Original scientific paper

Promoting emotional competence – a challenge to the curriculum

Silvana Loka ; Albansko Sveučilište Tirana, Albanija Odsjek za opću psihologiju

Abstract

Th e study proposed here concerns a curriculum analysis for grades one to four with respect to how the curriculum promotes the development of the child’s emotional competence. The study starts with the following questions: are the aims, standards or the expected results of pupils’ achievement anticipated by the curriculum (programs and textbooks) in accordance with the emotion-oriented approach; do such aims ensure appropriate support to pupils’ emotional development and do the „non-emotional” aims allow the integration of emotional development with other aims? The qualitative methods applied in this study include: a systematic literature review, an analysis of five Albanian academic articles focused on the development of a pupil-oriented curriculum, a content analysis of thirteen Social Studies textbooks for grades one to four that apply Altertext, and interviews with four experts working in textbook publishing. Th e articles have been selected according to the following criteria: they contain qualitative data on pupil-oriented curriculum and address the holistic development of pupils in primary school, including their emotional development. Th e results of the survey support the initial suggestion that textbooks are not oriented towards developing emotional competence of pupils and do not consider it to be a relevant curriculum norm. Textbooks do not take into account the relationship between academic achievement and a decrease of aggressive behaviour and the promotion of social and emotional competences. Recommendations have been given for integrating the development of social and emotional competences with cognitive achievements, as well as for improving the correlation between the theory and the empirical attempts emphasizing the importance of emotional competence for cognitive and behavioural achievements.

Keywords

emotional competence; curriculum; bullying; content analysis; meta-analysis; systematic literature review; interview

Hrčak ID:

113459

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/113459

Publication date:

20.11.2012.

Article data in other languages: croatian german

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