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This article reports on a teacher-researcher's efforts to understand tensions and dilemmas encountered during a doctoral narrative inquiry research project with eight children in an urban, multidenominational primary school in the east of Ireland. Using a narrative inquiry framework and focusing on the teacher-researcher's experiences, this article makes visible how tensions and dilemmas shaped the teacher-researcher's ongoing identity formation, the inquiry and offers insight to others so they may learn from these experiences. This article conceptualises tension as the bumping of lives [Clandinin, D. Jean, and Michael F. Connelly. 2000. "Narrative Inquiry: Experience and Story in Qualitative Research." 1st ed. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers] and the irresolvable desire to have one's story told [Cavarero, Adriana. 2000. "Relating Narratives: Storytelling and Selfhood." Florence: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315824574]. The narratives contained in this article were gathered across several arts-based workshops and include dialogue vignettes between children and the teacher-researcher, segments from the teacher-researcher's fieldnotes and personal research journal. The article has implications for teachers who transition into doctoral studies and become teacher-researchers. Findings support the idea that problematic encounters faced while engaging in school-based research can be considered sites where new possibilities of understanding and knowing may emerge.

Internationally and nationally, government and educational policies prioritise wellbeing to support education. Social-emotional learning (SEL), a frequently used term for wellbeing in the United States of America (USA), comprises accrued skills enacted over time. This article presents the findings of an arts-based narrative inquiry exploring eight primary school children's experiences of the five foundations of the social-emotional and academic learning program "You Can Do It (YCDI) Program Achieve." YCDI is a structured classroom-based programme where children are taught explicit SEL skills through lessons based on the five programme foundations, or SEL competencies, of "Organisation," "Confidence," "Getting Along," "Persistence," and "Resilience." Using a three-dimensional, narrative inquiry framework, the researcher addresses two questions: What impact did the YCDI programme and its foundations have on the children's lives on and off the school landscape? What are the implications for the future implementation of the YCDI programme? Through the presentation of children's narratives, this study provides insight into how YCDI improved the children's SEL skills and wellbeing. It also prompts important questions for those considering the program's implementation in the future.