Teaching and Teacher Education 27 (2011) 1039e1048

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Teaching and Teacher Education

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Emotional experience, expression, and regulation of high-quality

Japanese elementary school teachers
Rika Hosotani*, Kyoko Imai-Matsumura
The Joint Graduate School in Science of School Education, Hyogo University of Teacher Education, 942-1 Shimokume, Kato, Hyogo 673-1494, Japan

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The present study investigates the emotional experience, expression, and regulation processes of high-
Received 11 June 2010 quality Japanese elementary school teachers while they interact with children, in terms of teachers’
Received in revised form emotional competence. Qualitative analysis of interview data demonstrated that teachers had various
24 March 2011
emotional experiences including self-elicited negative emotions. The major expression patterns were
Accepted 25 March 2011
identified as direct staging and the suppression of emotions. Teachers considered emotion expression in
front of children as a skill, and their emotion regulation processes involved considering various purposes,
Keywords:
appropriately using emotion expression, and ideal teacher images. The findings suggest that high-quality
Emotion regulation
Emotion expression
teachers effectively use emotional competence in teaching.
Emotional competence Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Elementary school teacher
Emotional labor

1. Introduction will be enormously beneficial both for children’s development and

1.1. Teacher’s emotional interaction
It is not enough for school teachers to have only academic
knowledge and good instruction skills. Research has indicated that
teachers’ emotional interaction with children is also an important
issue, since good emotional support from teachers affects the
teacherechild relationship and plays a significant role in children’s
favorable adjustment to school (Hamre & Pianta, 2001, 2005;
Hamre, Pianta, Downer, & Mashburn, 2008; Mashburn et al.,
2008; Turner et al., 1998; Turner, Meyer, Midgley, & Patrick, 2003;
Turner, Meyer, & Schweinle, 2003). Moreover, teachers’ quality
emotional support plays a critical role for at-risk children who
display early social and/or academic problems in their school
adjustment. For example, Hamre and Pianta (2005) found that at-
risk children placed in first-grade classrooms benefited from strong
emotional support in terms of achievement and teacherestudent
relationships. Thus, the quality of teachers’ emotional approach to
children greatly influences children’s education. Therefore, an
understanding of how high-quality teachers interact with children
* Corresponding author. Tel./fax: þ81 795 44 2192.
E-mail addresses: d08703h@hyogo-u.ac.jp (R. Hosotani), matumura@hyogo-u.ac.jp
(K. Imai-Matsumura).
for teachers’ professional development.
1.2. Teacher’s emotional experience and emotion expression
Research on teachers’ emotions in teaching has attracted
considerable attention recently (Hargreaves, 1998, 2000, 2001;
Isenbarger & Zembylas, 2006; Lasky, 2000; Nias, 1996; Schutz,
Cross, Hong, & Osbon, 2007; Sutton, 2004; Sutton, Mudrey-
Camino, & Knight, 2009; Sutton & Wheatley, 2003; Zembylas,
2005a, 2005b). Indeed, teachers have various emotional experi-
ences including positive and negative ones at school, as do children
(Hargreaves, 2001; Sutton & Wheatley, 2003). Then, how do good
teachers emotionally interact with children? Good teaching is
supposed to be charged with positive emotions (Hargreaves, 1998).
However, teachers, as human beings, inevitably feel anger or frus-
tration while interacting with children. How will the teacher’s
emotional experience be dealt with while interacting with chil-
dren? Emotions have motivational and regulatory functions and
continually influence cognition and action (Izard, 1991; Izard, Stark,
Trentacosta, & Schultz, 2008). Are teachers’ own emotions an
impediment to teaching? Or do they use their emotions to advan-
tage while teaching? Some teachers may be able to deal effectively
with emotional arousal while others may not.
Teaching is considered to entail a great deal of emotional labor
(Hargreaves, 1998, 2000; Isenbarger & Zembylas, 2006; Schutz
et al., 2007). Emotional labor was defined in occupational

0742-051X/$ e see front matter Ó 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.tate.2011.03.010
1040 R. Hosotani, K. Imai-Matsumura / Teaching and Teacher Education 27 (2011) 1039e1048
psychology as “the effort, planning, and control needed to express
organizationally desired emotion during interpersonal trans-
actions” (Morris & Feldman, 1996, p. 987). Teachers may make
a great effort to express desired emotions as teachers. Are teachers’
emotion expressions associated with teaching? Teaching that is
favorable for child development seems to take place in a classroom
whose climate is full of emotional warmth and child-centered
(Hamre & Pianta, 2005; Hamre et al., 2008) but do teachers in such
classrooms prevent their negative emotions such as anger or
sadness from being expressed in their teaching? When a teacher
tries to construct a caring community in a classroom as an approach
to classroom management (Danforth & Boyle, 2006), does the
teacher empower children with an emotionally neutral expression
or with a certain emotional expression?
It is expected that the teacher’s way of expressing emotions may
influence his or her manner of instruction in the class, classroom
management, and handling of children’s misbehavior. Teacher’s
ability at emotion regulation and expression while interacting with
children may have significance for teaching outcomes. In addition,
because it is internationally acknowledged that teachers’ failure to
manage children’s misbehavior can result in those teachers’ stress,
and in extreme cases, burnout (Chan, 2006; Lewis, Romi, Qui, &
Katz, 2005), it is of great significance to investigate teachers’
emotion expression while interacting with children.
1.3. Emotional competence
We try to formulate teachers’ emotional experience and
expression relating to teaching in terms of teachers’ emotional
competence. Mayer and Salovey defined emotional intelligence as
the ability to perceive and express emotions, to understand and use
them, and to manage emotions, with an assumption that a person’s
level of ability contributes substantially to the individual’s intel-
lectual and emotional well-being and growth, and social relations
(Mayer & Salovey, 1997; Salovey, Detweiler-Bedell, Detweiler-
Bedell, & Mayer, 2008). Managing emotions means to monitor
and manage emotions in oneself and others to promote emotional
and intellectual growth and well-being; it thus includes working
on and regulating others’ emotions (Salovey et al., 2008). Saarni
also conceptualized eight skills of emotional competence including
the ability to differentiate inner emotional state and outer
expression and to understand that one’s emotional-expressive
behavior may have an impact on others (Saarni, 1999). The ability to
manage others’ emotions plays a significant role in impression
management and persuasion, and those who can effectively regu-
late others’ emotions are better able to act prosocially and to build
and maintain solid social networks (Salovey et al., 2008). Thus, in
human contacts, the way a person regulates and expresses
emotions, which we focus on in this study, reflects one aspect of
emotional competence (Goleman, 1998; Mayer, Roberts, & Barsade,
2007).
In teaching, emotions are things that teachers may use every
day. Teachers’ emotional intelligence has been statistically
surveyed in relation to burnout in countries such as Hong Kong
(Chan, 2006) and the UK (Brackett, Palomera, Mojsa-Kaja, Reyes, &
Salovey, 2010). However, to the best of our knowledge, no study has
investigated teachers’ emotions and their utilization in terms of
exerting emotional competence.
What emotional competence do high-quality teachers exert?
What are the emotional experiences of those teachers when
interacting with children in the first place? As a significant first step
toward exploring teachers’ emotional competence in relation to
their contact with children, we investigated the emotional experi-
ences, expression and inner regulation processes, which bring
about expression, of high-quality Japanese teachers in their
interaction with children. (In this paper, we defined high-quality
teachers as teachers who have a certain level of teaching ability
including the ability of classroom management and academic
instruction sufficient for supervising student teachers’ internships
and conducting lessons that serve as models for other teachers.)
1.4. Current study
The first research question explored in this study is what high-
quality Japanese elementary school teachers feel during interaction
with children. Internal emotional experiences provide individuals
with important information about their environment and situation,
serving as a significant source of judgments and actions (Schwartz
& Clore, 2003). Moreover, one can utilize emotions to facilitate
thinking and live adaptively (Izard et al., 2008; Salovey et al., 2008).
By investigating directly the emotional experience of high-quality
teachers while interacting with children, we will be able to reveal
their genuine emotional experiences which cannot be observed
from outside. Then, how their emotional experience is utilized in
their teaching, or how they exert emotional competence can be
considered.
The second research question of this study is what are high-
quality Japanese teachers’ emotion expressions like in front of
children. Emotion expression toward others reflects the individ-
ual’s emotional competence (Saarni, 1999; Salovey et al., 2008).
Teachers’ emotion expression in front of children may be different
from the emotion that is actually experienced by the teacher
because of emotion regulation processes. Moreover, high-quality
teachers may have developed strategies of emotion regulation for
teaching. Therefore, the present study investigates emotion
expression patterns of high-quality teachers and their inner
emotion regulation processes, by which expressional patterns
should be produced, and then discusses the association between
high-quality teachers’ emotional competence and teaching.
In one related study with American middle school teachers,
Sutton (2004) focused on the investigation of teachers’ emotion
regulation goals and strategies, mainly in terms of coping. We
considered emotion regulation from a rather broad emotional
competence perspective, which includes managing one’s and
others’ emotions, and focused on high-quality teachers’ emotion
regulation while interacting with children. This study should
contribute to understanding how high-quality teachers invest their
emotional competence in their classroom teaching.
In sum, the present study considers teachers’ emotional expe-
rience and emotional interaction in terms of their emotional
competence and investigates how high-quality teachers exert
emotional competence while interacting with children. First, the
present study aims at identifying the variations of emotional
experience that high-quality Japanese elementary school teachers
have during interaction with children. Second, it investigates the
variations of emotion expression patterns that high-quality
teachers use in front of children. Finally, it examines their inner
emotion regulation processes, by which emotion expression
patterns should be generated, and discusses the association with
education.
Teachers’ emotional experience may vary according to their
cultural setting. For example, Markus and Kitayama (1991)
demonstrated that many Asian cultures, including Japanese, have
distinct conceptions of individuality that emphasize harmonious
interdependence with others. By contrast, within American culture
individuals are more likely to seek to maintain their independence
from others by attending to the self and by discovering and
expressing their unique inner attributes (Markus & Kitayama, 1991).
It has been suggested that those differences in self-construal can
influence the nature of individual experiences, including emotional
 R. Hosotani, K. Imai-Matsumura / Teaching and Teacher Education 27 (2011) 1039e1048
ones (Markus & Kitayama, 1991). Emotional display rules are also
influenced by cultures (Saarni, 1999). However, does interest in
teachers’ emotional experience and expression related to teaching
while interacting with children differ according to their cultural
setting? Issues regarding teachers’ manner of interacting with
children, including strategies for teaching and handling of children’s
misbehavior, are of common interest worldwide. For example,
studies have examined teachers’ behavior for building positive
teacherestudent relationships in the United States (Newberry,
2010; Newberry & Davis, 2008), teachers’ misbehavior in Romania
(Sava, 2002) and Australia (Riley, Lewis, & Brew, 2010), classroom
management strategies of teachers who were successful in creating
a positive working atmosphere in the Netherlands (Tartwijk, Brok,
Veldman, & Wubbels, 2009), the relation between teachers’ class-
room management strategies and emotional consequences in Hong
Kong (Leung & Lam, 2003), and teachers’ discipline styles and
children’s misbehavior in Australia, China, and Israel through
a survey (Lewis et al., 2005). In addition, teachers’ approach toward
children’s behavior is an important issue for pre-service teachers
(Stoughton, 2007). Therefore, we believe that the implications
regarding teachers’ emotional competence and teaching strategies
presented by this study will attract the interest of educators
worldwide. Additionally, the present study, which was conducted in
a non-Western society, has taken a significant step toward
expanding international research on teachers’ emotions.
2. Method
Data collection and analysis are as described below. Since there
is currently little information about elementary school teachers’
emotion regulation processes in the literature, qualitative analysis
using an interview procedure was employed to examine it.
2.1. Data collection
The present study repeated data collection and analysis in two
phases (phase 1 and phase 2). In qualitative analysis, it is essential
for the quality of the study to develop categories in sufficient depth
(Corbin & Strauss, 2008; Strauss & Corbin, 1998). To construct
classification schemes for qualitative analysis, a grounded theory
approach was used (Corbin & Strauss, 2008). The grounded theory
approach suggests conducting data collection and analysis in
a repetitive manner to develop concepts and identify relationships
between concepts until concepts are saturated (Corbin & Strauss,
2008). To ensure sufficient development of concepts and qualita-
tive analysis, we first collected phase 1 data and analyzed them to
produce categories, and then added phase 2 data and further
analyzed them. As described later, because no new categories were
identified even after adding phase 2 data, a certain level of satu-
rability was confirmed in our final category sets.
Interviews allow participants to speak from their own
perspective, and the reflective component of emotional experience
is the most accessible aspect of emotion and can be most readily
related to the organization and guidance of cognition and action
(Izard, 1991). Because the aims of this study are to identify the
emotional experience and expression that mark high-quality
teachers and to investigate the inner processes that lead to
expression, obtaining participants’ subjective information about
their emotions seemed to be appropriate for investigating relations
among their emotions, perception, and behavior.
2.1.1. Participants
In the present study, high-quality teachers are defined as
teachers who have a certain level of teaching ability including the
ability of classroom management and academic instruction
1041
sufficient for supervising student teachers’ internships and con-
ducting lessons that serve as models for other teachers in open
classes. The teachers who participated in this study supervised the
training of interns for one month more than twice a year at an
elementary school affiliated with a university of teacher education
in Japan. The teachers supervised the interns’ preparation of lesson
plans, observed their lessons and gave practical advice for
improving their teaching skills, and evaluated their performance
and reported it to the university. In addition, the teachers had
experience in conducting open classes at a conference attended by
approximately 1000 elementary school teachers from all over
Japan. Most of the participants originally belonged to prefectures in
the west of Japan, but were selected by the local education boards
because they were considered high-quality teachers, and therefore,
were transferred for some years to the current elementary school.
Thus, because their background teaching experience took place in
different prefectures including cities and rural areas and was not
the same, participants in this study can be considered as high-
quality teachers drawn from various districts in Japan.
The first author, the interviewer, had no vested interest in
the participants. The interviewer explained the study, asked for the
participation of the teachers, and obtained the consent from the
participants before the interview. In 2008, 17 teachers (T1eT17)
were individually interviewed by the first author (phase 1). In the
following year, we added data collection (T18eT24, phase 2) to
enrich data and further develop categories. In total, the first author
interviewed 24 teachers (8 females). The average age of the
teachers was 33.8 years old (range: 24e41), and the average years
of teaching experience were 10.2 years (range: 2e18). Except for
one music teacher who taught upper grade music, all participants
were class teachers (the number of students was approximately 35)
and taught most subjects themselves. At least three teachers from
each grade from the first grade (age 6) to the sixth grade (age 12)
participated in the interview.
2.1.2. Semi-structured interview
Semi-structured interviews were conducted with teachers
based on a protocol developed by Sutton (2004). Before the inter-
view, the participants were assured that their cooperation was
voluntary, personal information would be protected, and the
collected data would be used only for research; their willingness to
continue was confirmed. The core questions of the interviews,
which were asked of all participants, are shown in Table 1. Teachers
mainly talked about interactions that occurred in the previous
month or two with their current students.
Interviews were individually conducted in a quiet and empty
room in the elementary school. All the interviews were recorded
with a voice recorder with participants’ consent. Interviews lasted
an average of 24 min (range: 15e58 min). All interviews were
transcribed, and qualitative analysis of the transcription was con-
ducted in the manner described in the following section, using
MAXQDA, which is software designed to assist in data coding.
Table 1
Core questions of the semi-structured interview.
1. “When you think about teachers’ emotions and classroom teaching, what
comes to mind?”
2. “Could you look at the list and describe the emotions you feel during your
interactions with class students?”
dThe list included anger, fear, sadness, joy, disgust, surprise, and
love/affection.
3. “On what occasions did you feel [emotions stated]?”
4. “How did you deal with [emotions stated]?”
5. “Do you regulate, control, express, or fake other emotions while interacting
with children?”
1042 R. Hosotani, K. Imai-Matsumura / Teaching and Teacher Education 27 (2011) 1039e1048

2.2. Procedure of qualitative analysis Table 2

Percentage of teachers who reported each emotional experience.

The following paragraphs describe the steps in the analysis of Emotional experience N (%)
the transcribed data. The analysis using the grounded theory Anger
approach involves cycles of close examination of the interview data Children-elicited anger 18 (75)
followed by formulation of concepts and classification schemes, Self-elicited anger 2 (8)
based on theoretical comparison (Corbin & Strauss, 2008; Larson & Sadness
Brown, 2007; Strauss & Corbin, 1998). Children-elicited sadness 6 (25)
The first step of the analysis involves investigation of the data Empathetic sadness 2 (8)
Self-elicited sadness 7 (29)
for the purpose of preliminary coding. Transcribed data were cut
into small sections according to content. All those sections were Fear
Children-elicited fear 3 (13)
coded individually and put into preliminary categories that repre-
Heavy responsibilities 2 (8)
sent shared properties. Most categories of emotional experience
and expression patterns were generated at this point. We decided Disgust
Children-elicited disgust 3 (13)
to focus on the basic emotions (anger, sadness, fear, disgust, and
Self-disgust 3 (13)
joy) posited by Izard (2007). We also identified three themes to
explore as discrete emotional experiences, discrete emotion Joy
Children-elicited joy 18 (75)
expression patterns, and emotion regulation processes regarding Pleasant daily interactions 6 (25)
direct staging and suppression. Sections in which teachers talked Empathetic joy 5 (21)
about the process for expressing emotions and points for consid- Successful teaching 5 (21)
eration that preceded emotion expression were analyzed as parts of Love/affection 24 (100)
emotion regulation processes. After coding all sections of the Surprise 23 (96)
interview data and making preliminary categories, we then
reviewed and refined categories through theoretical comparison to
see similarities and differences (Corbin & Strauss, 2008). As for number and percentages of teachers who reported each emotional
categorization, we adopted a category only when there were experience.
examples of such from at least two participants.
The final step involved theoretical analysis of the relationships 3.1.1. Anger
and linkages within and across categories (Corbin & Strauss, 2008; Qualitative analysis identified anger experiences as follows:
Larson & Brown, 2007). After we obtained category sets from phase children-elicited anger and self-elicited anger. Children-elicited
1 data, we analyzed phase 2 data and confirmed that no new anger, reported by 18 teachers (75%), was identified as anger felt
categories were identified. Therefore, we considered that the because of children’s not caring for peers, not following instruc-
categories were saturated (Corbin & Strauss, 2008). One of the tions, or not doing their best, or because of children’s dangerous
methods to validate the theoretical scheme is to tell the analytic actions. Simultaneously, self-elicited anger was identified by two
findings to respondents and other samples and request that they teachers (8%). Self-elicited anger was felt because they thought it
comment on how well it seems to fit their cases (Corbin & Strauss, was their own fault, consequently, that the children were insuffi-
2008). According to Corbin and Strauss, credibility and applicability ciently motivated to do their best.
are important for quality findings in qualitative research. To achieve
credibility, we repeated data collection and analysis using methods 3.1.2. Sadness
of theoretical comparison, enriched data, and then confirmed the Qualitative analysis identified sadness experiences as follows:
saturation of the obtained categories. Applicability indicates that children-elicited sadness, empathetic sadness, and self-elicited
the findings fit the area from which they were derived, are readily sadness. Children-elicited sadness was felt when children displayed
understandable, and will be used (Corbin & Strauss, 2008). We unfavorable behaviors or attitudes such as failing to maintain the
explained our analytic results to three experienced elementary discipline that they had been able to before. Some teachers repor-
school teachers, who had more than 15 years’ teaching experience ted that they felt children-elicited sadness after they felt anger.
and have experience in training interns. One of them was an Empathetic sadness was experienced as empathy for children’s
informant in the interviews. They understood our findings well and own sadness. Self-elicited sadness, similar to self-elicited anger,
the findings rang true to their experience, supporting the was felt because some teachers sensed that they had not fully
substantial applicability of our study. educated children. One teacher explained self-elicited sadness as
follows:
3. Results and discussion
It’s not about kids being bad. It comes back to me in the end.
When I noticed kids were not able to do this and that yet, I felt
In this section, we describe our findings and discuss the varia-
sorry. I could have guided them differently. Simply, I felt sorry
tion of teachers’ emotional experience, expression patterns, and
and I felt sad about that (T2, l.14).
regulation processes. The citations of teachers’ quotes have been
placed in parentheses (teacher’s code, the number of the line where
the quote starts in the transcript). 3.1.3. Fear
Fear experience was infrequent. Qualitative analysis classified
3.1. Variation of teachers’ emotional experience fear experiences as follows: children-elicited fear and heavy
responsibilities. Children-elicited fear was experienced when
To investigate teachers’ emotional competence, it is first neces- teachers noticed children’s misbehavior or physically dangerous
sary to identify teachers’ emotional experience. Teachers’ responses acts. One teacher said that when he found a child engaging in
about their emotional experience during interaction with children mischief, he felt fear and anxiety about the child’s future (T10, l.13).
were prompted by a list of emotion words. Table 2 shows categories Another teacher said that when children acted dangerously, she felt
of emotional experience derived from qualitative analysis and the anger as well as fear because of imagining the risk (T7, l.24). Some
 R. Hosotani, K. Imai-Matsumura / Teaching and Teacher Education 27 (2011) 1039e1048
teachers reported fear due to acknowledging a teacher’s heavy
responsibilities such as the teacher’s strong influence on children.
3.1.4. Disgust
Disgust experience was also relatively infrequent. Qualitative
analysis identified disgust experiences as follows: children-elicited
disgust and self-disgust. Children-elicited disgust was disgust felt
because of children’s unfavorable behaviors or attitudes including
bad manners or a too cynical attitude in some early adolescent girls.
Some teachers reported that children-elicited disgust led to anger or
sadness. In contrast, self-disgust, similar to self-elicited anger and
self-elicited sadness, was identified as disgust which was felt when
some teachers reflectively thought that their communication with
children might have been inadequate. One teacher stated as follows:
I sometimes felt self-disgust. I asked myself “Did I stunt the
children’s growth with my words?” or I thought “I should have
listened to the kids more.” (T8, l.26.)
3.1.5. Joy
Qualitative analysis identified joy experiences as follows: chil-
dren-elicited joy, pleasant daily interactions, empathetic joy, and
successful teaching. Children-elicited joy, reported by 18 teachers
(75%), was identified as joy felt because of children’s achievement or
autonomy. One teacher described children-elicited joy as follows:
I felt joy when kids went beyond my expectations. I felt joy
when kids were thinking and doing on their own. It was
a moment when they didn’t need my guidance. It is not often
you get to see such a moment, but when I see it, I would sense
their development and feel joy (T22, l.9).
Some teachers reported that they felt joy because of pleasant
daily interactions with children. Empathetic joy was felt when
teachers felt happy because of the children’s own joy or their
amusing playing. Some teachers reported that they felt joy because
of having taught successfully such as when they gave a good class.
However, the joy may not necessarily be self-approbation because
of one’s own success, as one teacher indicated in the following:
I felt joy when I taught well in a class. It happened when what
the children wanted to learn and what I wanted to teach
matched very well. It brought me a feeling of unity, and I felt joy
because of it (T20, l.25).
3.2. Emotion expression patterns in front of children
As mentioned above, teachers’ various emotional experiences
were identified. In the following sections, we will first overview
variations of expression patterns for each emotion.
3.2.1. Variation of anger expression
Through the analysis, four ways in which teachers expressed (or
did not express) anger were identified: direct staging, suppression,
losing temper, and extinguishing anger. Thirteen teachers (54%) were
clearly aware of their direct staging of anger. Direct staging of anger
was identified as a purposeful display to children of a strong
emotion of anger, whether the teacher’s real emotion was anger or
not. Teachers reported that they consciously control the intensity
of the expressed anger. One teacher explained the direct staging of
anger due to children’s dangerous acts or due to their speaking ill of
others as follows:
It was when I was not actually angry that I displayed anger to
kids. When I hit my desk, made a loud noise and scolded them
severely, my real emotion was likely not genuine anger (T1, l.33).
1043
Moreover, when teachers display strong anger, they are likely
aware of the objective of calm guidance. The following is a comment
reported by another teacher about how she guided children after
showing strong anger because of children’s not caring for others:
I show anger by raising my voice. If I have to show anger to one
child, we would first move aside. When I show anger to kids, I do
so very emphatically. But I never lose my temper. I first give
them it “like thunder,” then I loosen things up. I would ask them
“Do you know why you are being scolded?” or “Why did you do
this?” I do not stay angry for long (T17, l.51).
Suppression of anger was the second major response reported
by 10 teachers (42%). Teachers reported that they consciously
suppressed their anger through regulation processes because they
were reluctant to express their real anger without controlling it.
Some teachers said that they would first suppress their anger
because they thought they should first listen to children (e.g., T6,
l.15). One teacher said as follows:
If you just say “Do it!” to kids, it won’t help. When they don’t do
something, maybe there are reasons. So, I usually suppress my
anger first (T7, l.46).
However, four teachers (17%) reported that they sometimes lost
their temper and expressed their genuine anger toward children.
Extinguishing anger, reported by two teachers (8%), was iden-
tified as a way to extinguish anger through immediate reflection on
an event which might otherwise arouse anger in teachers. Teachers
reported that anger was extinguished right after they changed their
anger attribution and recognized the anger as their problem and
not the children’s problem. Teachers realized that it was not worth
real anger because children were immature. One teacher explained
this as follows:
When I felt anger, it was often anger over not being able to control
things as I wanted. In reality, I might be pressed because of work
and did not focus on what I was facing then.I might have got
angry at the moment, but immediately after that, I was able to
analyze it, get rid of my anger, and be myself again (T16, l.35).
3.2.2. Variation of sadness expression
Qualitative analysis identified three ways to express (or not to
express) teachers’ sadness: direct staging, showing empathetic
sadness, and suppression.
Five teachers (21%) reported direct staging of sadness, that is, to act
or show deep sadness to children whether their real emotion was sad
or not. One teacher said that he sometimes drew a crying face on the
blackboard and said to children, “This picture is me, crying. I’m sad,”
so that he could convey sadness to younger children when the whole
class was being too noisy (T13, l.72). Direct staging of sadness seemed
to be performed more by teachers of lower grades. Another teacher
explained an example of the direct staging of sadness as follows:
When children failed to do something, to follow a class rule for
example, although they were able to do so the day before, I said
to the class “I’m sad.” I didn’t feel sad actually, but I said so to the
kids instead of saying “No!” to them (T17, l.156).
Suppression of sadness, reported by four teachers (17%), was
also identified. Especially, teachers who reported self-elicited
sadness said that they did not show their sadness to children and
that they got past the feeling quickly, saw the situation as a possible
source of improvement, and contemplated their next move.
Some teachers talked about efforts that they made to show
empathetic sadness when a child was feeling sad over a personal
matter.
1044 R. Hosotani, K. Imai-Matsumura / Teaching and Teacher Education 27 (2011) 1039e1048
3.2.3. Suppression of fear and disgust
Suppression was the only category that was clearly identified for
fear and disgust expression. There were no teachers who said that
they consciously expressed fear or disgust in front of children.
Teachers who mentioned fear or disgust reported that they first
tried to suppress and hide the emotions from children. They tried
not to show their fear or disgust, probably because they did not
want to send the signal that their security was being violated or
signal rejection (Izard, 1991). One teacher said, “Even if I feel disgust
over kids’ behavior, I don’t want them to notice it, because I value
being around them as a teacher (T10, l.67).” Some teachers who
reported self-disgust talked about efforts to motivate themselves to
deal with the situation. For example, one teacher said that although
he sometimes felt down after kids left school, he made it a rule to
get over it by the next morning (T21, l.82).
3.2.4. Variation of joy expression
Through qualitative analysis, four ways in which teachers
expressed (or did not express) joy were identified: direct staging,
suppression, natural expression, and intentional spreading. Eleven
teachers (46%) clearly reported that they showed their joy by
consciously exaggerating or dramatizing words or by making joyful
facial expressions regardless of their real emotions. One teacher
said as follows:
Well, as I grew older, I realized that I am acting. There is a big
difference between me as a teacher in the classroom and my
natural self. When I express my joy to a kid, saying, “Wow, you
did it! Wonderful!” I might be thinking that “Oh, it’s been
a while since he came to talk to me. I guess he has some good
news to share with me,” and then I act in a way that shows that I
am happy to talk with him too (T16, l.66).
Suppression of genuine joy, reported by eight teachers (33%),
was also identified. One teacher said that even when children
achieved something and he felt sincerely happy, he sometimes
suppressed his joy and suggested the children could go further
(T18, l.33). He said he did so because he thought there was still
considerable room for growth. Another teacher said that he sup-
pressed his joy, kept a cool face, and gave instructions as usual,
although he was “smiling inside (T1, l.60)” when he found the first
graders thinking independently and acting before they were told
what to do.
Natural expression of joy was identified by six teachers (25%).
They reported that they expressed their joy naturally without
noticing it. Intentional spreading of joy, reported by four teachers
(17%), was identified as a way in which teachers purposefully
spread a staged joy to the whole class. This seemed to happen after
teachers acknowledged a child’s significant achievement. One
teacher said as follows:
When a kid does something good, I sometimes tell it to other
kids. I would say “Isn’t it great that he did it?” so that the kid can
hear it. The kid can hear my comments indirectly. I express joy
through a joyous facial expression and words (T15, l.61).
3.3. Emotion regulation processes
As demonstrated above, we identified some emotion expression
patterns that teachers used in front of children at school. Among
them, direct staging and suppression appeared to be major and
completely different expression patterns. It should be noted that,
indeed, sixteen teachers (67%) clearly reported that how they
express emotions was decided “on a case-by-case basis (e.g., T3,
l.31),” or that they “used various ways (e.g., T4, l.36),” or more
precisely, that emotion expression is “a skill (e.g., T2, l.155).” This
suggests that many teachers considered emotion expressions in
front of children as skills, and that they consciously decide to stage
or suppress their emotions according to the situation. This indicates
that teachers understand that their emotion expression influences
children, that is, teachers are aware of their emotion management
as a skill related to teaching and consciously utilize it.
Then, with what purpose and through what processes do high-
quality teachers stage or suppress emotions in front of children?
We qualitatively analyzed teachers’ data and identified some
categories regarding the purposes and processes of direct staging
and suppression of emotions. Table 3 shows the obtained cate-
gories. We describe each category in the following sections.
3.3.1. Purpose of direct staging
3.3.1.1. To evoke children’s emotion. Direct staging of emotion
involves enhancement of the intensity of the felt emotion as well as
conscious production of an emotional state. Qualitative analysis
indicated that teachers did direct staging of emotion to evoke
children’s emotions. In other words, teachers expected children to
understand by feeling the teacher’s emotion at heart and by being
emotionally responsive. One teacher reported utilizing the direct
staging of emotions as follows:
When I see my classroom not making progress or plodding,
I sometimes use and convey my emotion as a shot in the arm for
the children. It happens not only with anger but also with joy.
I think I sometimes need to express joyful emotion, telling the
kids “I like it”.to raise their morale (T5, l.53).
At the same time, teachers’ direct staging of emotions appeared
to function to convey teachers’ values, rules, or evaluation to chil-
dren. One teacher talked about the purpose of direct staging of
anger as follows:
Although I personally didn’t think it made me mad, I took
advantage of it and decided to share the concern with the whole
class. I raised my anger level, making a face and raising my voice
(T21, l.60).
Another teacher reported the necessity of appealing to chil-
dren’s emotions by conveying the teacher’s emotion, not logic, as
follows:
I always show anger over life-threatening issues, behaviors that
involve risk of injury, and insult to others. It’s not enough to talk
calmly in order to make kids realize that those things are really
bad and unacceptable. I think I need to show, or fake, emotions
to teach them (T23, l.60).
Table 3
Categories identified for the processes of direct staging and suppression of emotions.
Category
Purpose of direct staging
To evoke children’s emotion
To convey approval to children
Purpose of suppression
To get children ready to listen
dIneffectiveness of losing temper
Not wanting children to know teacher’s emotion
To encourage children to develop abilities further
dConflict
Appropriate use of direct staging and suppression
Children’s personalities and developmental stages
Teacherechild relationship
Ideal teacher images
Emotionally expressive teacher
Calm teacher
 R. Hosotani, K. Imai-Matsumura / Teaching and Teacher Education 27 (2011) 1039e1048
Teachers likely conveyed their values, rules, or evaluation not
only with negative emotions but also with positive emotions.
Intentional spreading of joy also suggests similar functions. One
teacher talked about the direct staging of joy as follows.
For good things, I sometimes express my emotions on purpose.
When I find what I wanted to see or what I expected, I convey
the information “these are good.” (T2, l.42)
3.3.1.2. To convey approval to children. Many teachers reported that
they tried to express positive emotions such as joy as much as
possible by using words, facial expressions, or physical contact.
Moreover, some teachers reported that they sometimes “exagger-
ated (e.g., T8, l.45)” their positive emotions to make an impression.
One teacher said “I consciously express positive feelings a great deal
because I want to give children approval as much as I can (T4, l.70).”
Furthermore, some teachers reported that when a child was feeling
sad, they consciously express empathetic sadness to the child.
These findings suggest that teachers were willing to express
“approval” to children on a daily basis.
3.3.2. Purpose of suppression
3.3.2.1. To get children ready to listen. When teachers suppressed
children-elicited negative emotions and calmly guided children,
teachers likely expected to prepare the children to listen to them.
In other words, teachers expected to “make children listen calmly
(T1, l.213)” and make them understand cognitively. Teachers
reported “When I think of how kids can be helped to listen to me,
my anger takes second place (T1, l.215),” or “I would not express
my emotions especially when I really get mad (T3, l.40).” One
teacher reported that when children did misbehave, she first
suppressed her anger and “let children talk (T20, l.44),” and then
she calmly guided them. Another teacher also said that he first
suppressed his anger because he wanted to make children
understand by giving reasons why their behavior was wrong (T19,
l.16). Thus, teachers likely suppress their real emotions and talk to
children calmly when they expect children to listen and under-
stand what they say.
In addition, ineffectiveness of losing temper was also identified as
a notion of teachers. Six teachers (25%) reported that expressing
real anger without regulation was their mistake because it would
just “provoke children to protest (T13, l.78),” “fail to appeal to kids
(T12, l.140),” or “fail to make them understand (T19, l.15).” Sutton
(2004) also demonstrated that the ineffectiveness of yelling was
acknowledged by American middle school teachers. Such a notion
may help teachers suppress their genuine anger.
3.3.2.2. Not wanting children to know teacher’s emotion. Teachers
sometimes suppressed their emotions because they did not want
children to know the teachers’ emotion. When teachers sup-
pressed fear or disgust, which they never wanted kids to notice, or
suppressed self-elicited emotions, they likely stayed calm and
reacted to children as usual. In addition, teachers’ self-elicited
negative emotions functioned as a “source of improvement (T14,
l.52).” As for suppression of joy, some teachers did not express joy
in front of children but relished it in private. One teacher said as
follows:
I privately relished small pleasures because of things that others
may not notice but I do, such as children’s subtle changes or
incremental development. I think that kind of joy may be even
more precious. I may express joy when children achieve
something or when they show apparent big changes, but those
don’t happen so often. I experience deep joy when I find a tiny
little change in children (T22, l.30).
1045
3.3.2.3. To encourage children to develop their abilities further. The
teacher needs to use foresight in appropriately setting goals for
children, and in guiding them. In teachers’ suppression of joy, we
found some cases where teachers suppressed their joy and priori-
tized guidance to encourage children to go further in developing
their abilities, even when they felt children-elicited joy or empa-
thetic joy. Moreover, some teachers reported that they felt conflict
when suppressing joy and giving guidance to children. An example
of that was a conflict between teaching children and sharing joy
with children, reported by a teacher who reminisced about seaside
training. According to him, some children succeeded in swimming
as far as 600 m out to sea; they were excited and joyful about it.
However, the children had displayed bad attitude before swim-
ming. Then, he, as a class teacher, suppressed his joy and warned
the children about their behavior. The teacher discussed this as
follows.
I don’t know if emotion control (suppression of joy) is a good
thing. I believe that I should express joy when I am with children
who are feeling sincerely happy. At the same time, I try to control
myself because I think I should do my job as a teacher before
sharing joyful emotions. I don’t know if that is good (T3, l.87).
3.3.3. Appropriate use of direct staging and suppression
Direct staging and suppression are completely different styles of
emotion expression. For example, direct staging of joy and
suppression of joy are opposite behaviors. However, both behaviors
are conducted in the hope of encouraging children’s development.
Then, how do teachers discern appropriate use of direct staging and
suppression? Qualitative analysis demonstrated that teachers
considered children’s personalities and developmental stages and the
teacherechild relationship before they decided on whether they
would do direct staging or suppression. For example, one class
teacher of fifth graders said that he considered whether the child
wanted approval before expressing his joy because some children
did not like to be overly acknowledged for work on which they had
expended little effort or for which they had shown no real enthu-
siasm (T14, l.58). Another teacher said that he carefully took into
consideration the child’s emotional state, the situation the child
was in, as well as the relationships with the child and with its
parents. Then he decided “to what extent” he could speak force-
fully, before showing anger toward the child. He also said that “it is
dangerous” to stage anger without establishing relationships with
children (T22, l.54).
3.3.4. Ideal teacher images
Two ideal teacher images were identified in the interview data:
emotionally expressive teacher and calm teacher. Such ideal teacher
images may also influence emotion regulation processes. An
emotionally expressive teacher was identified as the ideal teacher
who expresses both positive and negative emotions reflecting
human characteristics. In the present study, one teacher talked
about his ideal teacher image as follows. It should be noted that the
teacher consciously tried to be emotional.
Recently, I have come to the conclusion that teachers should be
more open in expressing their emotions regardless of whether
they are positive or negative. For example, it is okay for a teacher
to say “No! You can’t do it!” angrily to convey that the teacher is
really angry. For joy, surprise, and other emotions too .But it’s
on purpose. I mean, I’m trying to be emotional on purpose (T14,
l.28).
The other ideal teacher image, the calm teacher, was identified
as the image of an ideal teacher who always tried to be calm and
refrain from expressing negative emotions in front of children. One
1046 R. Hosotani, K. Imai-Matsumura / Teaching and Teacher Education 27 (2011) 1039e1048
teacher said that he “seldom expressed anger in a loud voice”
because he thought “how teachers express emotions would influ-
ence children (T19, l.120).”
It is possible that those ideal teacher images influence how
teachers regulate their emotions. For example, teachers who highly
value an emotionally expressive teacher may express and show
their emotions more often to evoke children’s emotions than
teachers who always tried to be calm.
As described above, qualitative analysis suggests that high-
quality teachers’ emotion regulation processes involve various
purposes, decision on the appropriate use of expression patterns,
and ideal teacher images. High-quality teachers may need to have
not only emotion expression skills but also the ability to decide
quickly whether to evoke emotion in children or to get them ready
to listen by considering the children’s personalities and the
teacherechild relationship.
4. General discussion
The present study investigated what emotional experience
high-quality teachers have and how they express and regulate their
emotions while interacting with children in the light of teachers’
emotional competence. Any emotion can have adaptive or malad-
aptive effects (Izard, 2007; Izard et al., 2008). Emotion researchers
have included the ability to use emotions adaptively to promote
thinking in their definition of emotional competence (Izard et al.,
2008; Salovey et al., 2008). Moreover, emotion utilization
involves spontaneous as well as planned constructive actions and
creative endeavors (Izard et al., 2008). The present study suggested
that self-elicited anger, self-elicited sadness, and self-disgust may
serve as a motivation toward self-improvement for teachers.
Additionally, teachers’ positive emotional arousal elicited by their
successful teaching may contribute to enhancing teachers’ self-
efficacy (Tschannen-Moran & Woolfolk Hoy, 2007).
The way one expresses emotion while interacting with others
reflects one’s ability to manage emotions (Saarni, 1999; Salovey
et al., 2008). The present study examined for the first time how
teachers tried to manage emotions of their own and others while
interacting with children. Generally, good teaching is supposed to
be charged with positive emotions (Hargreaves, 1998). Although
this is not discussed in detail, all the teachers in this study have
love/affection for children. Moreover, many teachers experienced
positive emotions and tried to express them as much as possible by
their caring behavior (Isenbarger & Zembylas, 2006; O’Connor,
2008). In some ways, teacherechild emotional interactions may
take the form of caregiverechild attachment (Wentzel, 2002). The
caregiver’s emotional warmth, responsiveness, and emotional
availability, which are described as the caregiver’s supportive
presence and acceptance of a broad range of emotions of the child,
are important for building a solid relationship between the child
and the caregiver (Ainsworth, Blehar, Waters, & Wall, 1978;
Biringen & Robinson, 1991; Bowlby, 1980; Sorce & Emde, 1981).
According to the caregiverechild relationship analogy, teachers’
caring attitude such as willingness to empathize with children and
express approval (in other words emotional availability) may help
in building secure relationships with children.
However, the present study demonstrated that the emotion
expression of high-quality Japanese elementary school teachers’ in
classrooms involves complex and various situational judgments
rather than only positive emotional expression. Teachers intention-
ally expressed negative emotions as well, such as anger and sadness,
toward children. In addition, teachers reported that they even
consciously suppressed a positive emotion of genuine joy in front of
children. Many teachers regarded their emotion expression as
“skills” related to teaching and they seemed to use those skills with
clear intentions. Teachers use direct staging of emotions when they
want to evoke and appeal to children’s emotion beyond logic.
Teachers also stage positive or empathetic emotions to convey
approval to children. Because expression of genuine emotions does
not effectively reach children, teachers try to suppress negative
emotions when children need to understand cognitively. Sometimes,
teachers suppress joy to encourage children to develop their ability
further. Although teachers sometimes experience a conflict in the
strategies that they have chosen, as T3 reported, high-quality
teachers use emotion expression skills and conduct elaborate deci-
sion-making with those intensions, considering children’s person-
alities and developmental stages and the teacherechild relationship.
In the light of the caregiverechild relationship, teachers’ exag-
gerated showing of emotions may function to attract children’s
attention, in the same way that multimodal motheresedadults
communicating with infants with exaggerated vocal and gestural
communicationdassists in drawing an infant’s attention (Gogate,
Bahrick, & Watson, 2000). Although further research is needed,
teachers may express positive emotions more frequently and
exaggeratedly for lower grade children to convey approval, and
suppress positive emotions more frequently for upper grade chil-
dren to encourage their reaching for higher goals.
The present study suggests that good teachers are well aware of
their emotion management and that they need the ability to decide
how and which emotions they should express in front of children in
order to meet their goals of teaching; they also need to choose
appropriate strategy through careful but quick consideration. It is
suggested that high-quality teachers not only have emotional
availability but also effectively exert emotion management skills as
one of their concrete teaching abilities.
In terms of emotional labor, the present study strongly supports
the notion that teaching requires a great deal of emotional labor
(Hargreaves, 1998, 2000; Isenbarger & Zembylas, 2006; Schutz
et al., 2007) and emphasizes the necessity of having the ability to
utilize emotions flexibly. Direct staging of anger may require much
labor to perform not only because there is emotional dissonance
between an expressed emotion and a real emotion but also because
the intensity of the required emotional display is high (Morris &
Feldman, 1996). Furthermore, it is teachers, not administrators or
the school, that decide on the spot what should be expressed and
what should not. Many workplaces where maintaining good rela-
tionships with customers is necessary generally require frequent
expression of positive emotions (Hochschild, 1983; Morris &
Feldman, 1996). It may be characteristic of teachers’ profession-
alism that teachers have the skills to maintain good relationships
with children as well as to express a variety of emotions including
negative ones toward children. Teachers are able to safely express
even negative emotions possibly because positive teacherechild
relationships act as a base, as T22 reported that staging anger
without positive relationships is “dangerous”. Since the boundary
between labor and caring may be blurred in teaching (Isenbarger &
Zembylas, 2006), teachers’ positive relationships with children
established by positive emotions and emotional availability can be
considered to be built with emotional labor (Newberry & Davis,
2008). Although the negative impact of emotional labor, such as
stress, is often discussed, it also involves a positive aspect in the
sense that emotional labor is rewarding (Isenbarger & Zembylas,
2006). Those who explained teachers’ emotion expression as
a skill seemed willing to engage in emotion regulation, anticipating
children’s development without being affected by the negative
aspects of emotional labor. A virtuous cycle may possibly exist,
where teachers execute emotional labor as educational profes-
sionals, establish positive relationships with children, and receive
rewards in the form of children’s development, which in turn
pleases the teachers.
 R. Hosotani, K. Imai-Matsumura / Teaching and Teacher Education 27 (2011) 1039e1048
There may be cultural influence on individuals’ emotional
experiences. Markus and Kitayama (1991) suggested that those
with interdependent selves may experience more emotions that
are derived primarily from referencing others, such as shame and
guilt, than those with independent selves (Markus & Kitayama,
1991). Teachers who participated in the present study never used
the word “guilt,” but some self-elicited negative emotions might be
similar to guilt. In Sutton’s work, self-elicited negative emotions
were not mentioned (Sutton, 2004). Further research will be
needed to discern whether teachers’ sensitivity to self-elicited
negative emotions is influenced by cultural differences of self-
concept or due to high-quality teachers’ high standards and goals
that lead them to be demanding of themselves in their self-evalu-
ation (Lewis, 2008).
Japanese elementary schools emphasize educating the “whole-
child,” that is, nurturing culturally valued qualities such as perse-
verance, cooperation, and empathy along with the spectrum of
school activities (Hoffman, 2000). Therefore, teachers in this study
may have talked much about supporting children in self-regulating
behavior. In addition, in Japanese classrooms, teachers and children
tend to share an emotional unity (Hoffman, 2003). In the present
study, teachers’ expression of emotions such as anger, sadness, and
joy to evoke children’s emotions was identified as a common
strategy that many teachers used to guide children. It is possible
that such a school culture influences teachers’ emotional experi-
ence and the manner in which they exert emotional competence.
However, as the present study suggests, we believe that it is
important to consider the perspective of teachers’ emotion
management while interacting with children for improving child
education not only in Japan but also in other countries. Indeed, the
manner in which teachers interact with children is a topic that has
attracted the interest of researchers worldwide (Lewis et al., 2005;
Newberry, 2010; Newberry & Davis, 2008; Riley et al., 2010; Sava,
2002; Tartwijk et al., 2009). Aggression, characterized by yelling
in anger and denigrating the students, is a possible albeit unfa-
vorable kind of behavior of teachers, and such behavior is related to
negative relationships with children and children’s misbehavior
(Lewis et al., 2005; Riley et al., 2010; Sava, 2002). However, such
a hostile attitude is a fundamentally different strategy from the
direct staging of anger, through which high-quality teachers
consciously express anger to guide children, as reported in the
present study. It is possible that better teachers may use more
sophisticated emotion expression strategies, whereas teachers who
are insensitive to emotion management may behave in a manner
that is against children’s interests. A study conducted in the UK
found that teachers try to suppress anger toward adults through
cognitive effort, whereas anger toward children tends to be
expressed rather immediately, with less cognitive effort (Farouk,
2010).It is necessary to distinguish between teachers’ unregulated
emotion expression and high-quality teachers’ conscious emotion
expression. As Lewis et al. (2005) pointed out, teachers are
professionals who need to respond in the best interests of the
children they teach. To foster such professionalism in teachers, it
will be necessary to introduce and discuss the perspective of
teachers’ emotion management in teacher education.
A limitation of the study is the definition of high-quality
teachers. Since teachers’ quality should be considered on multiple
levels, including their environment and beliefs as well as their
competence, it is difficult to answer “what is a good teacher” in
a simple way (Korthagen, 2004). In addition, teachers who are
highly evaluated by others may not always be good teachers.
Acknowledging the challenges posed in defining “high quality,” we
tried to define high-quality teachers on the basis of objective
performance, such as the experiences of supervising internships
and open classes, because both tasks cannot be performed without
1047
a certain level of teaching ability, including the ability of classroom
management and instruction. We think that the social desirability
response bias was not influential because the teachers discussed
seemingly unfavorable experiences, such as negative emotions,
mistakes, and conflicts, in the safe interview environment, where
confidentiality was protected.
Another possible limitation may be that the present study
examined only the self-reports of the participants. However, its aim
was to examine the subjective, not objective, aspects of emotional
experience and regulation, which lead to expression, and we have
performed substantial investigation regarding the aim through
repeated data collection and analysis. Although we need to be
careful about making generalizations about the present study, since
it is an exploratory one, we do think that the findings and impli-
cations gained by it about high-quality teachers’ emotional
competence will be a thrust for future research. The next stage of
the research, which will use other methodology, such as observa-
tion, should examine the relation between teachers’ inner regula-
tion processes and observable emotion expression, as well as the
relation between teachers’ emotion expression skills and their
influence on children and on relationships with children in actual
school settings. We are now promoting studies in such directions.
In conclusion, the present study revealed various concrete
emotional experiences and emotion expression strategies that
high-quality Japanese teachers used while interacting with chil-
dren. It introduced an important concept regarding the way
teachers interact with children, that of teacher’s emotional
competence, which may have been used implicitly by high-quality
teachers. It also offered both theoretically and practically important
implications. High-quality teachers regard emotion expression in
front of children as a skill and manage emotions through consid-
ering purpose, appropriate use, and ideal teacher images; it has
been suggested that high-quality teachers consciously use their
competence with emotion management as an effective practical
teaching tool. As this study has shown, accruing implicit knowledge
of the emotional competence that high-quality teachers may have
used will benefit teacher education. In teacher education, it may be
necessary to not only teach academic instruction skills but also
promote awareness and skills to develop teachers’ emotion
management. For example, the reflection method can be used in
teacher education courses to promote self-awareness of the level of
emotional competence by having student interns reflect on their
emotional interactions with children (Korthagen, 2004). In addi-
tion, support to improve teachers’ competence with emotion
management can be provided to not only novice teachers but also
long-careered teachers who are struggling with regard to their
emotional interactions with children. Teachers who are aware of
emotional knowledge and competence and use them effectively
may be different in terms of children’s achievement or attitudes
from teachers who are ignorant of them, depreciate emotional
interaction, and haphazardly interact with children. The findings of
this study suggest that teaching based on good emotional compe-
tence and the teacher education to promote and foster such
competence are needed.
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