. researchers have suggested.
It has been reported that researchers at Ohio State University found pre-schoolers whose teachers had a high degree of confidence had greater print awareness, they could answer questions like, “Show me just one letter on this page.”
Gains in vocabulary knowledge by the children were evident when they had a classroom offering emotional support as well as a teacher who was confident in his or her abilities, said Study co-author Ying Guo, a postdoctoral researcher in education.
Guo and colleagues looked at 67 teachers and their 328 pupils in several states during the course of 30 weeks. Teachers were questioned on their confidence in their teaching abilities.
It was also noted by the report that trained coders categorized the level of emotional support in the classrooms as either low, mid or high. Student language and literacy skills were assessed at the beginning and end of the 30-week period.
Certain gains were made only if the classrooms of the confident teachers had a high level of emotional support.
Guo said in a statement, “Classroom quality is important, and students seem to learn more when they have emotional support in the classroom.”
–Agencies–