Supporting children’s emotional wellbeing over primary-secondary school transitions
The project will develop the first robust, sensitive, and standardised scale to assess children’s emotional wellbeing in the context of primary-secondary school transitions. This novel instrument will be named the Primary-Secondary School Transitions Emotional Wellbeing Scale (P-S WELLS) and will add distinct value at a community level by developing a tool and manual to build capacity for educational practitioners to obtain immediate insight into the universal support their class needs and identification of specific children who need additional support.
Impact highlights
- The number of children experiencing poor emotional wellbeing is increasing rapidly
- Primary-secondary school transitions are a critical period for children and pose heightened risk
- There is need to develop a tool to identify and support children’s emotional wellbeing during this time
Charlotte Bagnall
Charlotte Bagnall is Lecturer in the Psychology of Education, Manchester Institute of Education
Primary-secondary school transitions are a critical period for children, that pose heightened risk for the development of poor emotional wellbeing and mental health. Our ability to identify and support children during this critical juncture is limited, however, by the lack of a robust, sensitive, and standardised scale to measure children’s emotional wellbeing in the context of primary-secondary school transitions, comprehensively and longitudinally. This is inhibiting empirical progress within the field, our ability to best support children in practice, and likely leading to policies and practices that are not fit for purpose.
The Primary-Secondary school Transitions Emotional Wellbeing Scale (P-S WELLS), has been developed following a multi-informant, mixed-methods model to overcome this gap, and will add distinct value in research and practice, through the additional objectives:
- To develop a clear theoretical and conceptual definition of emotional wellbeing in the context of primary-secondary school transitions and operationalise this conceptual domain through the design of P-S WELLS
P-S WELLS will holistically conceptualise and assess children’s feelings towards the changes that they are negotiating in context. - To pilot and conduct longitudinal psychometric assessment and longitudinal validation on two discrete samples, across two primary-secondary school transitions periods.
P-S WELLS will innovate the field methodologically by demonstrating the importance and viability of considering longitudinal contexts within the design of measures, to ensure measures are stable and sensitive to be able to clearly capture change over time. - To develop a P-S WELLS manual for use in schools, including CPD opportunities to administer, score and interpret the measurement.
P-S WELLS will add distinct value at the wider community level, by designing a tool and manual to build capacity for educational practitioners to obtain immediate insight into the emotional wellbeing of their class in the context of primary-secondary school transitions.
“Your impactful work on improving children’s emotional wellbeing over primary-secondary school transition has transformed our approach to supporting transition in Victoria (Melbourne, Australia). We are very keen to engage in the validation and international translation of P-S WELLS”
Professor Jon Quach
University of Melbourne
How we’re making a difference
P-S WELLS aims to offer theoretical and conceptual novelty by demonstrating a vital paradigm shift in conceptualising emotional wellbeing in a specific context (primary-secondary school transitions). Providing a model of emotional wellbeing in context will build capacity in the field of child mental health research, by focussing on how children emotionally respond to the context of primary-secondary school transitions and the specific emotional reactions evoked.
P-S WELLS will provide an innovative methodological tool to: a) evaluate the efficacy of pre-existing emotional wellbeing and mental health support interventions in the context of primary-secondary school transitions through robust randomised control trials; b) refine the content and delivery of pre-existing programmes, by strengthening the methodological and conceptual foundations that underpin primary-secondary school transitions and mental health research, and c) provide the means for sensitive identification of ‘at risk’ children to participate in targeted interventions.
Recognising that approximately 750,000 pupils start secondary school annually in the UK, the scale and importance of supporting primary-secondary school transitions effectively cannot be over-stated, and P-S WELLS will have practical utility to be administered and scored within schools on a whole-class basis, to enable educational practitioners to obtain immediate insight into universal support their class needs and identification of specific children who need additional emotional wellbeing support.
Ongoing impact
Knowledge of how best to support vulnerable children, has the potential to improve the mental health and educational trajectories of children across the life course, reducing long-term inequalities. Early detection of which aspects of moving to secondary school children are worried about, who might be particularly vulnerable and what universal and targeted support could be useful, facilitated through P-S WELLS is crucial.
Our approach to support children’s emotional wellbeing has been recognised by the Minister for Children, Families and Wellbeing, has been referenced in policy guidelines for NICE (07/22) and Health Scotland (01/20), and we continue to work closely with Policy@Manchester to amplify this awareness and the projects policy reach.
Connect with our experts
We are excited to connect with audiences interested in our work.
Research details
Charlotte Bagnall
Lecturer in the Psychology of Education, Manchester Institute of Education.
Website: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7213-2668
Project website: https://www.p-s-wells.org
Twitter / X: @_CBagnall
Twitter / X: @ps_wells
Connected research centre
Committee member of the national and international Educational and Life Transitions (TCELT) Research Centre TCELT-INTR which consists of approximately 200 academics, policy makers and professionals from across the world interested in educational and developmental transitions.
Related research by Dr Charlotte Bagnall
- Bagnall, C.L. Supporting vulnerable children over primary-secondary school transitions, University of Manchester policy article, November 2023: https://blog.policy.manchester.ac.uk/posts/2023/11/supporting-vulnerable-children-over-primary-secondary-school-transitions/
- Bagnall, C.L. (2024). Expert interview on supporting children’s emotional wellbeing over primary-secondary school transitions. Open Innovation Team, Department for Education
- Bagnall, C.L., Jindal-Snape, D., Panayiotou, M., Qualter, P. Supporting children’s emotional wellbeing over primary-secondary school transitions, University of Manchester policy briefing, October 2023. https://blog.policy.manchester.ac.uk/posts/2023/11/supporting-vulnerable-children-over-primary-secondary-school-transitions/
- Bagnall, C.L. (2023). Supporting vulnerable children over primary-secondary school transitions. BBC Radio Manchester
- Bagnall, C.L., Skipper, Y. & Fox, C.L. (2021). COVID-19 has made the transition from primary to secondary school harder. Here’s how parents can help. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/covid-19-has-made-the-transition-from-primary-to-secondary-school-harder-heres-how-parents-can-help-166313
- Bagnall, C.L., Jindal-Snape, D., Panayiotou, M., Qualter, P. (2024). Design and validation of the Primary-Secondary School Transitions Emotional Wellbeing Scale (P-S WELLS); the first instrument to assess children’s emotional wellbeing in the context of primary-secondary school transitions. International Journal of Educational and Life Transitions, 3(1), 4. DOI: 10.5334/ijelt.79
- Bagnall, C. L., & Jindal-Snape, D. (2023). Child Self-Report Measures of Primary-Secondary Transition Experiences and Emotional Wellbeing: An International Systematic Literature Review. International Journal of Educational and Life Transitions, 2(1): 4, pp. 1–31. 10.5334/ijelt.35