Two separate examples for how staff can better engage with students during one-on-one meetings, often in the personal tutor system. For example, student pathway preparation or how best to engage with students when they organise a meeting.

Students writing an essay on a negotiated topic are required to have the topic agreed by the module leader before the end of term, and to provide a draft essay structure and an indicative list of sources. In order to ensure there are no last-minute crises, I use this approach to ensure that a) students have a good source base for topics that can be very varied (and perhaps not covered in detail in the module and/or the module reading list), and b) aware of the extent of the topic as set by the essay question.

To carry out group presentations via submitted video instead of in front of the class. This allows students who are more introverted to feel comfortable presenting their ideas at their own pace and time.

This pedagogy involves creating an audio or visual rubric for assessment briefs to replace the traditional written style. This aims to facilitate a more inclusive environment for those students who learn in different ways and encourages a less daunting feeling when it comes to assessments.

At the end of each day students are asked to complete a feedback sheet with regard to the days teaching. On the feedback sheet – either paper or could be digital - there are four boxes headed: Liked, Disliked, Insights, Queries. The tutor collects these from students at the end of each day and looks through them. At the first session the next day queries are responded to and dislikes acknowledged and any remedial action that could be take is mentioned.

Guidance, warnings and ground rules are all designed to make learning spaces welcoming and inclusive for all students. By taking into account individual students’ needs and experiences, and setting clear parameters for content, dialogue, and classroom interactions, all students know that the classroom is a space in which they can share their ideas in a collegial and constructive environment.

Allocating reading material is a strategy that can promote co-production, peer-to-peer learning and alleviate workload for students in a seminar setting. The idea is to allocate a proportion of the articles or research papers from a week’s reading list; then create small groups (3-4) and divide the reading responsibilities equally between the different members of each group. At this stage, invite each member to provide a condensed series of notes for each of the readings they’ve been assigned to be brought in for the subsequent seminar. In the next seminar, you invite the groups to go through their notes and engage in a peer-to-peer learning exercise. This helps build on class integration, interpersonal skills and access to a wider range of reading material for class discussion.

Feeling good is how we feel physically, mentally and emotionally. Everyone will have times where they do not feel good. You may feel physically poorly, or mentally and emotionally drained and struggling. There will be times when you may not feel good or function well and at these times, it is important to have a toolkit that you can use to help yourself and to make positive changes. The more you practice these skills, the more you will understand what works best for you. Subsequently it is important to promote these strategies and focal points to colleagues and students.