Ashdown and Bernard

Can explicit instruction in social and emotional learning skills benefit the social-emotional
development, well-being and academic achievement of young children?

Ashdown and Bernard wanted to test whether the ‘You Can Do It! Early Childhood Program (YCDI)’
has an effect on the social-emotional development well-being and academic achievement of
preparatory school and grade 1 students. It was hypothesized that young children who receive YCDI
program would display greater gain in their levels of social and emotional competence, social and
emotional well-being and academic achievement. 45 females and 54 males were used in the study,
with 4 teachers, from a catholic school in Melbourne, Australia. The school was identified as ‘low
socio-economic statuses according to the catholic Education office. One prep class and one grade 1
class were randomly assigned to receive the YCDI curriculum. YCDI program was delivered by their
regular classroom teachers for over a 10 week time period. The other prep class and grade 1 class
didn’t receive the program as they served as a comparison group, however their teachers did
implement the program after the study to avoid disadvantaging them. All 4 teachers had to fill out 2
questionnaires for each pupil which were completed before and after the YCDI program, at similar
times for the non-YCDI students. ACER well-being survey tested pupil’s social and emotional well-
being and social and emotional competence. This questionnaire was validated by data provided by
over 6000 teachers. The social skills rating system measured social skills, problem behaviours and
academic competence. The test had been shown to have high internal reliability and test-retest
reliability. Observers watched teachers deliver the lessons to determine how the material were
being delivered. The results found were that children in the YCDI displayed significantly greater gains
in teacher-rated levels of social-emotional competence and also in social skills than pupils who didn’t
receive the program. The findings were also greater for pupils in grade 1. YCDI pupils scored higher
on social-emotional well-being, with the grade 1 making the greatest gains. There was no evidence
however that YCDI had an impact on reduction of total problem behaviours in prep pupils, but grade
1 pupils did reduce these more significantly compared to non-YCDI pupils. The strength of the study
is that it supports previous research which indicated that social and emotional well-being instruction
do have an impact on children’s social and emotional skills. They also observed the teachers who
were delivering the lessons and the teachers were also trained for the program. This increases
reliability of the experiment and ensures that all students were receiving the program correctly.
However, only one school in Melbourne Australia was used, which was also in a low socio-economic
area. Therefore, it lacks population and thus, generalizability. We do not know for sure that same
results will be found in a different city or country, and with students of a different status. As well as,
the teachers were aware whether they were in the YCDI or non-YCDI group, which may have led to
unreliable findings as the teachers might have answered the questionnaires through a biased point
of view, hence affecting the overall findings. In conclusion, although we can criticize the fact that the
teachers might have been biased for their answers given in the questionnaire, the questionnaires
were in fact shown to have high internal reliability and was validated by data therefore, making the
study reliable in general and pr0awoving that YCDI does consequently, impact learning of the
students.