Abstract
The Faith and Wellness: A Daily Mental Health Resource is a school-based, teacher-led social-emotional learning (SEL) intervention resource for elementary students. It is designed to address the challenges faced by existing SEL interventions, including lack of time, training, and resources. Using a randomized control trial design, this study evaluates short-term outcomes associated with the use of this resource. Participants were elementary teachers (NT1 = 201, NT2 = 129) and students (NT1 = 242, NT2 = 183; ages 4–14; 47.5% girls) from 19 Catholic school boards in [PROVINCE]. Using multi-level models, significant small to medium effect sizes indicated that intervention group teachers: taught SEL more frequently; had higher confidence in teaching SEL; and had more positive perceptions of the classroom climate, students’ SEL, and students’ school engagement at Time 2 than comparison group teachers. Results for students were less robust, though there was indication of dosage effects. Results highlight the role of teachers and frequent delivery in effective SEL implementation.