Gregory, Anne and Ripski, Michael B. (2008) "Adolescent Trust in Teachers: Implications for Behavior in the High School Classroom." School Psychology Review 37(3). pp 337-353.
Article's review of literature:
- Suspensions vary a lot by teacher, study designed to figure out what the teachers who don't suspend students a lot do differently
- High rates of suspensions correlate with high rates of other bad things (incarceration, drop-out, etc.)
- Defiance, disrespect, and disobedience cites as most likely causes and Black students are disproportionally suspended suggesting that fixing this issue would help the achievement gap.
- Adolescent view of the legitimacy of the person in authority affects how the student responds to that person.
- A review of different strategies (including PBIS) and their relative effectiveness.
- Trust is important in all the other relationships throughout a building, a well-researched idea, why not trust between teacher and student (focus of study)?
Study Aspects:
- Most students in suspension in this study were Black males
- Most teachers in study were white females
- Two types of teachers were invited to participate in the study - teachers who referred large numbers of students and teacher nominated by the suspended students as teachers they got along best with.
Results:
- 15 of the 17 teachers nominated by the students used the relational approach to discipline.
- Teachers who report using the relational approach have less defiant behavior because students have trust in the teacher's authority. The students saw themselves as more cooperative in these classes.
- In situations where adolescents are unclear about the intents of the authority figure, trust in the authority figure helps the students to not read hostility into the other's actions.
- Teacher who use the relational approach to discipline can detect early student disengagement and intervene early enough to limit disruption, as well as tailor strategies to students when larger disruptions do occur.
- Teachers that had greater suspension problems focused on structure and organizational mechanisms to maintain classroom order, which helps students stay on task and do better work, but may need to be augmented by relational strategies to help those students who work outside of this order.
- It may be that the relational approach is more important for Black students than other types of students as others (Whites and Asians in this study) assume the best intentions of their teachers.
What do the results of this study mean for you and your practice?
It is clear that student-teacher relationship/trust is critical to fostering greater success. The question I pose is: How does the level of trust with the administration, by the student, relate to how ofter students are actually negatively disciplined? Negatively meaning dismissed or "simply" sent to detention, vs. positively disciplined through restitution or actual completion of the work missed from the absence of class. From this study of teachers and students we see a key piece missing, that of the administration. IF the administration maintains a healthy relationship with the student/student body would there not be a better chance of reinstating the student back to the classroom. And further more a strong relationship between the staff and administration would foster future success. Page 4 confirms the need for further research on this. ----- Upon a quick search it seems there is material to review: Analysis of the Influence of Principal –Teacher
ReplyDeleteRelationships on Student Academic Achievement:
A National Focus
Nice post, it leads to a look at a building's overall relational trust and morale. This is were the EL philosophy of ALL staff having a CREW, including the administration, would be supported.
Good luck.... to the person who is posting here :)
Hans,
ReplyDeleteIn fact, there is a lot of research on this idea. Marzano's book _Leadership that Works_ comes to mind. I also have heard of a study where if administrators just great students as they enter the building test scores go up!
I think it is clear that administrators need to build a relationship before the student shows up with a referral. The results of this study would suggest that it is especially important with Black students as they typically have a negative view about the intentions of the authority figure.