Teacher’s Perceptions and Practices with Regards to Understanding Emotional Intelligence Amongst Primary School Aged Children

Emotional Intelligence (EI) has been a concept that has gained a growing amount of attention, this study presents EI within primary school education exploring it’s impact within the classroom. A clear gap within literature is the prioritising of EI within primary education and everyday learning. The research consists of qualitative and quantitative approaches, by using a teacher focussed questionnaire involving questions directly linked to EI competencies providing an overview of their practice with regards to EI, and then a focus group activity and observations based on children that has been thematically evaluated. The findings show that teachers have a good understanding of EI, but that there is room for improvement and opportunities for elevating their practice to make EI a higher priority within day to day learning. Similarly, children demonstrate a level of understanding towards EI but different environments within their school day presents dramatic differences of observed EI skills. This research is significant within this field as it is a powerful demonstration of what EI is, why it is important and why it needs to be at the forefront of practice, teachers can use this to influence their approach towards teaching the curriculum and educators can move this research forward by expanding the perspectives involved and creating comparisons between educational approaches that prioritise EI and those that fail to recognise its value.