Resource library

10 Ways to Embed Well-being into Remote Learning Environments
Remote learning environments come with their unique challenges. Creating conditions for our well-being will help us be resilient while we navigate these challenging situations. In a post-secondary institution, the learning environment is a central and crucial setting for creating a healthy campus community. Student health and well-being is a key predictor for student learning, success, and retention.

5-Minute Well-being Activities
Use these 5-minute well-being activities (no prep needed) to help your students enhance their well-being and academic success.

8 Ways to Build Resilience
This series of videos, presented by the Health Peers, is based on Health Promotion content found in Bouncing Forward Resilience Course. Students can learn about the 6 building blocks of cultivating resilience and follow along with the activities demonstrated in each of the videos. Consider sharing these with students or schedule them as part of your classes, lectures, seminars, labs, tutorials, etc.

Active Learning Techniques
Duke University has put together this guide on active learning techniques. Help build a positive classroom culture by incorporating some of these and strategies in your lectures or class time.

Assessing Student Well-being in Class
These questions have been designed for you to measure the impacts of your efforts in creating conditions for well-being in learning environments. They can be used as instructor specific questions on your Student Evaluation of Teaching and Courses (SETC), or within any other feedback and course evaluation tools you use.

Assignment and Assessment Design
This resource aims to offer ideas centered on flexible learning through intentional design of assignments and rethinking how we assess learning.

Bouncing Forward Resilience Course
This free, CCR-credited online Canvas course provides strategies on how students can build their personal resilience and improve their well-being. It can be shared with your students in your syllabus, on your lecture slides or through an announcement. You can also invite SFU Health Promotion to come and present this content to your class.

Celebratory Research Poster Sessions
To create an opportunity for students to share their projects in a poster session designed to meet educational goals. It is also an opportunity for students to celebrate each other’s accomplishments in the class. The non-graded awards are designed to include students who may not think quantitative analysis is their strength, but nonetheless put creativity into the conceptual development of their projects and effort into their assignments.

City Studio
Paola Ardiles supports civic engagement by having students work in collaboration with partner organizations like City Studio through service learning.

Class Check In Activity
To promote social connection between students, try facilitating these quick class check-in activities at the beginning of the hour.

Comment Card
Use this comment card by Mark Lechner to get feedback from your students throughout the term and create a flexible learning experience.

Contractual Agreement
Nicky Didicher enhances flexibility for students through “learner centered teaching” and use of contractual evaluations in which students choose their assignments, the weighting of their assignments and due dates.

Creating Class Guidelines for Working Together
Use this class guidelines activity to respect difference and create a safe place for discussion.

Creative Pre-class Activities for Social Connectedness and Student Engagement
These activities increase student engagement and help students start off the class connected and with their brains activated.

English as an Additional Language (SFU)
SFU has a variety of academic resources and support structures for EAL students, many of which have been compiled in this brief document.

First Day and Midterm Questionnaires
To enhance the relationship between the instructor and students in the class by using a student-centered approach to cater course content that better suits different learning preferences.

Get to Know Your Prof
To foster positive classroom culture, you can try these methods of introducing yourself to your class, helping them get to know you better as a person and not just as an instructor.

Group-generated Study Guide
Use this group-generated study guide assignment to encourage students to work effectively in teams while building professional skills.

Health and Well-being Resources Slide Deck
SFU Health Promotion has built a presentation slide deck you can use to share health and well-being information and supports with students at the beginning or end of your class. Contact Health Promotion or learn more about well-being education resources.

Ideas for Social Connection Start Ups
Foster social connection by trying out these quick activities in your classroom to get students talking to one another.

In The News Activity
Use this activity to help relate your course content to real world and current issues in the news.

Inclusive Classrooms Checklist
Kathleen Burke and her colleague Brett Lyons co-created a checklist and resources for inclusive classrooms that are being used to foster inclusivity within the Beedie School of Business.

Informational Interview Assignment
Try this informational interview assignment, created by Tara Immell, to help students build connections and navigate job uncertainty.

Intercultural Competencies
Intercultural competencies are abilities that help you work with and learn from people of other cultures. Explore the SFU Library’s training guide on intercultural communication, equity, diversity, and inclusion.

Interculture Awareness Resources
Explore videos, infographics, and resources to learn how to better foster inclusivity by supporting EAL (English as an Additional Language) students.

Involvement Opportunities
Let your students know about ways they can get involved at SFU, such as SFU's Peer Education programs, Passport to Leadership, Peer Mentorship and more. These opportunities help students develop new skills, gain confidence, learn about leadership and how to prepare for the workforce, and build their social connections, all of which impact their overall well-being.

LGBTQIA2S+ Resources
This is intended to be a draft/work-in-progress list of resources to support SFU FHS faculty in creating a safer and more inclusive university environment for trans, gender non-binary, and other gender diverse students, research participants, staff, faculty, and other community stakeholders. Please send updates, additions, and feedback to travis_salway@sfu.ca and pardiles@sfu.ca. Resources compiled at/after discussion at FC, January 16, 2020.

Make Space
Maintaining our overall well-being is key to maintaining a supportive learning and working environment at SFU – whether you’re a student, staff, or faculty member. SPACE is an easy-to-remember acronym that outlines five evidence-based areas to support your own, your peers’, or your colleague’s mental health.

Media Labs and Embodied Humanities
This resource offers suggestions on how to incorporate an Embodied Humanities approach to help ground students in the material world and make eighteenth-century literature that students read more engaging.

Mindfulness Meditation Practice
Taking a moment to pause and breathe can help students relax, de-stress, be present, and feel more grounded. Consider sharing self-guided mindfulness resources or schedule them as part of your classes, lectures, seminars, labs, tutorials, etc. Explore these resources, audio/video recordings and downloadable apps.

Practices that support student well-being in remote (or in-person) settings
Atousa Hajshirmohammadi spends 5-10 minutes of each class to introduce tools and topics related to well-being. Explore a variety of ways to show students that you care and support their well-being and success in learning

Pronoun Etiquette Cheat Sheet
Adam Dyck creates an inclusive classroom by supporting the declaration of self-identified pronouns in a “pronoun round” as part of introductions at the beginning of the semester.

Reality Check Reflection Tool
Use this reality check reflection tool, to encourage students to think about their values and abilities.

Recognizing & Referring Students in Difficulty
Learn more about how to support students in difficulty, referrals to resources, and tips for taking care of yourself. This is a companion document for faculty, instructors, staff, and TA/TMs to the SFU Supporting Students in Distress Response Guide.

SFU's Response Guide for Faculty and Staff
SFU's Response Guide for Faculty and Staff is written to help you identify and potentially assist students in distress, pointing them in the direction of appropriate services and supports for their situation.

San'yas Indigenous Cultural Safety Training (PHSA)
The PHSA (Provincial Health Services Authority) of BC delivers the San'yas: Indigenous Cultural Safety Program, a valuable resource in fostering inclusivity in your classroom.

Stress Reduction Tips
ResourceDescription

Stretch Break
Use these stretching techniques (see PowerPoint slides) during a class break to help students relax and feel their best.

Supporting EAL Learners
The SFU Centre for Educational Excellence (CEE) provides support, resources, and consultations for SFU’s multilingual teaching and learning community. Find a wide range of workshops, resources, and tools to support students who use English as an additional language.

Syllabus Language Regarding Stress and Support Services for Mental Well-being
You can use this language in your class syllabus to help better inform your students about the support services available to them for their mental well-being.

TLC: Experiential Learning Casebook
The Teaching and Learning Centre has compiled stories told by faculty members and students at Simon Fraser University in the Experiential Learning Casebook, filled with examples of ways to foster real life learning.

Teaching Philosophy of Stephen Brown
Be inspired by this sample teaching philosophy to get ideas for how you could create a supportive one in your class.

Team Based Learning
Learn more about team based learning and how you can use it to create social connections among students, and build a resilient and supportive learning community in your class.

Team Style Grading Rubric
Use this grading rubric to improve your students’ experience with group work, by assigning grades to the quality of team work.

Template for Feedback
Use this template to explore how you can share links to resources with students within the feedback you provide on their work.

Ten Strategies for Inclusivity in Remote or Online Learning Environments
The following PDF includes strategies for faculty and instructors to enhance inclusivity in their courses, in particular for remote or online learning environments. To learn more about student well-being, check out the Well-being in Learning Environments initiative, a collaboration between Health Promotion and the Centre for Educational Excellence.

The “Work-window” Time Management Method for Individual and Group Assignments
This resource shares a holistic approach to teaching that support student success and well-being by incorporating a strategic time management technique called the “work-window”.

Tips for an Accessible Learning Environment
Explore these tips for creating an Accessible Learning Environment.

Trans and queer supportive spaces: resource guide
his online resource guide includes toolkits, reports, graphics, and additional resources to learn more about how to contribute to a more inclusive learning environment.

Universal Design for Learning in Post-secondary Education
The Teaching and Learning Centre has shared a guide on the 9 Principles of Universal Design, with clear examples and suggestions on how to implement each principle both in the classroom as well as online in a Canvas course.

Using Data to Answer Questions
To enhance the connection between course material and real life, and students' sense of engagement with the learning process.

Using Digital Tools to Support Student Engagement, Collaboration, and Well-being
This resource offers ideas on digital tools and strategies that instructors and students can use to increase student engagement and facilitate collaboration.

Well-Being Check-Ins and Tips for Online Learning Environments
Enhance student well-being and learning by embedding brief well-being check-in’s in an online learning environment like Canvas. The following content is Canvas-ready – simply copy and paste any of the check-in’s below onto a new content page in your course.

Write and Reflect
Jenny Scott uses a two-minute write and reflect activity to help create social connection and positive classroom culture by having students reflect on and share their experiences with the course material.