According to recent research, young children who are taught by a teacher of the same ethnicity have higher learning and problem-solving skills by the age of seven. The effect was most pronounced among black and Latinx children, the findings — looking at more than 18,000 students across the US — showed. Published in the peer-reviewed journal Early Education and Development, the study showed that children are more likely to develop better working memory if their ethnicity is shared with their teachers.
It is the ability to hold and process information in your mind – a skill that is essential for learning and problem solving. “Diversifying the teacher workforce is an important step toward promoting greater equity in schools across the United States,” says lead author Professor Michael Gottfried, from the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education.
“Our results add to strong evidence that ethnic-racial representation among American teachers underscores an important way in which students’ developmental skills develop in schools. This is an important step in how students’ working memory, which is a key component of executive function. Function is consistently associated with improvements in student achievement and is most malleable in childhood.”
It has been known for some time that being taught by a teacher from a similar ethnic-racial background can improve student academic achievement, such as math and reading test scores. However, this study is the first to explore the effect of teacher/student ethnic-racial matching in children under the age of nine and to look at how it affects not only academic achievement but also development. The research analyzed data from 18,170 children who were part of the 2011 US Department of Education-led Longitudinal Study of Early Childhood – the kindergarten class.
This study follows a representative sample of children from the US population who were in kindergarten (preschool children aged 3 to 6) in 2011. The study analyzed information on these children from when they were in kindergarten through the end of first grade (ages 6 to 6). 7). Specifically, the research looked at the effect of matching the race/ethnicity of Asian, black, Latino, and white teachers and students on two measures of brain power known as `executive function`, which gives children a Helps engage in behavior that works for the goal.
One measure was working memory; The ability to hold and process information in our brains. The second was so-called cognitive flexibility; The ability to shift our focus and attitudes. To measure cognitive flexibility, the researchers tested the children’s ability to switch between thinking about different concepts. This was done through a task in which they had to sort the cards according to size, color and border. Working memory was assessed by the researchers by asking children to repeat a set series of numbers, with an additional digit added to the series when the child correctly remembered the previous series.
The study also looked at the effect of student-teacher race/ethnicity matching on children’s reading and math achievement scores. All groups were compared to a control group taught by a teacher from a different ethnic-racial background. The findings suggested that when students had an ethnic-racial match with their teacher, their reading and math achievement scores were higher. The effect size was largest among black students and Latinx students. In addition, working memory of Black and Latinx children matched with a teacher of the same race/ethnicity also improved. However, race-ethnicity did not affect cognitive flexibility.
These findings held true regardless of differences in teaching standards, whether children were taught by a matching ethnic teacher for one or two years, and whether the child attended public or private school. The authors say that, while the size of the effect is relatively small, when scaled up by population level and several years of schooling, the effect could make a big difference. There is growing interest in executive functioning skills because they can predict both strong human development and academic success.
Previous research has also shown that there are huge differences in executive functioning based on race/ethnicity and wealth level. One study showed that, on average, black and Latinx children start kindergarten behind their white peers in terms of working memory and cognitive flexibility. It may be that Latinx and Black teachers are better able to support their students’ development, the study authors suggest. If so, promoting ethno-racial teacher/student fairs may help address the observed disparities in executive functions in young children.
“Researchers have found that teachers of color are more likely to provide culturally relevant pedagogy, and when they do so, they are better able to connect with students whose culture and experiences are often at odds with standard school are not reflected in the curriculum and approach,” says Dr. Gottfried. Other factors at play could be the students responding to being a role model in front of the class of their race/ethnicity or even the unconscious bias of the teachers.
“What a teacher perceives about certain groups of students can change, for example, how they instruct, interact with parents, and grade papers. This perspective may change with a non-matching teacher.” may play into play by not accurately identifying a student’s skill or developmental level. Of color and thus scaffolding does not provide the appropriate level of instruction, which has been linked to improvements in executive functions in addition to academic achievement,” Dr. . Gottfried says. The authors say that future research should seek to explore the reasons why ethnic-racial matching of students and teachers has this positive effect on achievement and development.