A Systematic Review of Interventions to Promote Parent-Teacher Relationships in Early Care and Education: Exploring the Social Process Between Parents and Teachers

Parent-teacher relationships are known to promote positive outcomes for young children in early childhood education; however, parents and teachers face barriers to forming quality relationships. To better understand how to support parents and teachers in forming quality relationships, the present systematic review sought to identify existing interventions designed to promote quality parent-teacher relationships in early childhood education. Systematic search and data extraction identified peer-reviewed manuscripts describing interventions that included components to increase parent-teacher relationships in early childhood education. Each included manuscript was evaluated to answer the following questions: (1) how is the social process between parents and teachers conceptualized?, (2) what strategies were used to improve this social process?, and (3) what outcomes are associated with improving this social process? Nine out of the 1,992 nonduplicate screened manuscripts met inclusion criteria. Results indicate a small body of research focused solely on interventions designed to improve parent-teacher relationships. Included interventions were limited in their conceptualization of the social process between parents and teachers, strategies to improve it, and associated outcomes assessed. Additional research is needed to understand low-cost and highly feasible interventions that promote quality parent-teacher relationships in early childhood education.