The Role of Early Childhood Teachers' Sense of Community, Stress, and Trauma Teacher-Child Relationships

• In Event: Impact of Early Childhood Educators on Children

Abstract

In the context of the ECE workforce, where growing responsibilities and demands challenge teachers’ well-being demanding and growing responsibilities of those in the ECE workforce, (McLean et al., 2021), we give attention to how teachers’ emotional well-being (i.e., perceived personal stress, secondary traumatic stress) is related to the association between teachers’ sense of community and the quality of their relationships with children using the Job Demands-Resources model (Deci & Ryan, 2008) and Conservation of Resources theory to inform our hypotheses. Results indicate that the development of quality teacher-child relationships is a process social development that is related to not only how stressed teachers feel but also to how they process and respond to the stress and trauma of their students.

Authors

• Briana Bostic, Johns Hopkins University

• Xiangyu Zhao, Johns Hopkins University

• Katherine Ardeleanu, Johns Hopkins University

• Lieny Jeon, Johns Hopkins University