Improving Literacy Competence and Social and Emotional Competencies in Primary Education Through Cooperative Project-Based Learning

Cooperative learning and Project-Based Learning are methodologies that can promote learning environments and improve learning, school achievement, and social and emotional competencies. A mixed combination of these two methodologies called Cooperative Project-Based Learning was designed, and a quasi-experimental evaluation study with a pre-test and a post-test was conducted with a sample of 156 students from Primary Education. Literacy competence and social and emotional competencies, including empathy, were analyzed and compared between experimental and control groups. The intervention effectively increased scores on literacy competence, social and emotional competencies, and empathy in the experimental group, significantly more than in the control group. The girls in the experimental group exhibited greater improvement than the controls in literacy competence, social and emotional competencies and empathy. However, the boys in the experimental group were only different from the boys in the control group in literacy competence, but not in the other two variables. These results have implications for school practice and curriculum planning in Primary Education. New lines of future research are also being opened based on the impact of Cooperative Project-Based Learning on other key competencies and on the prevention of antisocial behaviors.