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Evaluation of an intervention to support teachers in tackling bullying and promoting positive classroom relationships: first findings

Chloë Finet, KU Leuven; Heidi Vandebosch, Antwerp University; Anouck Lubon, KU Leuven; Hilde Colpin, KU Leuven

Bullying victimization is a highly prevalent problem associated with numerous negative outcomes on the short and long run. Teachers may play a central role in preventing and reducing bullying, because they exert an influence on the peer ecology of the classroom. Nonetheless, despite their central role, teachers often feel insecure regarding how to best prevent and intervene against bullying. Therefore the current study aims to evaluate a newly developed teacher training targeted at supporting teachers to adequately deal with bullying and to promote positive classroom relationships. The training consists of three half-day sessions for grades 4-6 teachers of primary school. To evaluate intervention effects ten schools were randomly assigned to either the training or the control condition. During a pre- and post-test assessment (school year 2021-2022), questionnaire data on various constructs including teachers' responses to bullying, the quality of classroom relationships and levels of bullying victimization were collected from the participating teachers (Npre-test 63) and their students (Npre-test 1067). In this presentation, first findings on the effects of the intervention on teacher responses to bullying, on the quality of classroom relationships and on the level of bullying victimization will be presented. We expect that after the intervention teachers from the training condition will more frequently use active strategies for dealing with bullying and will engage less often in non-intervention compared to teachers from the control group. Moreover, we expect that students from the training condition will report higher quality classroom relationships at post-test than students in the control condition and that they will report lower levels of bullying victimization.

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