Parent-teacher trust as a relational pathway to the child: Teachers’ perceptions about child-teacher-parent relationship-building during the child’s transition to preschool

Beyond interactions with parents, young children's development is influenced by attachment-related interactions with close caregivers in different contexts, such as with teachers at professional childcare centres (“preschool”). The child's transition from the home environment to being cared for at preschool for the very first time is essential in this respect, providing a natural “window of opportunity” to establish close relationships with teachers. Yet, no evidence-based guidelines are available on how to organize this transition process to support establishment of such relationships. Consistent with a systemic perspective, the teacher's and parent's way of understanding each other during this process, the so-called “preschool introduction”, is crucial in this respect, as it may affect the teacher's perceived ability to relate to the child when establishing the relationship. Using a longitudinal quantitative design, our study indeed reveals that a teacher who perceives their relationship with the parent, built during the introduction process, as trusting contributes to warmth and closeness in the child-teacher relationship later on. Teacher ability to attend sensitively to the parent but also preschool-related structural characteristics were important to this end. Consequently, our results underscore the significance for preschool practitioners to view child-teacher-parent interaction as interrelated during the child's preschool introduction. Organizing the introduction process in a way that enables teachers to build trust with parents while also attending sensitively to the child is therefore important. Policy makers should focus on fostering teachers’ capacities to relate supportively to both children and parents by providing preschools with adequate structural characteristics and training.