Emotional competence training promotes teachers’ emotion socialization and classroom environment: Effects from a TIK-in-School pilot study

Primary school teachers spend many hours each day assisting students with various emotional challenges in the school environment. However, many teachers lack specific skills in how to guide and support children with challenging emotions. Thus, there is a need for interventions that directly enhance teachers’ emotional competence and capacity to respond to students’ emotional needs, thereby ensuring that improvements in the learning environment are ongoing and sustainable.

This pilot study explored implementation fidelity and acceptability and the outcomes of a newly developed emotion-focused teacher intervention, Tuning in to Kids in School (TIK-S), on primary school teachers’ emotion socialization practices and classroom environment. Two Norwegian schools were allocated into intervention or waitlist control, with 74 teachers from grades 1 to 4 participating. The intervention included group training for teachers focusing on how to identify, understand and regulate emotions and use emotion coaching with students, while reducing emotion dismissing. Assessments at pre- and post-intervention included teacher questionnaires on their emotion coaching and emotion dismissing practices and observations of the classroom environment. Data were analysed using mixed models. Facilitators reported high fidelity and participants good acceptability of content delivery. Results showed a significant decrease in teacher-reported emotion dismissing practices and improvement in observed positive classroom climate in the intervention, but not control, condition. Although non-significant, emotion coaching had an increasing trend in the intervention condition post-intervention.

Participation in TIK-S contributed to improved skills in teacher's emotion socialization and improved classroom climate, factors that are important for an optimal school learning environment.