Author: Minnie Teng

On November 2nd, our team will be presenting our findings and discussing how teaching practices impact student wellbeing during UBC Thrive Week! Faculty, staff, and student alike are all invited to join the dialogue on teaching practices and student wellbeing!

Learn more here: http://thrive.ubc.ca/

The 2015 Undergraduate Experience Survey (UES) suggested that teaching practices do influence student mental wellbeing. For example, students have indicated that teaching practices such as engaging students in the learning process and having clear instructions on how to succeed in class were helpful to their learning and wellbeing. Based on these preliminary findings, we adjusted the questions in the 2016 UES to further explore students’ perceptions of teaching practices.

For the 2016 question set, students were asked to allocate 100 points between 14 teaching practices based on the degree to which each teaching practice positively impact their wellbeing:

• How would you rate the following teaching practices in terms of the degree to which they have positively impacted your wellbeing? Rate the following teaching practices by distributing 100 points amongst them. You can distribute your points any way you like, but they must total to 100. Note that by giving a teaching practice more points you are indicating that it has had a greater impact on your wellbeing.

5548 students completed the question. In addition to analyzing the data for the whole sample, the data was also analyzed by demographic information. Specifically, by year level, faculty, gender and international student status. While there were statistically significant differences in the means, the ranking of the teaching practices was roughly the same. For all year levels, both genders, international and domestic students and all but one faculties, the top three teaching practices for promoting wellbeing (among the 14 asked) were:

1. When the instructor is clear about the expectations for assessment
2. When the instructor takes complicated assignments and breaks them into smaller components
3. When the instructor is clear about the course objectives

The table below shows the mean number of points allocated to each of the 14 teaching practices. The expected average (i.e. if students allocated an equal number of points to each teaching practice) is 7.14.

Teaching Practice	Mean
When the instructor is clear about the expectations for assessment	11.374
When the instructor takes complicated assignments and breaks them into smaller components	10.592
When the instructor is clear about the course objectives	10.253
When the instructor makes explicit connections to concepts I know of – including common knowledge and prior learning	8.211
When the instructor provides feedback at multiple points in the course	8.162
When the instructor communicated her/his passion and enthusiasm for the discipline	8.098
When the instructor assigns problems and tasks that made clear the relevance and application of the learning to the world outside the classroom	6.513
When the instructor is accessible outside of class (i.e. office hours, email)	6.492
When the instructor suggests effective study strategies for the course	6.120
When the instructor is flexible with assignment deadlines	5.422
When the instructor is clear about how students can catch up on required, prerequisite knowledge they are missing	5.402
When the instructor creates/fosters a supportive classroom environment	5.093
When the instructor creates/fosters a safe classroom environment	4.318
When the instructor offers choice in assignments	4.310

The chart below shows the breakdown by bucket. Red bars indicate the percentage of students who allocated zero points to a teaching practice. Orange bars are between 0 and 7 points – some positive impact, but below the expected average. The “bucket” size of 7 was reused for two additional intervals before becoming too small to be meaningful.

This finding gives us a glimpse into the kinds of instructional practices that have the greatest positive impact on student wellbeing. Are the results surprising to you? Why or why not?

On September 24th, our team had the opportunity to share our findings at the First Year Experience Science Education Symposium. Our audience was a wonderful group of (mostly) science instructors. Before sharing the results, we asked our audience to rate their skill/knowledge in four areas; at the end of the presentation, we asked the audience the same four questions. The difference was remarkable!

	Average
	Pre	Post
I am knowledgeable regarding the impact of mental health and wellbeing on learning	7.3	7.7
I believe that faculty members are responsible for supporting student wellbeing	8.3	9.3
I have the skills to enhance student wellbeing through my teaching practices	5.4	8.0
I am knowledgeable about teaching practices that promote student mental wellbeing	4.5	8.6

It seems that these 20 instructors are already using many of the teaching practices that promote student wellbeing – they just didn’t aware that’s what they were doing! Since they were already using many of the teaching practices we shared during our presentation and on our handout, our challenge to them was to identify one or two new ideas they could incorporate into their teaching to move from good to great to exceptional.

Now it’s your turn: you are probably incorporating many practices that promote wellbeing into your teaching. In the comments, please share the techniques that you are already using and any new ideas that you are inspired to try!

Check out this student’s experience: Gurshabad wasn’t involved in the project, nor was the video produced in relation to the project, but he sure brings our findings to life!

https://youtu.be/siZYHxjLJQc

 

(Photo Credit: UBC Public Affairs)

16 semi-structured interviews were conducted over the 2015/16 academic year with instructors from the faculties of Arts and Science whom students identified as promoting their mental health and wellbeing. These 16 instructors were asked about the teaching practices they use in their classes and their motivation for doing so. Our analysis identified five ways in which these instructors appear to support student mental health and wellbeing:

1. The instructor cares about student learning

The majority of instructors interviewed indicated that they care about student learning. Several instructors interviewed indicated that they had never thought about their teaching from a wellness perspective, instead, they had only thought about the teaching practices they used from a learning perspective.  The instructors demonstrated this care for student learning by putting effort into ensuring that the course is interesting and relevant to students, providing extra learning support to students, and enhancing student skill and desire to learn.

2. The instructor cares about student mental health and wellbeing

Most instructors indicated that they care about the overall success and wellbeing of their students.  The instructors recognize that students are people and that they have lives outside of academics. Instructors demonstrated this by  being aware of student stressors, opening discussing mental health and wellbing in class, connecting students to campus resources, setting grading practices to accommodate non-academic needs. The instructors also noted that student wellbeing is associated with faculty wellbeing.

3. The instructor trusts and respects students

Instructors expressed their opinions on how they relate to students. These included comments such as trusting and respecting their students, respecting the students’ autonomy, treating the students as adults, and getting the students to start thinking about who they are and who they want to be in the world.

4. The instructor fosters a safe classroom environment

Several instructors described how they foster a safe classroom environment. A safe classroom environment is one where students feel safe sharing their thoughts and feelings (i.e. are not worried about being judged for making a mistake or for having a different opinion from the instructor/a classmate). A safe classroom environment also includes being culturally sensitive. Having trust and respect between the student and instructor seems to be an important foundation for establishing a safe classroom environment.

5. The instructor fosters peer connections

Several instructors described teaching practices they use in class to help students develop social connections with one another. Group work and in-class discussions were the primary methods instructors use to foster peer connections. Instructors described two benefits of fostering peer connections within the classroom. First, students often feel more comfortable asking questions and opening up to each other rather than faculty, so by encouraging peer interaction many professors are promoting wellbeing. Second, students feel more comfortable if they know they have their peers to rely on if they are not solid on the material.

Have you tried any of the above strategies in your classes to help promote student learning and wellbeing? Did you notice any difference in student learning? If you are a student – do you agree that these strategies would improve your mental wellbeing? We would love to hear your thoughts!

(Photo credit: UBC Public Affairs)

Over the 2015/16 academic year, seven focus groups were conducted with 29 students from the faculties of Arts and Science. Each focus group discussed how different teaching practices impacted their mental health and wellbeing. Our analysis identified five concepts instructors could incorporate into their curriculum in order to support student mental health and wellbeing:

1. The instructor fosters a sense of belonging

Student wellbeing is enhanced when students feel have strong peer relationships and feel a human connection with their instructor. In addition to promoting social wellbeing, a sense of connection helps students weather tough times and reach out when they need help academically.  For example, using student names and providing opportunities for students to interact within the class.

2. The instructor supports the whole student

Students have indicated that their wellbeing is supported when instructors are cognizant that students have a life outside of academics. Supporting the whole student means exactly this – recognizing that students have a life outside of academics, and planning the course with this in mind. For example, setting office hours to accommodate for students’ schedules, and incorporating flexibility into the grading scheme (i.e. dropping the lowest test mark or offering extensions).

3. The course content is meaningful and relevant to the student

Student motivation and student wellbeing seem to go hand in hand. Students are more motivated to learn when they find the material valuable to them; this could be accomplished by connecting course material to current events, providing opportunities to engage in community-based learning, or by showing students how course material might relate to a future career.

4. The learning process is engaging

Student wellbeing and motivation is enhanced when the learning process is engaging. Most students prefer an interactive learning environment, where there is a balance between lecture components and more active components such as discussion, questions, demonstrations, video, activities, etc. It also helps when the instructor is passionate about the subject and uses a bit of humour!

5. The instructor effectively supports student learning

Most students attend university to learn – and when they are learning well their wellbeing is also supported. In addition to clearly explaining course concepts, students suggested… Having tutorials and review sessions, as well as being consistent in content difficulty, format, and marking are some of the ways that students have suggested as supportive of their learning.

There you have it – teaching practices that are effective at promoting student mental wellbeing from students’ point of view. We’ll be sharing more info about each topic over the coming weeks. As an instructor, have you engaged in any of the above practices? Have you encountered any barriers when implementing them? Feel free to comment below and share your experiences!

 

By December 2015 our initial results were showing that an instructor’s choice of teaching practices absolutely has an impact on student wellbeing.  Our preliminary findings from the 2015 UES and fall-term student focus groups suggest that student wellbeing is enhanced when instructors choose teaching practices that:

1. Offer students clear expectations for how to succeed in the course,
2. Foster a safe and supportive classroom environment,
3. Support the student’s sense of connection with the course material,
4. Establish a personal connection with the students, and
5. Foster peer to peer connections between students.

To get more in-depth information on these topics we fine-tuned our questions for the winter term student focus groups, instructor interviews and our campus-wide student survey (part of the 2016 UES).

We added a couple of additional questions to the winter-term student focus groups in hopes of getting more information about how an instructor can foster connections between classmates (in the fall we heard that peer connections are important, but didn’t hear much about how an instructor can foster them), and what a safe and supportive classroom means to the students (since it was one of the top two responses from the 2015 UES, but we didn’t hear much about it in the focus groups). The full list of fall and winter term student focus group questions can be seen here.

As part of our winter-term instructor interviews, we shared this list with the instructors, and asked them to comment on the teaching practices and, if applicable, how the instructor integrates them into his/her classroom. The full list of fall and winter term instructor interview questions can be seen here.

Can you think of any other questions to ask our students or instructors in order to learn more about the impacts of teaching practices on student wellbeing? Feel free to share them with us by commenting below.

 

(Photo credit: UBC Public Affairs)

As our project aimed to identify teaching practices that positively influence student wellbeing, we wanted to hear from both the instructor and the student. From our interviews with instructors we hoped to learn more about practical teaching strategies that they believe enhance student wellbeing.

Specifically, we wanted to talk to instructors who were already promoting the wellbeing of their students, so that we could learn more about the teaching practices they use and the implications of engaging in such practices. But how to identify these instructors?

We asked the students of course!

On the 2015 Undergraduate Experiences Survey (UES) we included a question asking students to identify instructors who positively impacted their wellbeing over the previous year. From the students’ responses we compiled a very, VERY large list of names which we filtered down to a manageable number of instructors to interview. It was encouraging and exciting to see so many faculty members nominated by students, but we needed to start with a smaller group to do the interviews.

Our first step was to organize the list, grouping mentions together. The next step was to identify the correct spelling of the instructor’s name and which department he/she taught in. From there, we created two lists of instructors: one for the Faculty of Arts, and one for the Faculty of Science (these two faculties had formally partnered with us on the project).

These lists were still rather large (well over 100 instructors each!), so we had to filter them down some more. For the fall term interviews, we invited five instructors from Faculty of Arts and five instructors from Faculty of Science (one per department) who received either:

• A large total number of nominations, or
• A high percentage of nominations (total nominations divided by the number of undergraduate students taught in the 2015/16).

9 of the 10 instructors agreed to participate! It just so happened that they were evenly distributed across genders. Almost all were from Educational Leadership stream (more info on UBC’s tenure process and the Educational Leadership stream). For the winter term, we used the same criteria, but purposefully selected a balance between Professoriate (research) and Educational Leadership (teaching) streams from each faculty.

Upon learning how we recruited instructors, do you think there are ways we could improve how instructors were recruited? Feel free to comment below. We would love to hear your thoughts!

(Photo credit: Andy Roberts, Flickr link here)

“If the frogs in a pond started behaving strangely, our first reaction would not be to punish them or even to treat them. Instinctively, we’d wonder what was going on in the pond.”

Sharing the same sentiment expressed in this quote by Dan Reist, our team at the University of British Columbia wonders how the post-secondary environment and teaching practices may affect the mental health and wellbeing of undergraduate students. Numerous studies have shown that both sound mental health and teaching practice contributes to student learning, but little is known about how different teaching practices impact student mental health and wellbeing.

The rising number of students experiencing mental health challenges prompts us to explore how different teaching approaches may improve student mental health and wellbeing. To this end, with the support of the Teaching and Learning Enhancement Fund, we spearheaded the Teaching Practice & Student Mental Wellbeing project at the University of British Columbia, where we engaged students, faculty, instructors, and staff alike to participate in our quest to identify and eventually promote teaching practices that are conducive to improving student mental health and wellbeing.

Our team conducted a mixed methods study over the 2015/16 academic year, consisting of two campus-wide surveys, 7 focus groups (with a total of 29 students), and 16 instructor interviews. This blog is a platform to share our findings on teaching practices that promote both student learning and student wellbeing, and is a place where we can discuss and share wellbeing-promoting teaching practices with each other.