6 Resilient and Flexible Teaching (RAFT): Integrating a Whole-Person Experience into Online Teaching

When venturing into wild or unknown territory such as a swiftly moving and ever-changing mountain river, a raft may be a necessary tool for basic survival. But what if during the careful navigation of rapid currents around rocks and other obstacles, you discover that your buoyant and flexible tool helps you to float through the fast and turbulent waters in a way that is meaningful, awe-inspiring, and exciting? As COVID-19 first hit our campuses, many of us switched to emergency remote education as a survival raft, just trying to stay afloat long enough to get to the other side of the semester without drowning. We quickly abandoned in-person teaching and jumped aboard online platforms, scrambling to provide continuity in learning and curriculum for our students. But as we begin to further explore these new waters, perhaps we will see our pandemic year as a catalyst for building a better equipped, sturdier, and more graceful model of resilient and flexible teaching (RAFT).

RAFT, a holistic, student-centered pedagogy, engages our learners in the best practices of our brick-and-mortar environments but within a flexible setting that allows them to navigate turbulent waters. RAFT not only provides for a flexible and resilient format but also engages students in a way that they become more resilient themselves. With rates of depression and anxiety increasing in young people (Chirikov et al., 2020) coupled with our national unrest and increasing global crises such as the pandemic and the effects of climate change, education needs to be flexible while also providing students with the tools necessary to navigate chaos. Instruction and services need to be offered to students in a way that they can easily access and integrate resources into their complicated lives. Resilient and flexible teaching integrates student support into the content and delivery of courses, and emphasizes both academics and well-being, helping students become better able to withstand disturbances.

By incorporating simple and holistic support strategies into the classroom, institutions have the capacity to shift from a pre-COVID, siloed campus environment to a post-COVID community in which integrated campus partners are empowered to build a more resilient teaching experience that prepares students to negotiate uncertain futures. The added benefit of the RAFT approach is that the holistic student experience creates opportunities for more equitable access to learning. In this chapter, we will discuss the RAFT model and offer examples of how to weave high-impact pedagogical strategies and essential student support services into excellent teaching, regardless of the format or location.

Paddling Quickly: What is Flexible Teaching?

With the onset of COVID-19, faculty and students were thrown into turbulent water and forced to paddle quickly in survival mode. Boulders and snags popped up as we moved students online with little support in the middle of the Spring semester. In addition to health concerns about the virus, students experienced unemployment, food and housing insecurity, and increased rates of depression and anxiety. These issues were especially problematic for students in historically disadvantaged groups (Anderson, 2020). Many institutions were loosely aware of these issues and tried to accommodate students in our emergency remote spring and summer. By the Fall 2020 term, however, most higher-education professionals became familiar with any number of better organized online and hybrid design models in teaching, from asynchronous to synchronous, blended to mostly in-person (Maloney & Kim, 2020). “Hyflex” teaching, for example, rose to prominence for many campuses with students split between face-to-face and remote environments. It is defined as using hybrid teaching (blending both classroom and online learning) to create flexible paths for students, such as offering student choice in the mode by which they complete the course (Beatty, 2019). Hyflex and other hybrid approaches work during times of disruption because they allow students to learn in an evolving context that includes the desire for face-to-face interaction as well as the need for quarantine and isolation. Whether students are ill, in quarantine, or sometimes simply choosing to learn from the safety of their homes, the greater flexibility of many of our current education models benefits learners and should be maintained whether in the rough water of a crisis or the still(er) water of the new normal. We note that this flexibility does not absolutely necessitate synchronous online class time for students at home (which can sometimes be impossible for faculty as well as students); there are many other ways faculty can offer flexibility to the class experience by offering multiple opportunities and venues for success.

In addition, flexible education goes beyond format. Faculty can mitigate student barriers, especially those presented during COVID, by utilizing best practices in online education. Universal design for instruction (UDI), or the “proactive design and use of inclusive instructional strategies that benefit a broad range of learners including students with disabilities,” is based on principles that enable instructors to design and deliver their courses in ways that consider diverse learners and make learning accessible to a wide variety of students (Scott et al., 2002). Crises can impact in-person learning experiences, so courses that are inclusive and accessible are more important now than ever before. By incorporating strategies aimed at flexibility, UDI allows all students to continue to learn in a high-quality instructional environment despite obstacles. The UDI framework provides a starting place for flexible teaching and learning aimed at the resilience and persistence of all students.

During the pandemic, we also found that faculty could offer greater flexibility, whether hybrid or online, by making course materials easily accessible electronically. Having a robust online presence, even in largely face-to-face courses, allows students to make health-conscious decisions about quarantine or other obstacles to interacting in person. This could be as simple as offering alternative assignments on the learning-management system (LMS) for students missing class meetings to a fully flipped class in which all materials and assessments are available to students outside of class time.

With as many as 6% of students on college campuses testing positive for COVID-19 in fall 2020 (Lederman, 2020), allowing an immediate opportunity for students to continue class while in quarantine is particularly useful during a pandemic, or even during university closures due to inclement weather or other emergencies. Zoom and other video conferencing tools allow teaching and learning to continue in real time. Constant improvements in the technology make possible small group discussions, back channels (such as chat), spotlighting main speakers, use of whiteboard features, and other ways of mimicking an in-person classroom experience online. While this can be done with a laptop or phone, technology-enhanced classrooms allow for students in the classroom and at home to learn together somewhat seamlessly.

Whether in person, online, or both simultaneously, faculty can also make their courses more flexible in simpler ways in order to allow students to continue learning during a pandemic or other personal or global emergencies. For example, flexible or floating deadlines can allow students to showcase their learning while taking into account student or community contingencies such as illness or quarantine (Boucher, 2016). Ungrading (Stommel, 2018) and competency-based education (Johnstone & Soares, 2014) have an individualized and flexible approach built into the system that may benefit students at a time when their ability to march lockstep through a semester is limited. With these kinds of examples in mind, we can design courses that can withstand rough waters and keep all members in the boat as we navigate particularly complicated semesters.

Flexible pedagogy will be especially relevant as we start to see older students return to higher education as they seek reskilling or upskilling to help them negotiate a difficult employment landscape due to economic stressors such as the pandemic (Karra, 2020). With the potential for an increasing number of working students, parents (now perhaps homeschooling their children), and other nontraditional students entering our courses, flexibility becomes more essential to student success (Soares & Smith, 2020).

Prior to this model, many students were counseled to take a withdrawal in class due to circumstances that forced them out of the traditional classroom setting—a working student who is required to take a different work shift to stay employed, a student with a temporary injury or flare-up of a chronic condition that needs attention, a death in the family that requires student travel, or a pregnant student obliged to bedrest. Through instituting a flexible model, students can retain their ability to learn and persist while facing life’s changing and challenging circumstances, ultimately leading to a more inclusive learning environment and likely higher institutional retention and graduation rates (Matheson & Sutcliffe, 2017). Varied student needs and environmental constraints can be addressed through the simple process of instituting ongoing flexibility in our course design.

Encountering Turbulent Waters: Teaching for Resilience

As institutions support flexible teaching strategies, educating during a global emergency also requires that we consider practices designed to foster resilience in our learners, teachers, and systems. Resilience thinking, long studied in ecology and community development, is increasingly part of the academic lexicon (Parker & Keith, 2019). According to Walker and Salt (2006), “Resilience is the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and still retain its basic function and structure” (xiii). Practices aimed at building resilience in students, as well as in academic communities, can be high-impact learning strategies that are relevant even in smooth waters or the integration of support and wellness services and tools available on campus and beyond that times of turbulence make increasingly necessary. Strategies and course decisions that foster student learning that may be especially relevant in rough water are often simple and easy to incorporate.

• Provide many low-or-no-stakes assignments. Students (and faculty) new to online or hybrid education may need practice with the LMS prior to higher-stakes assessments. Requiring many small (but meaningful) assignments in the first part of the term offers students the chance to ensure they are meeting the mark (or gives them a chance to fall in the river and be rescued without as much risk of being left behind) and alerts the instructor to students’ challenges before it’s too late to respond.
• Scaffold major assessments. Breaking higher-stakes assignments or projects into small pieces has many of the same benefits as low-stakes assignments. If possible, building timely and constructive instructor feedback into the system will enhance student learning and increase the likelihood of successful outcomes (Caruana, 2012).
• Make activities transparent. Transparency in learning and teaching (TILT) is an approach that involves small changes to assignments in order to increase the transparency of elements such as how an assignment meets student learning objectives, how students can successfully complete the assignment, and what a successful product looks like. Transparency has specific benefits for first-generation and minoritized students (Winkelmes et al., 2019), and are especially relevant in online and hybrid settings when students may feel they have less access to faculty members.
• Choose inexpensive course materials. Especially during the economic recession resulting from the pandemic, students may find it difficult to afford course materials. In fact, the increasing cost of textbooks may impede student success even in a normal year (Popken, 2015). When possible, consider using open educational resources or inexpensive books in order to remove extra financial pressure on students.
• Consider exams or signature projects that don’t require proctoring. Though there are a few cases in which traditional exams must be administered, the move to remote and online courses makes them more difficult. In response to concern about student cheating, there are an increasing number of software options for proctoring exams and surveilling students. However, there is a cost (including financial). Students express concerns about access to technology and about privacy, and some report greater anxiety as a result of surveillance (Harwell, 2020). Ethical considerations are arising for students of color, women, students with disabilities, and transgender people who may be flagged for cheating at greater rates by surveillance services (Swauger, 2020). When possible, formative signature assessments such as projects, portfolios, and even take-home exams and essays can be used to evaluate student learning without the financial and social costs of proctoring.
• Offer an “oops” token. Similar to low-stakes assignments, incorporating an “oops” token gives students the opportunity to make a small mistake, such as a missed quiz or daily discussion, without penalty and have it removed from their grade. It also gives them a sense of agency in their learning, which is likely to increase motivation for success (Darby & Lang, 2019).

Resilient pedagogy is more than making decisions about particular assignments and class materials. On many campuses, services that support resilience and persistence are siloed or lacking, especially in an online environment, but faculty can integrate resilience supports and tools right into their courses. Services including academic support, mental health counseling, and diversity and social centers and activities are central to the student experience, whether face-to-face, online, or hybrid. A benefit of brick-and-mortar institutions is that they provide these support services within close proximity to a student’s living and learning environment. When waters get rough, a student can easily make an appointment for counseling services, access the campus meditation space, jump on a treadmill, or find their people within campus hubs. These services increase student engagement, support student success, and ultimately build resilience as students face waves of change within an otherwise stable setting. Enriching faculty-student interactions as well as taking advantage of resources that promote academic success such as learning centers, mental health support, and office hours have been shown to positively influence retention (Wyckoff, 1998; Habley, 2004). Taking it a step further, Tinto (2004) notes that when academic supports are integrated into credit-bearing classes, students are more likely to engage in services and succeed.

In an online or hybrid format, especially in an institution unaccustomed to remote learning, these services are often less available or accessible. In addition to academic stress, undergraduate and graduate students are currently experiencing higher and more frequent levels of depression and anxiety (Chirikov et al., 2020). The American College Health Association (2020) reports that 60% of students indicate that the pandemic has made it more difficult to access mental health care. As a result of the pandemic and lack of access to care, they experience lower levels of psychological well-being. From racial tension to global climate change to financial and health-related stress, college students are experiencing unprecedented levels of need with less institutional support. As we face the continuation of the COVID era and even future personal or global crises, instructors need to find a way to embed these services into the curriculum as a way to support students. Colleges and universities should consider using resilient and flexible teaching to enable the success of their students, rather than impede progress through lack of services during turbulent times.

A resilience mindset is a set of skills and dispositions that can be built intentionally over time. Csikszentmihalyi’s (2008) theory of “flow” provides an interesting model for the kind of mindset students and adventurers need to meet challenges. Flow is a state of being that is characterized by intense concentration, control, and intrinsic reward; and that avoids boredom, stagnation, and frustration. It is experienced when an individual achieves a balance of skill and challenge—the rapids are big enough to be interesting and challenging, and even a bit risky, but the rafter’s skills are strong enough to meet the task. Growth occurs when this balance is maintained, though the challenges may increase over time. In the classroom, flow is also achieved by the right balance of skill and challenge, though students, just like rafters, need constant and consistent skill development and support in light of the changing waters of the educational landscape. With this in mind, we can take the best of the traditional campus supportive experience and integrate it into the online or hybrid experience in order to build resilient and resourceful students, even if they face constant disruption in their learning environment.

To begin with, faculty can create courses that show an empathetic attitude toward life challenges and also provide support through integrating practices traditionally provided through the external services of a brick-and-mortar campus. Empathy is the ability to deeply understand another’s situation, beliefs, and feelings and to express appropriate concern. Creating an empathetic learning community provides students with lifelong skills toward understanding themselves and their own needs while building collaborative relationships with others. Empathic classrooms increase the affective quality of the student experience and aid in retention but also allow students to feel a sense of connection in an otherwise disjointed and hyper-digital world.

In addition to modeling empathy in our interactions with students as they face the unusual circumstances that the world has presented to them, resilient pedagogy teaches students about empathy and having care for others around them despite differences or obstacles. Embedding simple practices into your online classroom does not take a lot of time and allows students to reflect on their learning and their relationships in class and beyond and allows instructors to assess their engagement. Faculty can express, model, and cultivate empathetic care in some of the following practices:

• Use icebreakers and temperature checks. Take the first few minutes of class to provide an icebreaker or “temperature check” on student well-being. An icebreaker might be a question, short activity or game designed to build community and warm a class up to further conversation. A temperature check is simply asking students how they are doing that day. It can take place in the form of a single verbal emotion; a gesture such as thumbs up, sideways, or down; or by using a metaphor like the weather or a thermometer. Icebreakers or temperature checks can be performed in-person or through online features such as a Zoom chat, poll, or LMS discussion board.
• Set community norms and ethical classroom expectations. Throughout the term, it is important to discuss and model community norms and expectations. At the intersection of multiple national and international crises, our learning environments should showcase strong communities with respect for diversity and a shared goal of creating resilient individuals. This could be in the form of a “do it yourself” list of rules or standards for discussion, classroom norms (such as turning video on or using other technology during class), or even a collaborative syllabus (Hudd, 2003).
• Collect data from students on their progress and well-being in class or beyond. Simple classroom critical incident questionnaires (Brookfield, 2005) can be used not only to deepen student engagement by asking them to reflect on their learning; they can also be used to give students a chance to express challenges, weigh in on instruction, and note any concerns they may have about inclusivity. Offer virtual office hours and encourage students to drop in regularly for face-to-face feedback.
• Include syllabus statements for mental health, support for students with disabilities, and inclusive classrooms. Building statements into your syllabus that evidence care and concern for student needs can set the tone in creating the kind of learning environment that you want a student to experience. Through adding statements geared toward student mental health, course access, and inclusive classrooms, you provide a warm and inviting tone to your students and provide transparency around support and additional resources. Presenting these resources at the beginning of class as a best practice for learning normalizes the process for students to ask for help.
• Highlight diverse readings and resources. Show students that you are intentional about decolonizing your course on the syllabus and throughout the activities of the course.
• Ensure that students have full access to their learning. The water we’re in is often choppy enough without faculty creating unnecessary disturbances. Accessibility practices should be engaged in every aspect of teaching and learning. From creating text descriptions to providing accessible documents, the accessibility of the course can reduce barriers that would otherwise need to be mitigated through external campus services, preventing resilience and persistence. Additional resources like DO-IT at the University of Washington (2011) provide faculty with guidelines for universal design for online learning. Accessibility checkers, such as on Microsoft Word or Google documents are quick tools that faculty can employ to evaluate their course with an eye toward access.
• Assess your instruction. Invite a trusted colleague to observe a class meeting, explore your online platform, or interview your students in a midcourse review to gauge their progress and response to your instruction. Discussing feedback with an educational development specialist can help to determine whether your instructional methods are likely increasing student learning, or whether it’s time to change course.

In addition, increasing students’ awareness in the environment of their own needs allows them to better prepare and decrease stress as they encounter rough waters. Well-being practice can be woven throughout the classroom experience. Starting with the use of syllabus statements, faculty can embed traditional brick-and-mortar support services into their online classroom while also creating a culture of support and care for their students. Mental health statements, accessibility statements, and diversity and inclusion statements can send a message of support to students in the face-to-face or online classroom in addition to developing class norms.

Another relatively simple way of incorporating resilience strategies and services into a course is to highlight campus support systems in the learning-management system. Providing LMS widgets for counseling services, tutoring and academic coaching, online fitness opportunities, and campus support groups, for example, can communicate to students that their learning context is holistic and that the instructor cares about their well-being in addition to their performance in a specific course. Inviting members of student support offices to visit class, especially online, connects students immediately to activities, such as tutoring or coaching, which bolster their chances of success. These are simple ways with a very small-time investment that faculty can expand the circle of support for each student.

Strategies aimed at wellness, such as preventative and contemplative practices, can even be incorporated directly into course content. Some faculty begin and end class with meditation and reflection in order to help students deepen their learning while at the same time modeling stress relief and wellness (Kirby et al., 2020). These practices support student mental health as they move through daunting times while also providing lifelong habits to increase emotional regulation, decrease reactivity, increase flexibility, as well as increase focused attention and well-being (Davis & Hayes, 2012). Examples of contemplative and reflective pedagogical strategies include:

• Engage in deep breathing and visualization. Allow time for students to settle into class through deep breathing or visualization. Granting time for a few deep breaths before class begins is an example of a preventative practice that can help to reduce stress and anxiety. In addition, having students visualize the concepts you are discussing for the class or helping them relax through mentally visualizing the day or the class, or even their success during the semester, can also be useful.
• Provide a moment of silence. In a life surrounded by noise pollution, students can benefit from structured silence or time for reflection and contemplation during class. One study suggests a connection between silence and new brain cell growth (Kirste et al., 2013).
• Promote growth mindset. Growth mindset is the belief that intelligence can be developed through effective use of strategies, effort, and support from others (Dweck, 2007). Faculty can use growth mindset language in feedback on assignments and in class meetings. In addition, faculty can notice and acknowledge fixed mindset language and can help flip it in order to see a challenge as an opportunity for growth.
• Embrace mantras for self-support. Encourage students to use mantras—phrases of self-support—around their capacity to succeed as a student. You might introduce your students to a short growth mindset phrase like “I am going to embrace new challenges in this class” or “I’ll ask for help when I need it” or “learning is hard, but worth it.”
• Consider embedding additional health and wellness resources. In addition to embedding campus resources into your class syllabus, consider embedding additional outside resources for students. It could be a tip or challenge around health and wellness or a video and links to national organizations like the Mayo Clinic or the National Alliance on Mental Illness. National resources offer numerous strategies and tips on topics like sleep, exercise, and stress management.

Many of these strategies are consistent with a growing understanding of trauma-informed pedagogy. In addition to classroom and campus strategies, we need to help students, and each other, sit with our situation. As Mays Imad states, “the social isolation and loneliness of the COVID-19 pandemic present significant emotional and physical health risks that make us feel disconnected and put us on high alert, triggering the body’s stress response” (2020). During the pandemic, we must remember that we and our students are teaching and learning in an environment where just going to the grocery store may feel dangerous.

Resilient and flexible teaching should acknowledge the inevitability of rough waters of the learning experience, and not just in our courses. Faculty and staff should model resilience strategies by incorporating them into our own lives. Institutions are reckoning with policies that create more disturbance during a crisis, such as requiring on-campus work for parents with kids at home or elders to care for (Mangan, 2020). While it is beyond the scope of this chapter to make sweeping recommendations for institutional policies, there are some simple ways to support colleagues during a crisis.

Oar to Oar: Paddling Together

With the stresses of health concerns, physical distancing, potential job loss, and caring for others, faculty and staff are also living through a pandemic and experiencing depression, illness, and burnout (Flaherty, 2020). At the same time that faculty and staff are steering the boat, they are also taking care of the student crew. They are caring for themselves and their families while also experiencing the emotional strain of caring for others within their classrooms. Increased workload as a result of crises can contribute to further stress. Helping faculty to both reduce stress and increase positive experiences can help them to build resilience and continue to steer with confidence through rough waters.

To reduce stress, developing habits of self-care and resilience serves us well in good times as well as times of crisis, and modeling resilient behavior for our students helps them, too. Berg and Seeber (2017) note that faculty stress affects student learning, but that modeling healthy academic behavior around time management and workload expectations can have a positive effect on our learners.

During challenging times, it can also be useful to refocus on hope as well as reconnect with our own teaching values. Consider asking what brings you happiness within your teaching and capitalize on these joyful activities. Reflect on what brought you into the profession and what you enjoy most about this work. Finally, it is important to reflect on what you and your students need right now. While it can be hard to let go of important content, meeting your needs and the needs of your students should take priority.

Teaching centers and faculty-development professionals can help by providing resources for resilience, such as support groups, faculty wellness activities, social media gratitude campaigns, or just regular check-ins and consultations. Teaching centers are designed to support faculty, and their personnel are willing to help, whether that be through providing individual support, leading campus workshops, or facilitating comprehensive online and RAFT instructor training. A teaching and learning environment that promotes a resilient, flexible, humane, and empathetic community is good for student learning, for faculty wellbeing, and for a world that needs, now more than ever, educated citizens prepared and interested in using their knowledge for good. Here’s a checklist of simple ideas for making your course and your professional role more resilient and flexible.

RAFT Checklist

• Inclusive, engaging, and clear syllabus
• Syllabus statements and LMS widgets on inclusivity, accessibility, mental health resources, tutoring/coaching, and other relevant campus resources
• Alignment of campus events, services, and activities with course content
• Clear guidelines for building class community and establishing norms
• A plan for incorporating mindfulness, reflection, and contemplation
• Growth mindset language and the use of mantras for student (and faculty) success
• Clear routines and policies
• Accessible and affordable class materials
• Welcoming language and support for those with specific challenges, such as students with learning disabilities, working students, caregivers, etc.
• Scaffolded, transparent assessments with clear but flexible deadlines and/or paths to completion
• Icebreakers and temperature checks
• Inclusion (on the LMS and in class) of holistic wellness resources or activities
• Multiple formats for engaging with course material and peers
• Opportunities for feedback, such as critical incident questionnaires
• A plan for assessment of instruction (course observation or midcourse review)
• Space in the term for faculty wellness and community

Staying Afloat: Avoiding Snags and Holes

Experienced whitewater rafters know that riffles and rapids are great fun when you’re up to the challenge, but also that there is danger in hazards such as snags (branches that can drag you under) and holes (when water cycles both up and downstream and can pull the boat under). Likewise, there are positive and negative consequences to our pedagogical choices. Even with all we have learned about supporting students and ourselves in turbulent times, we also have to be aware of the tools we use. In rocky waters, we need a sturdy but lightweight vessel. A raft that is bogged down by extra equipment is unwieldy and dangerous and is more likely to get trapped in a snag or hole. A course that uses too much or too many kinds of new tools and material threatens the learning process. Since the beginning of the pandemic, faculty and staff have been inundated with emails and calls from established and startup educational technology companies with short-term free trials and other offers aimed at getting more people to buy hardware, software, and apps. While many of these may be useful, students (and faculty) may be overwhelmed by the overuse of such tools (especially if multiple faculty members are experimenting with different tools in addition to what may be an overcomplicated and clunky learning management system). In a time of crisis, resilience rests partly on stability and expectations. A student faced with multiple ways to engage in classes, a variety of ways to turn in assignments, and too many apps to keep track of may find it difficult to maintain an eye on the goal and to navigate an over-complicated learning environment. Further, we know that the overuse of screens can have negative effects on humans (Domingues-Montanari, 2017). Allowing students to incorporate activities into their learning that build community, inspire creativity, and reap the healthy benefits of the outdoors (especially in light of a highly infectious disease) will likely have greater positive effects downriver.

Embracing the Ride: Turning Disruption into Adventure

As instructors embrace our new RAFT, we are provided with a unique opportunity to help our students understand that out of disruption comes a more resilient learner capable of handling a variety of life’s challenges. Csikszentmihalyi’s concept of flow might again be especially apt in thinking about teaching during an emergency. The sweet spot of flow in whitewater rafting occurs with the right mix of skills and challenge, and often with a crew leader who models an adventurous but skilled attitude toward risk; likewise, flow in teaching and learning results from having the requisite skills and support to actively embrace the challenges of learning, guided by a faculty member who successfully navigates the difficult terrain of teaching during a crisis. Research on flow experiences suggests that people are more likely to feel the joyfulness of flow when actively engaged with others (Walker, 2010). This makes the classroom an engaging environment.

The obstacles of learning during a pandemic must be met with a holistic circle of academic and affective support that offers a new and collaborative mind and skill set. While students may initially imagine being thrown off the boat into dangerous waters, teachers can help them navigate the rapids through a supportive teaching model like RAFT.

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