Promoting Emotional Vocabulary and Hope Competence in Primary School Religious Education

Abstract

Can emotional vocabulary and hope competence be promoted in primary school religious education? This quasi-experimental study (N = 110) examined the effects of two short lesson sequences. Three classes received an intervention aimed at fostering emotional vocabulary using Baldermann’s didactics of the Psalms, while three classes participated in an intervention designed to enhance hope competence based on Snyder’s theoretical framework. The results indicate statistically significant, small effect sizes for both interventions. Overall, the findings suggest that primary school religious education can contribute to the development of children’s emotional competence as a cross-curricular educational objective.