Background

Research shows that social-emotional skills can be taught and help improve academic learning. When introduced in a teaching programs, students are more likely to remember and use what they are taught. Emotions can facilitate or impede children’s academic engagement, work ethic, commitment and ultimate school success.

The main contribution of this project to the international research on Social Emotional Learning (SEL) topics is the creation of a standardized assessment tool, which will offer precise guidelines to evaluate children’s SEL skills and will help guarantee high quality SEL intervention practices. The rapidly growing interest in children’s social and emotional skills in Europe shows that there is a need for a pan-European assessment tool, so that the impacts of SEL can be properly evaluated and compared across countries. Since the school seems to be the arena where these skills are taught, it is important for school personnel to be able to understand the impact of social and emotional learning programs.

The project, led by the University of Perugia (Italy) involves partners from Croatia, Italy, Slovenia, Switzerland and Sweden.

This project aims at developing teacher training in five different countries and the sharing of expertise about SEL. A multi-country partnership offers an added value to the project thanks to the transnational cooperation and the location of the different main partners. Partners are also sharing the research, the expertise and the different approaches accumulated in teaching competence concerning social and emotional skills as they are developed in the different countries. The differences in education systems and methodologies and culture in the different partner countries, as well as their life-style,will be surely contribute to produce a “European SEL Model”.

Thanks to the collaboration with 36 associated members from all the partner countries, thereby guaranteeing maximum impact, the partnership uses a range of websites and international events to disseminate its teachers training products. The impact will produce an undeniable change, during and after the project. The project will help pupils in learning, adopting and use specific life-skills different than the disciplinary ones but concerning the person’s development and socialization. To this aim, the project deals not only with teacher training, but also with the pupils’ emotional competencies to be spent in their socialization.