1. Supporting Child Development in Quality Programs PK-3: Interactions Matter
Robert C. Pianta, Ph.D.
Dean, Curry School of Education
Founding Director, Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning
TALKING POINTS:
Welcome.
We will now shift gears, and for the next three days we will focus on how to implement MyTeachingPartner. So instead of thinking in terms of coding classrooms, you will be thinking in terms of supporting teachers to improve their teaching practices related to CLASS dimensions. 1

2. Effects of PK-3 Enrollment
“Educational” programs yield greater benefits (~30% long-term gap; 50% gap in one year)
Locus of effects is classroom experience
How to drive existing infrastructure toward bigger impact — curricula, outcome assessments, professional preparation and ongoing training
Current systems intended to drive children’s learning are weak and not highly aligned/integrated

3. What to measure? Workforce and Quality
Teacher credentials (e.g. degree status), teacher experience
No evidence that these indicators drive learning on their own (several studies). Teachers’ skills and knowledge do matter for children’s learning
Qualities of children’s experiences in classroom setting drive learning
Curriculum, assessment/data use
Teacher-child interactions

4. Measure for Workforce Development
Focus on what’s happening in classrooms: Teaching that matters for children’s learning
Teacher-child interactions: Knowledge about interactions, skill to interact effectively (e.g. language, self-regulation, sensitivity)
Teacher knowledge of child development
Knowledge of curriculum and data use in the classroom; focus on implementation with fidelity
Targeted, focused workforce development linked to assessed competency and credentials

5. What Do We Know Currently?
Policies focus on structural items (e.g. degree attainment) and not on strong evidence of knowledge and competence
Current prep programs offer 1 course in child development, mostly outdated content
Teachers do not know about or use contemporary, effective curricula
Little direct training in interactions.
Professional prep content not aligned to standards
Lack of robust assessments

6. Child-Adult Relationships and School Settings
Relationships with adults form the “infrastructure” for school success:
Social competence with peers
Self-regulation, emotional self-control
Task orientation, persistence, following directions
Attention, language, self-regulation are social processes
Relationships and interactions with teachers become vehicle for elevating quality and value of early education and improving readiness.

7. Off-Task Behavior, Teacher Sensitivity,
and 15 mo. Child Temperament: Grade 1 12 10 8 6 4 2
Even-tempered
Approach-Oriented
Off-Task Behavior
Teacher Sensitivity

8. Understanding the CLASS Framework: Overview
Teacher-child Interactions
Emotional
Support
Classroom Organization
Instructional
Support
What to Say and Do
Explain that the CLASS focuses on three broad domains of effective interactions that characterize children’s classroom experiences.
Emotional Support - Positive relationships among teachers and children, teachers’ abilities to support social and emotional functioning in the classroom
Classroom Organization - Well-managed classrooms that provide children with frequent, engaging learning activities
Instructional Support - Interactions that teach children to think, provide ongoing feedback and support, and facilitate language development
Tell teachers that each domain includes multiple dimensions of effective interactions known to contribute to children’s success in school. Let them know that you will look at each domain in detail in later slides.

9. Dimensions of Interaction: CLASS PK-5
Positive climate
Negative climate
Teacher sensitivity
Regard for student perspectives
Effective behavior management
Instructional learning formats
Productivity
Concept development
Quality of feedback
Language modeling
Emotional
Support
Organization/
Management
Instructional
Support

10. What is the Setting of Instruction?
Whole class – 50%
Individual – 35%
Virtually no small group instruction or cooperative learning
Fairly consistent result across grades/years
Means few opportunities for developing close relationships

11. Understanding the CLASS Framework: Overview
What’s Happening Nationwide?
What to Say and Do
Explain that this graph shows how much the effectiveness of interactions varies.
Explain to teachers that based on CLASS data collected from observing several thousand pre-k-3rd classrooms throughout the country, researchers know that
Children tend to experience all, but mostly moderate to high, levels of effective interactions for Emotional Support and Classroom Organization.
Most children attend pre-k-3rd grade classrooms characterized by low levels of instructional support.

12. Understanding the CLASS Framework: Overview
Across grades 1, 3, 5 only 10% of children are consistently enrolled in top-third of classrooms for quality of interaction (even allowing for 2/3 occasions in top third).
Yet……
…effective teacher-child interactions are key ingredients for children’s social and academic development.
What to Say and Do
Tell teachers that research shows that the differences in effective interactions are linked to how much children learn and grow in school.
Point out that children in classrooms with higher CLASS ratings experience greater gains in academic achievement and social skill development during the school year:
Classrooms in which teachers develop positive relationships with children and are sensitive to children’s needs (as measured by the CLASS domain Emotional Support) foster children’s social development.
Classrooms in which teachers effectively manage behavior and take an active role in creating learning opportunities (as measured by the CLASS domain Classroom Organization) enhance children’s self-regulatory skills and help children get the most out of each day they spend in the classroom.
Children in classrooms in which teachers offer higher quality feedback and more consistently support the development of thinking skills (as measured by the CLASS domain Instructional Support) show more academic progress in both pre-K and kindergarten than do their peers who receive lower levels of these supports.
When early childhood education programs provide effective emotional, organizational and instructional supports, children are more successful learners and are more likely to meet expectations about what children should know and be able to do.
Emphasize that the differences among classrooms has an impact on what children are able to get out of their school and early childhood education experiences.

13. Interactions and School Readiness in PK
Emotional Support
Instructional Support
ECERS-R Total
Structural indicators
Receptive Language 
Expressive Language
Rhyming
Letter Naming
Math Skills
Social Competence
Behavior Problems
Changes in children’s development from beginning to end of preschool Mashburn, et al. (in press)
As you can see, what we found in these preschool classrooms was that the CLASS Instructional dimensions in particular were associated with children’s language learning (can go through more specifics).
Please note that this analysis used a previous grouping of CLASS dimensions so ES contained PC, NC-r, TS, OC-r, and BM, and IS contained PD, ILF, CD, and FDK

14. Gains in Achievement in Emotionally Supportive Elementary Classrooms
Understanding the CLASS Framework: Overview
Gains in Achievement in Emotionally Supportive Elementary Classrooms
1st Grade Emotional Support
107
106
Kindergarten
adjustment
problems
105
Standardized tests of achievement adjusted
104
103
No problems
102
What to Know
This graph shows that effective interactions matter, and that they matter especially for high risk children.
Children’s adjustment problems include problems with sustained attention, problems with externalizing behavior, and problems on standardized tests of social and academic competence. Children are considered to have multiple problems if they have three or four problems. An area was considered problematic if performance was one standard deviation above the mean for problems or one standard deviation below the mean for competencies.
Several clicks are required to display all information on the graph. Practice talking through the slide to time your comments with what is displayed.
What to Say and Do
Click- Researchers looked at how emotional support provided in first grade classrooms was related to students standardized tests of achievement. Researchers looked at students with no problems in kindergarten and compared them to students who had multiple adjustment problems in kindergarten.
Click – Researchers found that when emotional support is low, there is a significant difference between the first grade achievement of students who had no problems and students who had multiple problems.
Click - There is a similar picture when emotional support is moderate—students who had problems previously are behind.
Click - But when the emotional support in these first grade classrooms is provided at a high level, students who had problems the previous year are able to perform at a level commensurate with their peers who had no previous problems.
Summary: In first grade classrooms that provide low to moderate emotional support, students who had adjustment difficulties in kindergarten have significantly lower achievement scores than those who did not have difficulties in kindergarten. However, in classrooms with high levels of emotional support, students who had previous adjustment difficulties are able to achieve at a level commensurate with their peers who did not have such difficulties. These data come from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) study.
101
Multiple problems
100 99 98
Low
Moderate
High

15. Implications of CLASS Research for Professional Development
Teacher-child interactions are components of classrooms that matter for children’s social and academic development
Children need consistent, ongoing exposure to high- quality effective interactions with teachers; yet quality is generally low and inconsistent
Therefore, professional development needs to focus on teachers’ interactions with children
TALKING POINTS
Because of these findings, researchers at UVA saw a great need for professional development to support teachers in improving practices related to CLASS dimensions. 15

16. Aligned Professional Development: MTP
Connecting outcomes and inputs – Alignment
CLASS – specific definitions of interactions
Video Library – analysis of others’ interactions
Coaching – ongoing analysis/feedback on own interactions
Course – knowledge and analytic skills
All tested effective in RCTs

17. General Goals for Teachers
Become better observers of their interactions
Use the CLASS lens to understand and describe teacher-child interactions
Feel more effective in their interactions with children
Intentionally create more opportunities in their interactions to teach and help children learn
Knowledge, skills, awareness of interactions and children’s relational perspectives
Course, Video Library, Coaching
TALKING POINT:
We are going to take time to explore each of these goals in the next several slides.
Bullet 5: By focusing on how they implement curricula and lesson, how they interact with children to help them learn during lessons.

18. Effects of MTP Coaching in PK-3
Teachers with MTP coaches
Grew more sensitive in interactions with students
Increased students’ engagement in instruction
Improved language stimulation techniques
High-poverty classrooms benefit a great deal
Early career teachers benefit from coaching and video
Children with MTP teachers
Made greater gains in tests of early literacy
Experienced lower levels of problem behavior
Demonstrated higher levels of expressive language
Demonstrated higher levels of inhibitory control
TALKING POINTS:
Here are more of the findings of the MTP Professional Development Study. 18 18 18 18

19. MTP Course Improves Quality of Interaction*

20. The Importance of “Seeing”
Standardize – coaching is expensive – want it to tightly align with program outcomes

21. Building Relationships with Banking Time
Student chooses activities using materials suggested by teacher
Teacher observes, narrates, and reflects student’s behavior:
Banking time continues even if student misbehaves
BT increased teacher sensitivity, child cooperation; decreased stress, misbehavior, cortisol

22. MTP Online Course on Interactions
2 semester-long course sequence
Course 1: Emotional Support and Classroom Organization
Course 2: Instructional Support

23. Online Content
Help teachers “chunk” complexities into 10 key elements of practice
Dimensions
Indicators
Behaviors
Tightly couple knowledge of interactions with visuals of what it looks like in real classrooms

24. Analysis of Others’ Teaching

25. Positive Effects even Larger with Instructor Conferences
Cohen’s d
End of Course 1
End of Course 2

26. Observing Interaction, Improving Relationships
Feasible, reliable and valid – A scalable language and lens for classroom settings – builds coherence in quality across educational settings
Focus for teacher prep and PD that fosters teacher knowledge, skill, and child development.
Importance of “seeing” moment-to-moment and understanding larger goals of the relationship
Level and consistency are challenges: School/system work over time to build capacity