A Study of How Teachers In the US Build Student-Teacher Rapport in

Class

NanZhang ( Nancy)

Introduction

1-Background

How important is the student/teacher relationship for students, and

what do teachers and students believe to be the most effective

relationship in the middle school classroom? In my class, I find that my

students have become deaf to my motivated speech, and more and more

students become less active , which really upsets me a lot. Therefore,

when I got this opportunity to observe the classrooms in US, I studied the

student-teacher rapport in the middle school classrooms to find whether

rapport is important to build a successful classroom environment. I expect

that after I go back to China I can maximum classroom effectiveness by

building a positive rapport with my students.

2-Literature Review

Inside a classroom, it’s a normal sight to see the teacher in front of the

class and making an effort to educate a whole bunch of students. These

students, on the other hand, are trying their very best to stay awake

through the whole hours of studying and class discussion. Indeed, it is

considered as the teacher’s responsibility to not only educate but provide

students with a fun and lively studying experience. In doing this, students

will be able to discern that studying can be fun and not boring most of the

times. One way is to build and eventually strengthen the rapport the

teacher have with their students.

2.1-What is rapport?

Oxford Dictionary gives a definition of rapport in English, that is

rapport is a close and harmonious relationship in which the people or

groups concerned understand each other’s feelings or ideas and

communicate well.(http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/rapport)

“A supportive environment is one in which the people involved

support and help each other and express themselves freely and openly”

(Tracey Sutherland)

In Haslett’s study(1976), several hundred high school students and

college students ranked a set of teacher behavior aspects in order of

importance. Teacher/student rapport was rated the most important factor

in both the high school responses and the college responses.( Haslett,

1976)

Diero(1997) states “People like people who think highly of them.

Students like teachers who think highly of them”(p. 198). And teachers in

Kentucky and Russia believed students were more motivated when

relationship were free of hostility and when the students believed the

teacher liked them and the students liked the teacher( Hufton, Elliot,

Illushin, 2003, p.372). This shows that an environment of positive rapport

is beneficial to the classroom and good relationship can change the

students’ attitude in class, which is a remarkably effective way to improve

classroom management. On the other hand, by creating a friendly but

focused learning experience, it is likely that students will want to be in

the instructor’s company and, accordingly, will want to come to class.

Subsequently, it is apt that students will strive to work harder in order to

eventually excel with the material and succeed in the class(Walsh 1996).

Therefore, the importance of establishing rapport with students is huge

and has great impact on the over-all performance in school.

2.2-What is Graffiti needs assessment

A needs assessment is a systematic process for determining and

addressing needs, or "gaps" between current conditions and desired

conditions or "wants". The discrepancy between the current condition and

wanted condition must be measured to appropriately identify the need.

The need can be a desire to improve current performance or to correct a

deficiency.( http://www.adprima.com/needs.htm Kizlik, B., "Needs

Assessment Information", ADPRIMA, last access 16 October 2010.)

Barbara Goza developed this first day of class activity. She posts

pieces of newsprint on the walls around the classroom. Each newsprint

contains the beginning of a sentence. Those sentences may inquire about

all sorts of things of interest to the instructor and fellow classmates. “In a

nutshell, here is what I know about (fill in the name/content of your

course.” Here’s what’s worrying me most about this class. . .” “I learn

best in classes where the teacher. . .” Here’s what my classmates can do

that will help me learn in this class. . .” The sky is really the limit with

respect to the prompts. Goza gives her students 15 minutes during which

they walk around the room and fill in answers to the prompts. You could

certainly encourage students to chat with each other while they are doing

this. As Goza goes through the usual first day details, she refers to

responses the students have written, raising questions about them,

offering clarifying material, addressing concerns, etc. Its another great

way to indicate your willingness to address student concerns right from

the start.

2.3-Strategies used by the American teachers to keep a positive rapport

in the classroom

Building positive teacher -student relationship can be done through

various teaching strategies. To build genuine rapport, you have to draw

students to you. You have to use your personality, your humor, and your

charisma to get students to want to be around you and take an interest in

who you are. It’s this natural appeal that allows you to effortlessly make

personal connections with students and influence their behavior choices

—often without ever having to say a word. Through observation, I found

the teachers in US often use the following strategies:

• Be friendly and sympathetic with students.

Students tend to work harder and respond more if they know that

their teachers are interested in them as individuals. Spending time talking

to students about backgrounds, interests and working behaviors is really

important on the first day of the class, which helps students feel free

when they share their difficulties in studying as well as in life with their

teachers afterwards. So in the classes observed, I found in the first period

of the new semester teachers always give a brief presentation on their

background, interest in the field, summer vacation, family, hobbies etc.

Just as what Leslie Wooten-Blanks (2012) suggests, instructors share

some details about their experiences and difficulties they faced as

undergraduates. By doing so, an instructor is demonstrating that he or she

“is a human. Not a robot” (Wooten-Blanks 2012).

•Be accessible.

Barbara Harrell Carson (1996) found that accessibility to be “the

single most frequently cited evidence of a professor’s caring.” Thus,

making yourself available to your students can really drive the

relationship forward. Consider arriving a little early and staying after

class in order to give your students the opportunity to chat with you

(Gillespie 1997). Additionally, keep in touch with your students via

email; send out class reminders, respond to their requests within a

reasonable time period, and “check-in” with those who may be having

difficulties. Finally, be sure to invite your students to come to your office

hours on a weekly basis. When I studied in ESL, my teachers always did

like that, chatting with us, telling us which food is the most popular and

where we can find it, exchanging some useful things like website,

teaching sources by sending emails and helping us to solve various kinds

of our problems. In many cases, we try to work hard to reciprocate our

teachers’ kindness.

•Smile until the students do the same.

During my observation in the school in US, I noticed that when the

teachers take attendance, they always make eye contact and smile until

the student smiles back at them. Sometimes some of the teachers make

funny faces instead of smiling or exaggerate a frown until the student

does the same, which may look fun and shorten the distance between the

teacher and the student. I interviewed some of my classmates here, and I

found almost everyone loved the teachers with a smile, like Cary,

Safineh, Katie, etc.

•Learn the students’ names.

Even though it may be somewhat challenging, consider memorizing

students’ names because it will allow you to call on them during

classroom proceedings. Additionally, by using students’ names you’ll be

acknowledging them as individuals which can be important considering

that he or she is among hundreds, if not thousands, of others on campus

(Gillespie 1997). Therefore, some of the teachers who I observed can

remember all the students’ names in the first period of the new semester,

which really surprises the students and makes the students think the

teachers focus their attention on them. And the teachers will

automatically win favor by having active learners in their classroom.

Consequently, it is easy for the teachers to establish a positive

relationship with their students.

•Work hard on lesson plans and use good teaching methods.

If a teacher can have lesson plans along with good teaching methods,

it is also a good way to establish the rapport in the class because it’s

teachers’ care to their students that motivate students to work effectively,

and they can reach the objective of the lesson right after class. Moreover,

a successful lesson plan proves that the teachers are well-organized and

experienced, and thus they will gain the respect or even admiration from

their students. During my field visit, I found almost all the teachers have

formed their own teaching styles. Before the class, all the teachers write

down their objective of the lesson on the fixed place of the blackboard.

During the period, they use various kinds of teaching methods, such as

using videos to arouse the interest, using different games to reinforce,etc.

In other words, good teaching behaviors and working habits form perfect

teachers who will become good models for students to take.

•Be modest and honest.

To be modest and honest can be considered some of the main

characteristics to build up a good relationship between teachers and

students. Most teachers think that they must be better than their students

in all fields. Some of them are too proud of themselves that they negate

all new points from their students. Instead of giving the immediate

feedback, teachers should double-check the information, and sometimes

they can admit that “You learn from me, and I learn from you

sometimes”. Being honest does not mean that they are lacking in

professional ability but they respect their students and appreciate their

learning attitude. When we studied in UCI, the teachers here all regarded

us as their friends, their colleagues. They treated us very friendly, and we

formed a very positive relationship with them, so it is easy for us to learn

a lot from them.

•Emphasize student-centered learning.

Create learning opportunities in the classroom that are full of “lively

exchanges.” For example, utilize classroom discussions that allow the

students to “to think out answers for themselves.” Or, weave tangible and

applicable examples from the students’ lives into the content (Carson,

1996). Ultimately, an emphasis on active-learning ensures that your

students participate which can reinforce their sense of ownership of the

class. In all the lessons we observed, the teachers like group work or team

work, they casually divide the students into groups or teams, asking the

students to do a lot of discussion, and everybody is encouraged to deliver

their own opinions and everyone’s opinion is right if he/she can explain it

reasonably. Therefore, the students will take an active part in every

activities in class. Naturally, the class will become more effective because

the students can feel that the teachers demonstrate respect towards them,

making them have the senses of belonging.

•Gather student feedback.

Consider gathering student feedback around the midway point of the

semester. Invite your students to write responses to 3-4 questions related

to their learning. For example, “What would you like to see more/less

time spent on (in this class)?” or “How could I make my comments on

your papers more helpful for you?” or “In what areas of the class are you

still confused?” (Curzan 2006). Or, consider asking your students the

same questions that we typically include in our student evaluations: 1)

“What works well in this class?” 2) “What does not work well?” and 3)

“What suggestions or recommendations do you have?” By giving the

students an opportunity to provide some feedback, teachers are

demonstrating that they truly care about the students’ learning as well as

gain a better idea of what improvements can be made. During our study

in UCI, the teachers often gathered our feedback by requiring us to

answer their questions which are about what we really wanted to learn

from them as their assignment. After they checked our homework, they

would change their lesson plans, trying to satisfy our requirements. In this

way, we appreciated what the teachers did for us and we tried to work

hard to reciprocate our teachers’ kindness.

•Enhance feedback.

Students may take little notice of the helpful comments made by

teachers on their assignments or by email feedback. Assignments can

often be found in trash bins soon after the student has recorded the grade

they were assigned. This behavior is common where the assignment has

no formative purpose and the event is “over” when it is graded. From a

student viewpoint there may be nothing more that can be gained from the

task once it is graded. An obvious strategy is to allow students to improve

their grade in some way by encouraging resubmission as in mastery and

competency testing. These allow students to use assessment as a chance

to improve.

Whitman (1987) emphasized that having a personal sense of control

is an important factor in reducing student stress.When students do not

know what to expect in their courses they feel out of control. Having a

visible set of assessment criteria is an important strategy to use to

enhance the students’ feelings of control. Students deserve to know

“where the marks lie” so that they can focus on the main point of any

assessment and not get lost in irrelevant detail. There are numerous

rubrics available for those who want to redesign their criteria and enhance

learning rather than grade-chasing. So during the observation, I found that

one of the primary trends is the recurrence of smiling faces, and the

teachers like using some supportive feedback with phrases such as “good

job”, “nicely written”, “very interesting”, etc.

2.4-Effects of Positive Classroom Rapport

Ramsden (2003) noted that, “The emotional aspect of the teacher-

student relationship is much more important than the traditional advice on

methods and techniques of lecturing would suggest” (p. 74). Students

were more likely to understand the content of a lecture if the lecturer

interacted with them in a way that encouraged involvement, commitment,

and interest. “Various studies of student ratings of teaching in higher

education also identify a recurring factor variously labeled ‘student

centeredness,’ ‘respect for students,’ and ‘lecturer student rapport’ among

other aspects...” . So not only can developing a personal bond with

students benefit the teacher, but students feel a desire to work with that

specific teacher, they want to learn with that teacher. Just getting students

to want to be in your classroom can feel like an accomplished mission.

From research on student opinion and motivation in mathematics as they

graduated from elementary to middle school. Midgley, Feldlaufer, and

Eccles(1989) found that students’ intrinsic value and perceived usefulness

of math is related to perceived amount of support they get from teachers

before and after the transition from elementary school to junior high

school. In the context of early elementary students, a study by Liew,

Chen, and Hughes(2010) suggested that positive and supportive teachers

play a compensatory role for students with self-regulatory difficulties

through their creation of a learning environment that promotes academic

achievement, and is positive and low-conflict. This may mean that

positive rapport with students can compensate for their inability to

maintain task-accuracy and self-control in the classroom. Another study

also shows that “All students made better grades when they had more

positive views of teachers, but this was more true of Hispanic American

girls than it was for most boys and for whites”(Crosnoe, Johnson, and

Elder, 2004,p.68). Similarly, Ryan and Patrick (2001) noticed that

“students’ perceptions of teacher support, and the teacher as promoting

interaction and mutual respect were related to positive changes in their

motivation and engagement”(Ryan and Patrick, 2001,p.437). Thus the

effects of building positive rapport with students can give many

advantages to the teacher when dealing with student behavior ,

motivation, academic efficacy and multiple other variables.

Through the observation, I also found that firstly when students feel

rapport with their teachers and feel that their teacher’s personalities are

something like their own, they feel they are respected by the teacher and

their motivation becomes higher. Secondly, when there is rapport,

students tend to answer more freely and with a greater degree of

frankness. Thirdly, rapport leads to satisfaction.When students have

rapport with the teacher, their satisfaction with the course increases.

Lastly, as rapport grows, so does understanding and comprehension.

Teachers and students understand each other better when there is rapport

between them.

All in all, rapport does not result in learning, but it certainly helps to

create conditions conducive to learning—things like higher motivation,

increased comfort, and enhanced communication. And rapport is one of

those factors that can contribute positively to learning. Building rapport

effectively can allow for a teacher to turn everyday classroom into an

organized, fun, and safe environment. Because of the positive effects of

student-teacher rapport in the classroom, it would be better for teachers to

pursue building positive relationships.

Conclusion

Rapport building between teacher and learner is not in the top category

for factors loading onto a statistical explanation of effective teaching

(from student evaluation data) but in a wider range of research literature it

is an important and acknowledged attribute for enhancing learning and it

makes intuitive good sense. Dr. Murray Banks, popular psychologist in

the 1960s, in an album titled What to do until the psychiatrist comes, said

that happiness was like a butterfly. Chase it and it will elude you; stand

quietly and it may settle on your shoulder. The same could be said for

seeking student approval.

To sum up, establishing rapport between teachers and students in class

is one of the most important stages in teaching methodology. Depending

on students’ status and interests, teachers can have different ways to build

up the good relationship between them and their students. However,

friendliness, sympathy, good working-behaviors, modesty and honesty

are regarded as the basic characteristics that help people to have good

relationship. Only in this way, can the teacher get the students to

experience ownership of their learning and gain pride in achievements,

and make students aware of things they do well – especially things they

couldn’t do before.

In this paper, I have just demonstrated what I observed in the US

schools. I hope that some of the strategies the teachers in US used to

establish the positive relationship will lead to more valid assessments and

ultimately more appropriate to our teachers in China.

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