Incorporating Wellness to Promote Metacognitive Knowledge and Regulation

Alexis Hauck & Angela L. Vaughan: University of Northern Colorado

The secret of health for both mind and body is not to mourn for the past, not to worry about the future, or not to anticipate troubles, but to live in the present moment wisely and earnestly.

—Buddha

As students transition to college, they typically face many challenges; however, these difficulties have increased substantially for today’s students in the midst of an ongoing pandemic. As a result, student wellness has become a priority. This does not just include physical wellness but also many other areas such as emotional and social wellbeing. In the past, many programs feature wellness as a specific unit or content area; however, as a counterpoint, it is important to intentionally plan and incorporate wellness throughout the semester with connections to multiple topics. In this issue of The Toolbox, we will examine some basic strategies for including wellness into the student learning experience.

Incorporating Wellness to Promote Metacognitive Knowledge and Regulation

Today, effective instruction goes well beyond teaching students content. Instructors are charged with the task of creating and maintaining an environment that promotes a safe place to learn. With increased enrollments of diverse student populations, many who are the first in their family to attend college, instructors also seek to help students meet basic needs. These include safe living spaces (e.g., roommate problems that pull students away from class and finishing homework), managing their money/budget so they can have consistent food access, as well as making sure content gets covered. As such, programs are asking a great deal of academic advisors, graduate students, faculty and staff who teach first-year experience seminars and want to make student safety and wellbeing a priority.

It is quite common to receive feedback from students that wellness-related topics should be covered earlier in the semester. Although wellness is often shared and discussed anecdotally throughout, the specific units on wellness often do not occur until before the midterms (e.g., test anxiety) and again at the end of the semester (e.g., dimensions of wellness) prior to finals. Students connect well with these topics because they are relevant to how they conceptualize their lives at these moments. They, for example, understand how their social wellness impacts their emotional wellness. Additionally, these are areas of their lives that they were invested in maintaining and improving (i.e., social, emotional, physical, intellectual, etc.). It is, therefore, recommended that faculty make a conscious decision to overtly incorporate wellness concepts into lesson planning and class discussions from the very beginning. Intentional planning can impact student’s understanding of concepts like goal setting, metacognition, and time management as they become even more applicable to their lives through a wellness lens. Especially as these students, many times, are walking into the classroom stressed out, sleep deprived, and anxious.

WELLNESS IN ACTION

Visualization

On the very first day of the course, for example, instructors can utilize mindfulness through a visualization exercise. Students are asked to visualize themselves on graduation day, walking across the stage in their cap and gown, shaking the hand of their department head and looking out into the audience to see people who care about them. Then, students are asked to write a letter to themselves that states their purpose in choosing to invest in their education. At various points in the semester (e.g., after mid-term exams and during the motivation unit), students reread their letters to remind themselves of their purpose and to help them persist and move past the tough times.

Goal Setting

During the second week, students are invited to discuss goals and goal setting. This is the first time instructors introduce the idea of a “Wellness Wheel.” Students are asked to assess their satisfaction with their personal wellness in six key areas: Physical, Social, Emotional, Spiritual, Intellectual, and Occupational. Following this self-assessment, students then write:

» Four personal goals

» Weekly action steps for the goals

» Obstacles that they can identify, and

» Action steps to reduce the influence of those obstacles.

Additionally, literature has shown that sharing one’s goal with another person increases the likelihood of goal attainment (Morisano et al., 2010). As part of this activity, students identify someone with whom they can share their goals. Finally, students are asked to write a narrative statement where they visualize the change they are seeking in their life, and why they deserve to achieve this goal. In this process, students explicitly connect their goals to areas of wellness and begin to understand how working toward and attaining their goals is all a part of strengthening their personal wellness.

Introducing Metacognition

Although students do not often realize this until later, but these reflective activities are integral to metacognitive processes. Part of the goal-setting process and metacognitive regulation process involves revisiting and reevaluating progress toward goal achievement over time. To facilitate this evaluation, a guide is included for students to check-in with their goals every three to four weeks throughout the semester. This includes reflection on four key questions:

» What has worked well for me over the past four weeks?

» What do I need to accomplish in the next four weeks?

» What did not work?

» What can I adjust?

Later in the semester, these activities effectively connect students’ experiences directly to the metacognition unit. Their experiences and responses provide clear illustrations of both metacognitive knowledge (i.e., knowledge of person, task, and strategy; Flavell, 1979) and metacognitive regulation (i.e., planning, monitoring, and evaluating; Brown, 1987; Fogarty, 1994). For students, the end result is that metacognitive processes are not necessarily abstract but a concrete way to achieve the goals that are important to them. Faculty can then connect these processes to other personal and academic areas.

Other Ideas for Metacognition

Other ideas for incorporating metacognition and wellness into an academic classroom include:

» Financial planning activities related to course content

» Using peer mentors to provide the student perspective on how they see/implement wellness in their lives as college students

» As a welcome to class each day, share slides that highlight upcoming campus activities

» The creation of “Ideal Weekly Schedules” that incorporate both academic and personal priorities (e.g., religious services, fitness routines, time with friends, etc.)

» Offer extra credit to students when they write about their experiences after a wellness activity

» Reflective writing during class as a way for students to practice this important skill

» Embedding weekly routines into the class (e.g., last 15 minutes of the week) that provide an open forum for students to talk about their experiences, successes, and challenges

» Regular mindfulness and visualization practices during class time to practice this new skill

Figure 1. Taken from Vaughan & Wilkinson, 2019.

REFERENCES

Brown, A. (1987). Metacognition, executive control, self-regulation, and other more mysterious mechanisms. In F. E. Weinert & R. H. Kluwe, (Eds.) Metacognition, motivation, and understanding (pp. 65-116). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Flavell, J. H. (1979). Metacognition and cognitive monitoring: A new area of cognitive–developmental inquiry. American Psychologist, 34(10), 906–911. https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.34.10.906

Fogarty, R. (1994). How to teach for metacognitive reflection. Palatine, Ill: IRI/Skylight Pub.

Morisano, D., Hirsh, J. B., Peterson, J. B., Pihl, R. O., & Shore, B. M. (2010). Setting, elaborating, and reflecting on personal goals improves academic performance. Journal of Applied Psychology, 95(2), 255 – 264.

Vaughan, A. L., & Wilkinson, B. D. (2019). Educational psychology for learners: Connecting theory, research, and application (2nd ed.). Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt.