Promoting teachers’ wellbeing through gamified learning: Qualitative and quantitative evidence from the Teaching to Be project

Teacher wellbeing has become a growing concern in educational research and policy, particularly in light of increasing professional demands and the heightened emotional pressures experienced by teachers in recent years. The Teaching to Be (T2Be) project was developed to address this challenge by translating research on teacher wellbeing into an innovative professional development programme combining reflective learning and gamification. The programme includes an Online Wellbeing Course (OWC) centred on a serious game designed to foster teachers’ socio-emotional competences and promote sustainable professional wellbeing.

This contribution presents findings from two complementary studies examining teachers’ experiences with the programme and its effectiveness. Study 1 explored teachers’ perceptions of the OWC through focus group interviews conducted with participants who completed the intervention. Thematic analysis highlighted several perceived benefits, including increased emotional awareness, stronger self-care practices, improved empathy and communication with students and colleagues, and greater reflective capacity when dealing with challenging classroom situations. Participants reported that the serious game format facilitated engagement and allowed them to experiment with emotionally complex scenarios in a safe and reflective environment. Study 2 quantitatively evaluated the effectiveness of the intervention using a quasi-experimental pretest/posttest design involving a large sample of Italian teachers assigned to either an intervention group or a waiting-list control group. Results showed significant improvements in teachers’ socio-emotional competence and self-efficacy, together with a significant reduction in perceived stress among participants who completed the OWC. Mediation analyses indicated that increased self-efficacy played a key role in explaining the reduction in stress levels.

Overall, the findings provide mixed-methods evidence supporting the potential of gamified professional development programmes to enhance teachers’ psychological resources and wellbeing, offering promising implications for teacher training and whole-school approaches to wellbeing.