Add to favoritesWritten by Tara Embrey, OT Reg. (Ont.) & Melissa Beacom, OT Reg. (Ont.), partners at Mint Occupational Therapy
We often think of mental health support and learning skills as two distinct areas of support for students, when, in fact, they are intertwined. Being a learner can be an incredibly vulnerable experience that can make each task terrifying and often paralyzing: putting work out there to be evaluated, facing uncertainty about assignment expectations, carrying the weight of past academic struggle, and feeling the pressure to perform at or above the level of one’s peers. This experience can be magnified for students with learning disabilities and/or ADHD who might have a painful history with academic tasks and have had to work within a system designed for neurotypical brains. School experiences often leave an emotional legacy guiding students' behaviour beneath the surface.
Learning to Bounce (LTB) was a program designed by two occupational therapists (OTs) employed at the University of Guelph as accessibility advisors. The program explored the hidden emotional demands of academic tasks, so students could more accurately label and address what was getting in the way of completing work. LTB was piloted and researched in 2022/23 with University of Guelph students whose mental health or ADHD was impacting academic progress, motivation, or performance. Outcomes from the mixed methods research demonstrated a profound shift in how students approach academics with statistically significant improvements in school avoidance, perfectionism, self-compassion, academic resilience, connection with peers and stress management. Upon completing the program, students highlighted improved mental health and ability to attend lectures, write tests and exams, and complete schoolwork earlier or with more ease.
Learning to Bounce Format: Group Education, Study Hall, and 1-1 counselling
OTs facilitated six weekly group sessions exploring the emotional demands of schoolwork. Topics included mindfulness, stress awareness, perfectionism, shame, self-compassion, motivation, habits, and procrastination. As it takes practice to shift entrenched habits, LTB created weekly study halls—space and time to practice with support. If students got stuck or overwhelmed in study hall, they had access to 1-to-1 counselling with facilitators to apply new tools to current academic challenges. Facilitators centred themselves as learners and modelled vulnerability and non-judgment in interactions with students and each other. Facilitators ensured students experienced genuine support regardless of what schoolwork they did or did not do that week.
Learning to Bounce Content
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) was used to provide practical tools to help students make room for difficult emotions instead of avoiding them, helping students face scary tasks and thus decrease procrastination (Wang et. al, 2017). LTB paired an evolutionary lens (Hanson & Hanson, 2018) with habit research (Clear, 2018) to help students understand their stress response and how to work with it in the face of academic challenges. By recognizing that our brain is trying to help us, we can reduce the shame and blame of procrastination patterns. This practice opens the door to a more self-compassionate stance towards our struggles. Self-compassion helps with motivation (Kotera, et. al, 2023), engagement and perseverance (Babenko et. al, 2018). Self-compassion also buffers against academic stress (Zhang et. al, 2016), supports coping with failure and setbacks, and improves mental health (Trompetter et al., 2017).
“If your brain is perceiving a threat, it will put your system in a state of hyperarousal or shutdown, and we call that procrastination and lack of motivation. There is no such thing as true lack of motivation.” Britt Frank, Science of Stuck (2022)
Students with learning disabilities and ADHD have often faced repeated experiences of academic struggle and shame, which can lead to avoidance of the tasks that have caused pain in the past. It is so human to want to protect yourself from repeated suffering. Noticing our thoughts and feelings allows us to respond with intention rather than being swept away by this pain (Fletcher, et al., 2010). This awareness can help us break unhealthy patterns and develop positive coping strategies to promote academic perseverance (Teper et al., 2013). Combining mindfulness exercises with self-compassion has been shown to reduce the impairment caused by perfectionism in university students (James & Rimes, 2018). Students in LTB tuned into the high cost of pursuing perfection and learned tools to shift towards healthy striving.
“Perfectionism kills curiosity by telling us that we have to know everything or we risk looking 'less than'. Perfectionism tells us that our mistakes and failures are personal defects, so we either avoid trying new things or we barely recover every time we inevitably fall short.” Brene Brown, Atlas of the Heart (2021)
Research Findings
A mixed methods approach was used to answer the following research question: What impact did the LTB program have on students’ academic functioning and wellness? Qualitative Data was gathered through exit interviews (n=38) and open-ended responses to an anonymous feedback survey (n=35). Quantitative data was gathered from consenting LTB participants who completed both the intake and exit surveys (n=23 undergraduate, n=7 graduate) and/or the anonymous feedback survey (n=35). Those surveys included the Academic Resilience Scale (ARS-30) developed by Cassidy (2016), the Self-Compassion Scale - Short Form (SCS-SF) developed by Raes et al. (2011) and additional questions created for LTB. The following highlights some of the key themes that emerged from the data.
Developing Awareness
Mindfulness was a powerful tool to support students in managing academic stressors:
“[I’m] starting to be able to recognize the spirals that I can get into before I've gone all the way down — Sometimes I can pull myself back and focus on something else.”
Students shared how during times of stress and overwhelm, LTB grounding tools helped them to check in with themselves and get back on track:
“The [strategy] that really sticks out is the one to help get present in the space...it really helped with my avoidance. It lets me review the situation and what I'm feeling.”
Students developed insight into their internal states and the root causes of procrastination and perfectionism. Instead of viewing patterns as character flaws, such as being lazy or unintelligent, students took their new learning on the evolutionary basis of stress to understand the natural reasons for avoiding work:
“I've not allowed things to be seen as character flaws. It's not because I'm not smart – it's because I'm scared that I can't do it. I'm not taking it to heart.”
“For me, learning to understand the reasoning for why we do certain impractical things and how we can get around them has been the most impactful. For example, procrastinating because the task doesn't feel safe so you avoid it as you would with any other danger.”
Cultivating Self-Compassion
Instead of beating themselves up for failing to meet preconceived expectations for academic performance, students started to shift their self-talk toward a more accepting and gentle tone. In line with the scholarly research, many students in LTB reported that self-compassion helped them to manage academic stressors, overcome shame and support themselves when tired or overwhelmed:
“After I would hand assignments in, I would get stuck thinking about things I forgot or did wrong. This time, I...did think of something I forgot, but instead of beating myself up and saying 'You're stupid. You messed up, you idiot,' I was able to let it go and say, ‘It happens'.”
On the self-compassion scale (SCS-SF), the number of students scoring low on self-compassion decreased from 15 at intake to 7 at exit. While only 1 student had a high self-compassion score at intake, 9 did by exit.
Tackling Avoidance
Students discussed a profound shift in how they approached academics after LTB, including attending lectures more frequently, writing tests even when feeling underprepared, getting started on assignments earlier or with more ease, handing in assignments more consistently, and requesting fewer extensions:
“In the past, I would have not written a test if I didn't feel prepared enough. I would find the experience too scary, so would sleep through it. Then, I would start the exhausting process of trying to solve the situation - reaching out to the professor and accessibility services. So exhausting.”
“I came to study hall for support and got started on the things that I was worried about. Once starting, I would often find it was not as hard an assignment as anticipated, so I was able to work through it once I started. In the past I would avoid it...I cried, spiraled, had mental breakdowns, isolated from friends, avoided schoolwork.”
The quantitative results also reflect a significant reduction in avoidance. Before LTB, the majority of students (67%) were avoiding work most of the time or almost always. At exit, the majority of students (67%) had shifted to sometimes or almost never avoiding. Remarkably, at intake 12 of 30 students almost always avoided academic work, and by exit that dropped to zero students.
From Perfectionism to Healthy Striving
For many students, perfectionism has been a constant companion for years, significantly impacting mental health and academic progress. After LTB, perfectionism started to loosen its hold on many students, freeing them up to engage in learning and pursue excellence with less fear:
“I only deferred one midterm and one project [this semester]. In the past, I couldn't even write midterms and couldn't write assignments because perfectionism paralyzed me.”
Some students started to separate their self-worth from their performance, placing more value on the process of learning than on the outcome of their academic work:
“After [my] nutrition midterm, I left and felt calm for the first time. Didn’t even check what I got right or wrong. Didn’t care what mark I would get. It was such a foreign thing to say for me. I did my best and put it out there. I’ve been able to focus more on the learning than the outcome.”
“Before, I looked at schoolwork with fear and intimidation, that it wouldn't go well or be too much for me to do. In reality, I'll be able to do this. I don't have to do it perfectly.”
In a pre and post-comparison, students identified a marked and statistically significant reduction (α=0.001) in how much perfectionism was impeding their academics. Before LTB, 40% of students were ‘almost always’ impacted by perfectionism and at exit that dropped to zero students.
Improving Mental Health
Many students explained that following LTB they are more accepting of difficult thoughts and emotions that arise in the academic context and are managing their mental health symptoms better than in the past:
“I'm starting to be attuned to my mental health. I have that harsh voice in my head and it's there but I'm just going to do my thing.”
“[LTB] has played a big role in keeping me healthy and on track and in a more positive headspace. Less feelings of being overwhelmed.”
Students noted that LTB helped them handle stress better than before. Students described being able to ride the wave and make space for challenging emotions rather than push them away:
“I was more like ‘that kind of sucks! What are my options?’ In the past I would freak out that the world was over.”
“I was stressed out about final projects, but... I was better able to handle emotions and complete work and not get stuck in own head.”
In the intake and exit survey, students were asked how satisfied they were with how they manage academic stressors. Notably, the majority of students (97%) were dissatisfied with how they managed academic stressors at intake and by exit the majority of students (67%) were satisfied with how they managed academic stressors. This change represents a statistically significant improvement at α=0.001.
Power of Community and Belonging
The most profound and consistent impact reported by students was finding belonging. The authentic community helped students see they were not alone in their struggles, sometimes for the first time. They also began to realize the gifts they had to offer. While honouring the true challenges that can come with neurodivergence, LTB also shone light on the gifts that are often lost in our neuronormative culture:
“What I found to have the greatest impact on me was the overall acceptance that I felt from the group. I don't think I've ever had conversations with people who really faced the same things as me. Having the extra support from people who actually get it made me feel a lot more "normal" and less of a burden.
“Learning that I was not alone in my academic challenges allowed me to accept that my struggles are real and valid. From there, I could shift towards making an action plan, instead of being stuck in shame.”
Summary
Following LTB, many students became more flexible in their framing of challenges, more self-compassionate, and more accepting of their emotions, culminating in an improved ability to approach schoolwork, persevere through challenges, and remain hopeful for future semesters:
“I can’t describe how much better this semester has gone for me in comparison to the last few years. Maybe not a super huge change in terms of grades, but certainly in my ability to cope with challenges, remain hopeful, and to pull myself up again if I fall down.”
“I think it was the most helpful part of my university experience.”
“I feel like it just changed my life.”
Helping students recognize the hidden emotions that are underlying their approach to schoolwork has the power to transform their relationship with academics. Through the combination of ACT, an evolutionary lens, nervous system awareness, self-compassion, and mindfulness, LTB normalized students’ experiences of struggle and decreased the shame that can get people stuck. Equipping students with effective research-based tools and a community of support provides the opportunity to engage with the learning and bounce back from academic hurdles. Integrating these emotional learning skills into curriculum supports growth and learning for all students, including neurodivergent learners.
To learn how you can put these strategies to work in your classroom and prepare students with LDs for post-secondary, click here to read the article "Developing Emotional Learning Skills to Prepare Students for Post-Secondary"
Disclaimer: The Learning to Bounce program was created by Tara and Melissa in the course of their employment with the University of Guelph and all rights in and to the Learning to Bounce program are retained by the University of Guelph. Their current community work with Mint Occupational Therapy is completely independent from the Learning to Bounce program at the University of Guelph and is not associated or endorsed by the University of Guelph and the University specifically disclaims all responsibility with respect thereto.
Special thanks to our co-creators: the dedicated students who put their whole hearts and efforts into Learning to Bounce and to student occupational therapist, Joelle Chandler who was a tremendous help with the research.
About the Authors:
Tara Embrey is a neurodivergent occupational therapist and psychotherapist with a wealth of experience in mental health and ADHD support. As an accessibility advisor at the University of Guelph, she saw students struggling with perfectionism, procrastination, and shame. As part of this role, she co-created Learning to Bounce, a transformative group therapy program based on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. Now working in the community through her company, Mint OT, Tara supports youths and adults in their academic, professional, and parenting journeys. Her practice is characterized by compassion, enthusiasm, and a deep belief in the inherent worth of every person.
Melissa Beacom is an occupational therapist who practices psychotherapy with more than 20 years of experience as an accessibility advisor at the University of Guelph with a specialty in mental health. Melissa uses Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and her occupational therapy lens to provide practical tools to help learners tackle perfectionism, avoidance and improve motivation. In 2022, in her role at the University of Gulph, Melissa co-created Learning to Bounce, an evidence-based program that helps students explore and manage the hidden emotional demands of learning to help them flourish as learners. Melissa now supports clients in the community through her company, Mint OT.
References
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