The article aims at defining the expression of prospective teachers’ emotional competences and their readiness to develop pupils’ emotional competence, emphasising the necessity to reflect about one’s emotions under conditions of increasing tension. Having discussed the constructs of emotional intelligence, emotional competence and social competence, the attention is focussed on teacher’s emotional intelligence competence, its structure and content, aiming to research the expression of this competence empirically while students communicate with learners during their pedagogical practice.

Straipsnyje aptariami santykinės mokymo kokybės ir ugdomosios sąveikos veiksniai, lemiantys studentų mokymo ir mokymosi rezultatus, pagrįsti geriausia moksline ir praktine pedagogine patirtimi.

Purpose of the study was to investigate relationship between ability to recognize emotions and school adjustment indicators (academic achievement and popularity in class) among primary school children in Lithuania. Subjects in the study were 67 (31 girl and 36 boys) pupils attending 2nd and 3rd grade in one of schools in Kaunas. Age of the subjects ranged from 7 to 11 years. Material and methods. Ability to recognize emotions was measured using the Child Emotion Skills Questionnaire (CESQ) developed for the present study on the basis of the ACES questionnaire of Schultz, Trentacosta, Izard, Bear (2004). Information about academic achievement of children was collected from their class teachers. Popularity among classmates was assessed by asking children to indicate 3 classmates with whom they would like to be friends. Results. Results of the study revealed that ability of primary school children to recognize emotions is related to their popularity among peers in a non-linear way: though children, who were good at recognizing emotions, were not necessarily very popular, however, popular children demonstrated at least an average ability to recognize emotions (p = 0,03). Ability of primary school children to recognize emotions was linked to their academic achievement: as the ability to recognize emotions increased so did academic achievement (p = 0,009).