Effectiveness of Life Skills Strategies on Mental Health of Prospective Teachers

Prospective teachers require adaptive, interpersonal and emotional skills as they prepare for the demands of teaching. This study examined the effectiveness of life skills strategies in relation to their mental health and assessed whether the observed changes were evident at a retention assessment. The study was conducted among second-year Bachelor of Education students at the College of Education, Alagappa University, Tamil Nadu. From a population of 200 first- and second-year students, 60 second-year students were selected by convenience sampling and divided into an experimental group and a control group, with 30 participants allocated to each. The experimental group received researcher-developed life skills strategies, while the control group continued with conventional teaching. A mental health rating scale was used at pre-test, post-test and retention assessment stages, and the reported comparisons were analysed using t-tests. In the control group, the mean score changed slightly from 17.73 at pre-test to 17.83 at post-test. In the experimental group, the reported mean increased from 18.70 to 35.17, with a statistically significant within-group difference. At retention, the experimental group mean was 35.53, with no statistically significant difference from its post-test mean. These results suggest that life skills strategies may be associated with improved mental health scores among the participating prospective teachers. However, the findings should be interpreted cautiously because the sample was selected non-randomly, no direct between-group change test was reported and an inconsistency remains in the experimental post-test sample size.