Effects of Feel Your Best Self Mini-Lessons During Morning Meeting on Kindergarten Class-Wide Behaviors

Abstract Universal prevention efforts in schools have been advocated as a way to address substantial challenges in access to social, emotional, and behavioral supports, but schools often struggle to deliver these services effectively. Feel Your Best Self (FYBS) was developed as one solution by offering a flexible, easy-to-use way for elementary teachers to integrate learning simple emotion-coping strategies. Using an alternating treatment design, we investigate the effects of FYBS mini-lessons delivered during Morning Meeting on class-wide behavior compared to business-as-usual Morning Meeting in a kindergarten classroom. Systematic direct observation and Direct Behavior Ratings of class-wide behaviors were used as outcomes. Results suggest increased class-wide academic engagement and positive affect in the instructional period following FYBS mini-lessons, as well as decreased disruptive behavior. No differences were found in class-wide frustration tolerance or flexibility. FYBS mini-lessons were perceived as highly usable by the teacher. This study provides initial evidence that FYBS can be used to promote emotion skills and positive classroom behavior and can be integrated into existing classroom routines such as Morning Meetings.