Simply greeting students increases satisfaction and relatedness
Having a good relationship with teachers is beneficial for students. Their attitude towards teachers, their level of satisfaction, the feeling of being at home, their attendance rate, their activity during lectures as well as their grades are positively influenced by having a better relationship with their teachers, Gillian M. Sandstrom (University of Sussex) writes in her research paper.
Naturally, it will be difficult for teachers to show tokens of such a relationship – like greeting students individually or making small talk – when their classroom is packed. Nevertheless, there is reason to make those efforts, Sandstrom shows. Even the smallest social interactions between teachers and students can benefit the latter.
Enjoyment and connection
As research in other areas than higher education had already shown that small gestures, making eye contact or remembering a name can strengthen the experience of a relationship, Sandstrom tested whether that also applied to the setting of higher education. She did so by designing and applying two simple interventions that aim to establish (the feeling of) a relationship between people.
The first intervention consisted of the use of name tags by students, which should help the teacher learn and remember their names. In the second intervention, students were greeted by the teacher as they entered the classroom. That way, the teacher could learn to recognize them individually. Both interventions contributed to the enjoyment, the relatedness and the feeling at home of students, Sandstrom’s research shows.
Greeting by the door and using a name tag
The experiments were conducted during lab classes of three courses, two of which were taught by Sandstrom herself. The interventions were tested during the first five weeks of the courses. In total, 352 first-year and second-year undergraduate students participated. One group put name tags on their desks, another group was greeted upon entering the classroom and a third group was not approached in any of these ways.
After five weeks, the students were asked to fill in a questionnaire on their relationship with the teacher, their satisfaction with the lessons and their relatedness to the group. The answers of students that attended their lab class less than three times were excluded from the statistical analysis.
Positive influence of perceived recognition
Almost half of the students that were greeted by the teacher felt the teacher would recognize them personally, the results show. Of the students that were not greeted, only a quarter thought so. Furthermore, students that believed the teacher knew their name reported they enjoyed the course significantly more than those who did not believe the teacher knew their name.
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The use of a name tag proved to have the intended effect as well. In classes that did not use name tags, only seven percent of the students thought the teacher would know their name. However, when name tags were used, 31 percent of the students believed the teacher knew them by name. This intervention seemed to contribute to the students’ enjoyment as well.
The reported enjoyment did not differ between students who believed they were recognized by the teacher and students who believed the teacher knew their name.
Satisfaction and relatedness
As greeting students and knowing their names strengthens the relationship between a teacher and students, Sandstrom expected students who were greeted or asked to show a name tag to report more satisfaction and relatedness than those who were not. Satisfaction and relatedness were indeed higher for the former group but were not influenced by the intervention those students were subjected to.
Students who did not believe the teacher recognized them personally, on the other hand, reported a lower sense of belonging.
Sincere greeting
Greeting students when they enter the classroom and trying to learn their names; providing them with the benefits of a perceived relationship can be that simple, Sandstrom concludes. Naturally, he adds, the shown interest and kindness has to be sincere and should not be at odds with the general behavior of the teacher.
