Preschool Teachers’ Financial Well-Being and Work Time Supports: Associations with Children’s Emotional Expressions and Behaviors in Classrooms

The current study examined associations among teachers’ financial well-being, including teachers’ wages and their perceptions of their ability to pay for basic expenses, and teachers’ work time supports, including teachers’ paid planning time, vacation days, and sick days, and children’s positive emotional expressions and behaviors in preschool classrooms. Analyses controlled for teachers’ education and experience, as well as classroom quality (as assessed by the CLASS). Results suggest that teachers’ financial well-being is associated with children’s positive emotional expressions and behaviors in classrooms. Specifically, teachers’ wages positively relate to children’s positive emotional expressions and behaviors in classrooms, and children in classrooms of teachers who can pay for their basic expenses exhibit more positive emotional expressions and behaviors than children in classrooms of teachers who cannot pay for their basic expenses. Implications of the effects of early childhood teachers’ financial well-being on children’s emotional experiences in classrooms are discussed.