The Teacher’s Influence on Early Childhood Socio-Emotional Growth

Think about a teacher you remember from childhood – chances are, it wasn’t their lesson plans you remember most, but how they made you feel. Teachers hold a unique and powerful position in young children’s lives, particularly during the early years when social and emotional foundations are being built. For children with intellectual disabilities, this influence becomes even more significant. Research consistently shows that early childhood teachers are responsible not just for academic instruction, but for supporting children’s social, emotional, and cognitive development – skills that shape who children become long after they leave the classroom.

Teachers as role models: more than just instructors 🔗

Young children are natural imitators. They watch the adults around them closely, absorbing social cues, emotional responses, and behavioural patterns. In the classroom, the teacher is often the most consistent authority figure a child interacts with, making their behaviour a constant reference point.

Early childhood educators model desired behaviours through their everyday actions – saying “please” and “thank you,” resolving disagreements calmly, or showing empathy when a child is upset. Children observe and replicate these behaviours in their own peer interactions. This is not incidental learning; it is one of the most direct pathways through which children develop social competence.

Beyond modelling, teachers also communicate values – about fairness, respect, and kindness – through the limits they set and the boundaries they maintain. A teacher who consistently enforces turn-taking, acknowledges every child’s contribution, and addresses conflict with patience is actively teaching children how to engage with the world.

The power of teacher expectations 🔗

One of the most well-documented phenomena in educational psychology is the Pygmalion effect – the idea that a teacher’s expectations of a student can shape that student’s actual performance. The concept was formally studied by Rosenthal and Jacobson, who found that when teachers believed certain students were poised to excel academically – even though these students were chosen at random – those children genuinely outperformed their peers on follow-up assessments a year later. Teachers had, without realising it, given these students more encouragement, more detailed feedback, and more learning opportunities.

The effect works in both directions. Research by Brophy identified that negative expectations from teachers can lead to harmful outcomes: giving up too quickly on lower-achieving students, praising them less when they succeed, or offering little to no feedback on their responses. These behaviours create conditions that actively hinder a child’s motivation and self-esteem.

Children build their identity and self-concept during the early years, making them highly sensitive to messages received from authority figures like teachers. A teacher who communicates confidence in a child’s abilities helps that child develop a sense of self-efficacy – the belief that they are capable of succeeding. Conversely, subtle signals of low expectation can quietly erode a child’s motivation before formal schooling even begins.

A longitudinal study published in Contemporary Educational Psychology confirmed that teacher expectations were positively linked to students’ academic self-concept, and that this self-concept subsequently predicted academic achievement. In short: when teachers believe in children, children begin to believe in themselves.

Building close, trusting relationships 🔗

Trust is the foundation of any meaningful teacher-child relationship. According to the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), children benefit socially, emotionally, and academically when teachers intentionally create close, trusting relationships. Consistently offering warmth, affection, respect, and care – even on difficult days and when children misbehave – is critical to children’s well-being in early education settings.

This warmth is not simply “being nice.” It means actively listening to children, responding to their emotional cues, treating each child as an individual, and maintaining patience even under challenging circumstances. Research on early childhood teaching practices highlights that when teachers respond to misbehaviour with guidance rather than punishment – focusing on helping the child understand and develop better responses – they preserve the trust relationship and support the child’s forward progress.

Specific strategies teachers use 🔗

Early childhood educators use a range of evidence-backed strategies to foster social and emotional growth. These include consistent displays of warmth and affection, modelling respectful behaviour, offering real-time praise and gentle behaviour cues, nurturing emotional literacy through conversations about feelings, providing time for unstructured play, and using storytelling as a way to explore complex emotions. Teachers also support self-regulation – a child’s ability to manage impulses, focus attention, and persist with tasks – through structured routines and consistent expectations.

Supporting children’s socio-emotional development from an early age builds a solid foundation for their future, preparing them to manage their emotions and behaviour, establish caring relationships with others, follow limits and expectations, and interact productively in groups. Studies show a measurable increase in achievement for children who receive this support compared to those who do not.

Creating a supportive learning environment 🔗

A classroom is more than a physical space. For young children, it is the environment in which they learn what it means to belong, to be safe, and to be seen. When teachers design the classroom to be stimulating, predictable, and emotionally safe, they create the conditions for development in all areas – cognitive, physical, and socio-emotional.

A supportive environment includes clear routines that give children a sense of predictability, opportunities for both structured and free play, and a classroom culture where differences are respected. Decades of research have linked participation in high-quality early childhood education programmes to multidimensional well-being, with socio-emotional skills in the early years showing the strongest association with long-term outcomes across social, academic, and behavioural domains.

Supporting children with intellectual disabilities 🔗

For children with intellectual disabilities, a supportive environment requires deliberate and targeted planning. These children may face additional barriers to social and emotional participation – including difficulties with communication, emotional regulation, and understanding social cues – that teachers must be equipped to address.

The Individualized Education Program (IEP) is one of the most important tools available to teachers working with these children. According to the Council for Exceptional Children, the IEP is the foundation of special education services, serving as a collaborative, legally documented plan developed between school personnel and a child’s family. It sets out measurable academic and functional goals tailored to the child’s unique strengths and needs, and specifies the specialised supports and services that will be provided. Crucially, the U.S. Department of Education’s IEP Guide emphasises that an effective IEP requires genuine teamwork – parents, teachers, and specialists working together with a shared commitment to the child’s progress.

For children with intellectual disabilities, IEP goals extend beyond academics to encompass functional, real-world competence – such as communication, daily living skills, and social participation. This whole-child approach ensures that educational planning reflects both the child’s current abilities and their long-term potential for independence and inclusion.

Multisensory teaching methods 🔗

Alongside the IEP, multisensory teaching methods play a central role in supporting children with intellectual disabilities. Multisensory instruction engages more than one sense at a time – combining visual, auditory, tactile, and kinaesthetic experiences to reinforce learning. For children who may struggle to access information through a single channel, this approach creates multiple entry points into a concept.

Practical examples include using textured materials to reinforce letter recognition, song and rhythm to support sequencing, visual schedules to aid comprehension of daily routines, and hands-on manipulation of objects to build number concepts. Effective IEPs for children with intellectual disabilities specify these methods in concrete, measurable detail – not merely noting that “multisensory support” will be used, but describing precisely how it will be implemented in daily instruction. This specificity ensures that teaching is not left to chance.

The teacher-parent partnership 🔗

Teachers do not support children in isolation. A critical part of the teacher’s role is building strong partnerships with families. Early childhood educators establish these partnerships through regular communication, parent workshops, and collaborative activities that extend the learning environment into the home. For children with intellectual disabilities in particular, this partnership is essential – parents carry knowledge about their child’s history, preferences, and needs that no formal evaluation can fully capture, and teachers bring the pedagogical expertise to translate this knowledge into effective classroom practice.

When teachers and parents communicate openly and consistently, children benefit from a unified message across their two most important environments. Social and emotional skills taught at school are reinforced at home, and challenges identified at home can be addressed proactively at school.

Long-term impact of teacher influence 🔗

Emerging research confirms that the social and emotional skills developed in the very early years of life have the greatest impact on lifelong outcomes. Children with strong socio-emotional skills are more likely to build lasting friendships, maintain employment, contribute to their communities, and experience good mental and physical health in adulthood.

For children with intellectual disabilities, early, targeted, and relationship-based teaching can be the difference between passive participation and active inclusion in school and community life. Teachers who understand their influence – who are intentional about the expectations they hold, the environments they create, and the relationships they nurture – have the capacity to alter a child’s developmental trajectory in profound ways.

What do you think? How can teachers become more conscious of the expectations they hold for individual children, particularly those with developmental differences – and what practical steps can early childhood settings take to ensure that every child, regardless of ability, experiences a genuinely supportive and high-expectation learning environment?

References

1. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1235885.pdf
2. https://post.edu/blog/aided-early-childhood-education-toddlers-begin-mastering-social-skills/
3. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/raising-resilient-children/202505/understanding-the-pygmalion-effect
4. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1066376.pdf
5. https://neuronup.us/psychology/the-pygmalion-effect-and-the-power-of-expectations/
6. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0361476X18300729
7. https://www.naeyc.org/resources/pubs/yc/mar2018/promoting-social-and-emotional-health
8. https://www.nzcer.org.nz/nzcerpress/early-childhood-folio/articles/how-do-teachers-support-children-s-social-emotional
9. https://www.athenacareers.edu/the-role-of-educators-in-early-childhood-social-emotional-learning/
10. https://teachingstrategies.com/blog/5-ways-support-social-emotional-development-early-childhood/
11. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s40723-021-00084-8
12. https://exceptionalchildren.org/topics/individualized-education-programs-ieps
13. https://www.ed.gov/sites/ed/files/parents/needs/speced/iepguide/iepguide.pdf
14. https://queensonlineschool.com/individualized-education-plan-examples/