Improving Teacher-Child Relationships Using Relationship-Focused Reflection: A Case Study

This study evaluated LLInC (Leerkracht-Leerling Interactie Coaching in Dutch, or Teacher Student Interaction Coaching), an intervention targeted at teachers' mental representations to improve dyadic teacher-child relationship quality. Four teachers and eight children from Dutch elementary schools participated in this single case study. Teachers themselves selected two children with whom they experienced a difficult relationship. The results indicated that teachers' global judgments of relationship quality improved from pretest to posttest for almost all teacher-child dyads. Day-to-day perceptions of conflict, closeness, and self-efficacy improved for a few teacher-child dyads, and especially for teacher-child dyads of the second targeted child. This implies that LLInC is especially helpful when carried out for at least two teacher-child dyads. The results of this study suggest that LLInC is promising, especially with regard to teachers' global relationship perceptions. However, LLInC should be further evaluated using a larger, representative sample, especially with regard to day-to-day perceptions of relationship quality.