Student-Teacher Relationships and Child Development: The impact of gender and migration background

Data from the national study on education and care in early childhood (NUBBEK) were analyzed to examine the relations between the quality of student-teacher relationships and children's development, taking into account effects of gender and migration background. Data come from 714 four-year-old children living in Germany. In addition to an assessment of the relationships between kindergarten teacher and child and mother and child, mothers and kindergarten teachers reported on social-emotional competencies, problem behavior, and communication skills; moreover, test values provided by a receptive language test were taken into account. Adjusting for family characteristics, the quality of student-teacher relationships had a significant effect on each child's outcome: children experiencing student-teacher relationships of high quality showed the highest scores in social, language and receptive vocabulary skills and the lowest scores in problem behavior. Regarding language development, results indicate that the quality of student-teacher relationships is more important for children with migration background, especially for boys. High-quality student-teacher relationships can have a compensatory influence on the social-emotional development of boys.