Early Development of Academic Skills in the Classroom

This is a two-arm cluster randomized controlled trial. The two arms will be: 1) Intervention group, where the stimulation program will be implemented; and 2) Comparison group (active). The aim of this study is: To evaluate the effectiveness of a program aimed at stimulating cognitive (working memory and inhibitory control), emotional (emotion recognition), and social competence skills (choice of prosocial behaviors) for the development of initial literacy learning and pre-calculation in socioeconomically disadvantaged preschoolers immediately after the intervention and at 6, 12, 18, and 24 months post intervention, controlling for gender, mental health, and baseline state of the skills stimulated. The intervention program, which targets cognitive, emotional, and social competence skills, was designed for socioeconomically disadvantaged preschoolers in order to stimulate their working memory, inhibitory control, emotion recognition, and choice of prosocial behaviors during the development of the academic skills of initial literacy learning and pre-calculation. Immediately after the completion of the intervention program, participants are expected to show improvements in these skills and the academic skills of initial literacy learning and pre-calculation.