The Importance of Positive Teacher-Student Relationship
Positive Teacher
Tringa Bells, physical therapist student

On average, a student spends almost 2000 hours per year in school. That is a significant amount of time that should be utilized well in order to ignite a student’s lifetime love of learning. It is also a significant part of a student’s life, not to be wasted on unhealthy teacher-student interactions. Experts argue that a good teacher-student relationship is critically important to the direction a kid’s future takes.

Some of the ways through which a teacher can build healthy relationship with each student in the classroom include communicating positive expectations, being fair when implementing rules and regulations, being caring, providing all learners with reasonably fair assessment, and developing classroom pride. Educators can also leverage strong relationships with their students to make teaching fun and effective.

Healthy relationship between teachers and students can significantly boost a kid’s self-esteem, especially for the kids who are not fortunate enough to have supportive families. Here are four more benefits of establishing positive student-teacher relationship:

Overcoming behavioral issues

Most behavioral problems in the classroom result from kids feeling alienated from the community around them. It is normal for a young kid to hate school, but it is not okay when their dislike of school starts to affect their academic record and spoils the classroom environment for other kids. You can prevent this by relating at a personal level with every kid and understanding why the problem kids behave in the manner they do.

Being friendly, calm, and approachable will help you understand the socio-economic background of every kid, so you will know how to approach every problem kid without igniting the resistance in him/her. Building a strong relationship with learners helps the kids feel like they belong – like they are a part of a bigger group and a bigger purpose.

Boosting academic success

Part of this is the precipitation of good behavior. When you make a kid feel like at home and want to be a part of a greater purpose than just being naughty, the kid is able to repurpose his energy from being rebellious to working hard in the classroom. That will more often than not translate to academic success.

Having a strong bond with your students also helps you to clearly communicate your expectations to and for each student. You are able to motivate struggling students to work hard and the bright students to outscore their current score.

In this context, you can motivate them to take additional training classes such as assertiveness training that can help them improve the overall interpersonal skills and gain more self-respect. On their part, the students trust in your ability to help them, so they listen to you more and respect your orders without any resistance. They are also very comfortable consulting you whenever they encounter a hitch in their coursework.

All these factors combined boosts the students’ performance. If you are working remotely, that means that you will be sending a lot of academic materials online. Thus, make sure that the students understand the technicalities of sending emails, sharing files, and converting files into pdf, and the likes. Having a holistic understanding of such technicalities will evade them being discouraged, and actually focus on mastering the material, and succeeding academically.

Enhancing students’ social maturation

The nature of rapport a kid has with the adults in his/her life determines how well his social maturation process pans out. A teacher is the non-parental authority figure the kid spends most time with. If you create a positive environment where they can grow their emotional and social intelligence, they are able to mature well in time. Remember that these kids trust and respect you when you are friendly with them, so they will always feel privileged to have such a wonderful adult in their lives. They will want to emulate you and grow into as responsible and caring as you.

Improving students’ mental health

Healthy student-teacher relationships translate into reduced stress and anxiety, especially for the students who come from poor socioeconomic backgrounds and who experience any disorder. One such problem would be children with speech disorders, who because of their problem can be marginalized from their peers, which in turn can cause problems in their mental health. In such cases, teachers should support them in their speech therapy and help them get integrated into the class. Such kids might be living in neighborhoods filled with hate and crime, meaning that you could be their only source of protection they know besides their parents. Kids who suffer from learning difficulties, on the other hand, usually suffer from low self-esteem. Your love and care will help them develop a sense of self-worth, a sense of pride. That is good for their mental health.

Conclusion

It is not uncommon for teachers to have challenging relationships with their students, especially when the kid is rebellious and poorly behaved. However, a bad relationship only exacerbates the problem. The kids continue being rebellious, the teacher finds more reasons not to like the kids, and the kids find more reasons to not like the teacher. In the end, your career stagnates and your dreams of changing lives through teaching are shattered. You must start looking for ways to engage each one of your students in a positive way.

About the author

Tringa Bells is a physical therapist student and loves everything related to exercising and outdoor activities. She loves spending time with her family, her friends, loves traveling and coding. Her hobby is writing, and she loves to express herself through words. In her free time, she loves to take care of kids and works as a nanny.

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