Role of relationships to learning

The key to learning is the relationship between the teacher and student

The majority of teachers in the four countries agreed that the key to learning is the relationship between the teacher and student. T eachers in Sweden were more likely to agree with this statement at 87%, followed by UK teachers at 85%, Greek teachers at 80% and Spanish teachers at 76%. The only highly significant difference between the countries was between Swedish and Spanish teachers, with the Swedes being more likely to strongly agree that the key to

learning depends on the relationship between the teacher and student compared to their Spanish colleagues (< 0.001, d = .41 suggested a small to moderate practical significance), as well as between Swedish and Greek teachers to a lesser significance (< 0.01, d = .37 suggested a small to moderate practical significance). The other difference was between UK and Spanish teachers, with UK teachers more likely to agree that the key to learning is the

relationship between the teacher and student (< 0.01, d = .25 suggested a small practical significance).

The findings from this statement showed that a majority of teachers from Greece, Spain, Sweden and the UK agree that the key to learning is the relationship between the teacher and student, but teachers from Sweden are highly significantly more likely to agree compared to teachers from Spain and Greece, and teachers from the UK are significantly more likely to agree than teachers from Spain. In terms of demographics, the age of teachers influenced the answers in all four countries, with teachers aged 51-60 in Greece, Sweden and the UK more likely to agree, and teachers aged 41-50 in Spain more likely to agree; gender influenced the answers in Greece with male teachers more likely to agree, and in Sweden with female teachers more likely to agree; income influenced the responses in Sweden, with teachers with higher wages more likely to agree; and finally, experience influenced the answers in Greece, Sweden and the UK with more experienced teachers more likely to agree.

Whether teachers taught in preschool/primary or secondary school, or their education (whether they had undergraduate or postgraduate qualifications, or whether they received SEE training) did not

Table 3.7. Frequency distribution of the statement: The key to

learning is the relationship between the teacher and student, means of responses

Strongly Agree

Agree Neutral Disagree Strongly Disagree NA Greece 38% 42% 8% 1% 0% 12% Spain 40% 36% 12% 2% 0% 10% Sweden 63% 24% 5% 2% 0% 7% UK 51% 34% 5% 1% 0% 8%

Sweden UK Greece Spain

Mean 4.58 4.46 4.32 4.27 (s.d.) (0.7) (0.7) (0.7) (0.8) n 95 227 130 227 UK 0.17 - - - Greece 0.37** 0.2 - - Spain 0.41*** 0.25** 0.07 -

Note: The means of responses are presented in descending order. Higher means represent agreement that the key to learning is the relationship between the teacher and student. The grid is organised to present all pairwise comparisons and indicates the magnitude of Cohen’s effect size (d) where .2 is small, .5 is moderate and .8 is large. * Significant at the (p) < 0.05 level ** Significant at the (p) < 0.01 level *** Significant at the (p) < 0.001 level

Social and emotional education has improved my relationship with students

As to whether social and emotional education improved teachers’ relationship to students, the majority of teachers agreed: 72% of teachers in the UK agreeing, 72% in Spain, 67% in Sweden and 62% in Greece. This was the Likert scale in the study which had the most minimal significant variation and effect sizes between the four countries. However, Spanish teachers were still more likely to agree compared to teachers in Greece (p < 0.01 , d = .40 suggested a small to moderate practical significance), Sweden (p < 0.05, d = .25 suggested a small practical significance) and the UK (p < 0.01, d = .24 suggested a small practical significance).

Table 3.8. Frequency distribution of the statement, ‘ Social and emotional education has improved my relationship with students’

Strongly Agree

Agree Neutral Disagree Strongly Disagree NA Greece 18% 44% 18% 1% 0% 19% Spain 39% 33% 16% 1% 0% 12% Sweden 25% 42% 18% 0% 1% 15% UK 25% 47% 13% 2% 0% 13%

Spain UK Sweden Greece

Mean 4.25 4.07 4.05 3.98 (s.d.) (0.8) (0.7) (0.8) (0.7) n 222 215 87 119 UK 0.24** - - - Sweden 0.25* 0.03 - - Greece 0.4** 0.13 0.09 -

Note: The means of responses are presented in descending order. Higher means represent agreement that social and emotional education has improved teacher’s relationship with students. The grid is organised to present all pairwise

comparisons and indicates the magnitude of Cohen’s effect size (d) where .2 is small, .5 is moderate and .8 is large. * Significant at the (p) < 0.05 level ** Significant at the (p) < 0.01 level *** Significant at the (p) < 0.001 level

The finding from this item show that the majority of teachers from Greece, Spain, Sweden and the UK agreed that social and emotional education had improved their relationship with students, with no significant cross-cultural variation in the answers. In terms of demographics, teachers’ ages influenced the answers in Greece, with older teachers more likely to agree; whether teachers taught in preschool/primary or secondary school influenced the answers in Spain and the UK, with primary school teachers more likely to agree; income influenced the responses in Spain, with teachers with lower wages more likely to agree; experience influenced the answers in Sweden and the UK with more experienced teachers more likely to agree; and finally, SEE training influenced teachers in the UK with teachers that had undergone SEE training more likely to agree.

Teachers’ gender and education (undergraduate or postgraduate degree) did not influence responses on this item in any of the four countries.

Conclusions about the role of emotion and relationships to learning

Teachers’ perceptions in the sample about the role to learning are thus: Spanish teachers are far more likely than the other three countries in the study to think emotion fundamental to learning, as well as have confidence in teaching social and emotional skills to their students (female, primary school teachers on lower wages, especially), but not as likely to agree that the relationship between the student and teacher is the key to learning compared to Sweden and the UK. Conversely, teachers in Sweden and the UK are more likely to prioritise the relationship between teacher and student as the key to learning. In the UK, though emotion is seen as fundamental to learning by the majority of teachers, the respondents were not as confident about teaching social and emotional skills to students. In both Sweden and the UK, the importance of emotion to learning, as well as the ability to impart social and emotional skills to students, was found to be prioritised more by experienced, female teachers, as well as teachers on higher salaries (that is, senior teachers and/or headteachers), and in the case of the UK, primary teachers in particular.

In Sweden, teachers were far more likely than the other countries to not think emotion to be fundamental to learning, and the highest effect found to positively change teacher beliefs in this regard was teacher experience and receiving a higher salary. In Greece, no demographic variable was found to influence teacher opinions about the role of emotion, but multiple demographic variables were found to affect that of relationships: with older, more experienced male Greek teachers more likely to agree that the key to learning is the

SEE had improved their relationship to students. Besides this, no statistically significant difference was found overall between teachers from Greece and teachers from the UK, the largest effect size was d = .2 in all four Likert scales between the two countries which

suggested a small practical significance: that is, though emotion is seen as fundamental to learning by the majority of teachers, teachers still believe the key to learning is the teacher-student relationship, and are not as confident about teaching social and emotional skills to students as they are more established subjects.