WITS Primary Program
Problems addressed
Externalizing behaviors/problems
School violence or bullying
Effectiveness

Promising

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Promising

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Life periods served
Children (4 to 13 years)
Where the program was applied
Education establishment
Country of application
Canada
Description

This is a school program aimed at children in the first to third grades of elementary school who are at risk of peer victimization.
Teachers take part in a mini-training course online with access to children’s books, activities to reinforce the program’s messages in the classroom, and information on literacy techniques, vocabulary-building, songs, and other activities.

Impact evaluations

Impact evaluation studies have shown that the program led to a statistically significant reduction in physical and relational aggression victimization and an improvement in social competence, but there was no significant effect on physical aggression perpetration and social responsibility [1] [2].
One of the studies had a quasi-experimental design with a sample of 422 students from six schools that implemented the program and 418 students from five schools that did not, all located in metropolitan Western Canada [1].
The other study used a six-year follow-up cohort with a sample of 432 children from 17 public schools in a city in Western Canada [2].

Bibliographic reference

[1] Hoglund, W. L. G., Hosan, N. E. & Leadbeater, B. J. (2012). Using Your WITS: A 6-Year Follow-Up of a Peer Victimization Prevention Program. School Psychology Review, 41(2), 193–214. https://doi.org/10.1080/02796015.2012.12087520

[2] Leadbeater, B. & Sukhawathanakul, P. (2011). Multicomponent programs for reducing peer victimization in early elementary school: A longitudinal evaluation of the WITS Primary Program. Journal of Community Psychology, 39(5), 606–620. https://doi.org/10.1002/jcop.20447

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