Abstract
Children’s readiness for school is often threatened by the occurrence of both externalising (EP) and internalising (IP) problems. In search for solutions, research has shown that School-Wide Positive Behaviour Support (SWPBS) is particularly effective for fostering children’s behavioural skills and reducing EP. However, whether SWPBS can enhance children’s emotional skills and reduce IP is less clear. Therefore, TIME-IN was developed, which extends SWPBS by also including emotional support systems. It will be tested whether TIME-IN is effective for (a) improving emotion regulation (ER) and (b) reducing depressive symptoms. Furthermore, it will be tentatively explored whether TIME-IN is accompanied by more than natural fluctuations in both children’s EP and IP. The effectiveness of TIME-IN will be evaluated in a non-randomized study, in which an intervention group will be compared with a matched control group. Both research questions will be addressed in a sample consisting of children between 8 and 12 years of age with special educational needs (SEN), who have been argued to benefit most from school readiness interventions. Questionnaires for teachers, children, and their parents will be administered at the beginning (T0) and the end of the school year (T1) using multi-informant assessment. Practical implications, strengths, and limitations were discussed. ISCRTN registry 54456609.Registered on 28 March 2017. Ethical requirements were fulfilled.
Highlights
IntroductionTo promote special educational needs (SEN) children’s school readiness (see Britto, 2012) and, more concretely, identify and reduce both EP and IP problems within the school environment, it seems appropriate to extend School-Wide Positive Behaviour Support (SWPBS) and its wellevaluated behavioural interventions (i.e. mainly intended for reducing EP; see e.g. Horner et al, 2009) with transdiagnostic mechanisms that explicitly focus on IP, such as emotion regulation (ER; Aldao, Nolen-Hoeksema, & Schweizer, 2010; McIntosh, Ty, & Miller, 2014)
To promote special educational needs (SEN) children’s school readiness and, more concretely, identify and reduce both EP and IP problems within the school environment, it seems appropriate to extend School-Wide Positive Behaviour Support (SWPBS) and its wellevaluated behavioural interventions with transdiagnostic mechanisms that explicitly focus on IP, such as emotion regulation (ER; Aldao, Nolen-Hoeksema, & Schweizer, 2010; McIntosh, Ty, & Miller, 2014)
The effectiveness of TIME-IN will be evaluated in a non-randomized study, in which an intervention group will be compared with a matched control group
Summary
To promote SEN children’s school readiness (see Britto, 2012) and, more concretely, identify and reduce both EP and IP problems within the school environment, it seems appropriate to extend School-Wide Positive Behaviour Support (SWPBS) and its wellevaluated behavioural interventions (i.e. mainly intended for reducing EP; see e.g. Horner et al, 2009) with transdiagnostic mechanisms that explicitly focus on IP, such as emotion regulation (ER; Aldao, Nolen-Hoeksema, & Schweizer, 2010; McIntosh, Ty, & Miller, 2014). TIME-IN was developed, which complements SWPBS by adding emotional support systems such as (a) screening instruments for identifying IP, (b) ER training and (c) crisis intervention strategies. It was considered useful to train children’s adaptive ER strategies by means of the key principles of Affect Regulation Training (ART; Berking & Schwarz, 2014), since ART has several advantages as it complements behavioural and cognitive interventions (as present in SWPBS), integrates different adaptive ER strategies into one coherent model, and is effective for reducing various mental health problems (Berking & Lukas, 2015). TIME-IN is a school-wide health care policy, consisting of both behavioural and emotional support systems, with the final aim of promoting children’s school readiness (Weymeis, 2015)
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