Considering Atypical Student-Teacher Relationship Patterns: A Latent Transition Analysis of Latinx Children in Early Elementary

• In Event: Use, Analysis, and Development of Classroom Assessments with a focus on Culturally Responsive Educational Practices

Abstract

Positive student-teacher relationships (STRs) are vital in helping children make the adjustment through the first few years of school (Hamre & Pianta, 2001). Unfortunately, all children do not have access to positive STRs in the early elementary period. Children from culturally and linguistically minoritized (CLM) backgrounds are less likely to have access to positive STRs (Cherng, 2017; Goldberg & Iruka, 2021). Although it is clear that STR quality typically declines across the school years (Jerome et al., 2009), and Latinx students are at greater risk for experiencing poorer-quality relationships, little is known about fluctuations in STRs from year-to-year using person-centered approaches.
Current person-centered trajectory studies (e.g., Jerome et al., 2009; O'Connor et al., 2011; Spilt et al., 2012) examine closeness and conflict separately, and suggest that some children experience increasing or decreasing STR quality over the course of elementary school. These approaches further support the positive-negative dichotomy of relationship quality types. However, qualitative work suggests broadening our understanding of STR quality (McGrath and Van Bergen, 2017, 2019) to identify more complex STR patterns that jointly consider closeness and conflict. In fact, risk and resilience perspectives suggest that it is the cumulative effect of risk and protective factors that can have long lasting impacts on children’s academic and social development (Masten & Gewirtz, 2006). Given that STR quality may be a key protective mechanism for Latinx students, it necessary to explore the within group variability of STR trajectories within Latinx populations over time. This paper uses latent transition analysis (LTA) to examine the following research questions:
1) What are the statuses (i.e., patterns) of STR quality among Latinx students?
2) What is the likelihood of transitioning from one status to another over time, from first to third grade?
Methods. We used data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study–Kindergarten Cohort (ECLS-K:2011), including 1,460 teachers and 4,050 Latinx students. We conducted LTA to jointly model teacher ratings of closeness and conflict (indicators of STR quality) with their Latinx students, to obtain STR statuses and transition patterns from 1st to 3rd grade.
Results
RQ1: LTA revealed 5 statuses: (1) Positive, (2) Functional Average, (3) Reserved, (4) Complicated, and (5) Negative. These findings showed distinct and atypical relationship quality patterns experienced by Latinx children and their teachers (see Figure 1 for mean indicator levels across statuses, with Time 1 indicator means as the reference point; see Table 1 for marginal predicted means of indicators for each status).
RQ2: Transition probability results showed there was considerable variability in the likelihood of remaining in or transition to another STR status over time. These results illuminate the potential influence STRs at an earlier time may have on the quality of future STRs for Latinx students. See Table 1 for transition probabilities for STR quality across first to third grade.
Conclusion. Results from this study highlight the importance of considering atypical relationship patterns in the elementary period. We discuss the implications of our findings for identifying which Latinx students are most vulnerable to experiencing inhibiting educational environments.

Author

• Melissa Lucas, Yale University
  Presenting Author