Development, implementation and effectiveness evaluation of the extra curriculum to enhance emotional awareness and communication skills

In 21st-century education systems, individuals' emotional, social, and communication skills have become as crucial as academic success. In this context, designing and implementing curricula that support the multifaceted development of individuals is considered a significant step toward addressing deficiencies in education. This research aims to identify the emotional needs of secondary school students that are not sufficiently addressed within the existing official curriculum, develop an additional curriculum to meet these needs and evaluate its effectiveness. The study was conducted in two phases using the action research method. In the first phase, a curriculum was designed to enhance secondary school students' emotional awareness and communication skills. In the second phase, the implementation process was carried out using a pre-test-post-test control group experimental design to assess the effectiveness of the curriculum. Broad participation was sought in the needs analysis stage during the curriculum design. To achieve this, feedback was gathered from the educational staff working in the implementation school and the students' parents. In this context, individual interviews were initially conducted with school personnel (n=18), followed by administering parent survey forms to volunteers who agreed to participate in the study (n=126). This approach incorporated multiple stakeholders' perspectives into the curriculum design, enabling a more comprehensive identification of students' emotional awareness and communication skills needs. The study was conducted with 5th-grade students in a secondary school in the Aksu district of Antalya. The developed extra curriculum was implemented with the experimental group (n=21), while no intervention was applied to the control group (n=21). The effects of the curriculum were evaluated through statistical analyses using the pre-test-post-test model. To assess the effectiveness of the curriculum, the Emotional Awareness Scale and the Communication Skills Scale, both of which have undergone validity and reliability testing, were utilized. Additionally, qualitative data were collected through unstructured observation notes from the implementing teacher, structured observation forms from course teachers, and semi-structured focus group discussions with parents. This multifaceted data collection approach facilitated a comprehensive evaluation of the curriculum's effects on students through quantitative and qualitative methods. The research findings indicate that the developed extra curriculum enhanced students' emotional awareness levels and improved their active listening and empathy skills. Furthermore, positive changes were observed in students' social relationships, a significant increase in their self-confidence was achieved, and a statistically meaningful improvement was recorded in their communication skills. Qualitative findings suggest that parents and teachers frequently emphasize the positive impact of the curriculum on students' developmental processes. In particular, the emotional and social gains observed by teachers during the curriculum implementation process underscore the necessity of an education system that provides academic content and fosters individuals' emotional and social development.