Systemic Pedagogy in Primary Education Classrooms: A Quasi-Experimental Pilot Study of Teacher-Rated Observable Academic Performance in Language and Mathematics

Systemic pedagogy was developed for Angelica Olvera at the CUDEC center and implemented in schools in Spain and Latin America; however, quantitative evidence remains absent. This exploratory pilot study examined whether students in classrooms implementing this approach showed higher observable academic performance in Spanish Language and Mathematics in Grades 1–2 of Primary Education, using a quasi-experimental pretest–posttest design with one classroom per condition per grade. Sixty-nine students participated (Grade 1: n = 33; Grade 2: n = 36); direct-observation rubric scores, operationalized as teacher-rated observable academic performance, served as dependent variables, analyzed via ANCOVA with pretest scores as a covariate. All four primary analyses showed significant group differences (p ≤ 0.003), with large-to-very-large effect sizes (ω2p = 0.225–0.540; d = 0.40–1.16). In Grade 2, the control group declined in Language (Δ = −0.044, p = 0.025) and showed no gains in Mathematics. Subscale results revealed a cross-grade descriptive pattern consistent with a hypothesized temporal progression: relational and procedural dimensions showed larger differences in Grade 1, whereas cognitive dimensions showed larger differences in Grade 2. A genuine test of this sequence would require longitudinal measurement of the same cohort. Aligned with Control-Value Theory and Self-Determination Theory, these preliminary, hypothesis-generating findings require replication with larger samples, multiple classrooms per condition, and blinded external assessors.