Early Childhood Parent-Teacher Relationships During COVID-19 and Parent Ratings on Children’s Learning

Considering the program changes that took place during this challenging time in early childhood programs, not much has been researched on how children’s development was impacted. The study used a quantitative design and surveyed 83 parents of young children in early childhood programs in the spring of 2021. The study investigated the ratings of parents on their children’s social emotional development, reading, math and creativity during the pandemic and correlated them with parent teacher relationships subscales. It examined how the current parent teacher relationship model in early childhood programs faired in supporting children’s learning. Over 50% of the parents in the study indicated their children not doing well in all of the four developmental areas. Non-significant correlations were found for math and parent teacher relationships subscales among others. Implications for developing parent teacher relationships geared towards children’s learning and development are discussed.