Getting Started:

Start out with the main learning modules of our Interactive Learning Resource in Course Outline.

  • Try your best to complete each activity and assessment. These will help guide your learning, and you are also able to receive feedback from the formative assessment in the end of each subtopic.

To learn more about the design of our Interactive Learning Resource see the drop-down in the menu under course overview. Or follow the links below:

More Info:

Course Rationale:

  • Why am I taking the course?

Through this course, students will gain a solid foundation of the concepts of self-care, including emotional and physical self-care.

  • What is the course talking about?

Self-care is an essential part of becoming a well-rounded student that often gets left behind. Two integral aspects of self-care reside in maintaining and improving physical and emotional wellness. The foundation of physical self-care promotes overall well-being. Physical self care is dependent on daily exercises, sleep time, and what we eat. Regular exercise enhances cardiovascular health, strengthens muscles, and boosts mental well-being (Warburton et al., 2006). Moreover, adequate sleep is crucial for cognitive function, emotional regulation, and physical health, helping reduce the risk of chronic diseases (Hirshkowitz et al., 2015). Also proper nutrition, including a balanced diet rich in fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, supports physical health and prevents nutritional deficiencies (Micha et al., 2017). Regarding emotional self-care, it helps university freshmen foster skills such as deep learning, self-regulation, and motivation (Earl, S. R. 2024). Similarly, a study by Webster and Hadwin (2015) showed that first year students face a lot of unfamiliar difficultures, thus giving students the tools to regulate and monitor their emotions through self-care is a useful skill to offer freshman university students.

Reference:

Earl, S. R., Bishop, D., Miller, K., Davison, E., & Pickerell, L. (2024). First‐year students’ achievement emotions at university: A cluster analytic approach to understand variability in attendance and attainment. British Journal of Educational Psychology, 94(2), 367–386. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjep.12650

Hirshkowitz, M., Whiton, K., Albert, S. M., Alessi, C., Bruni, O., DonCarlos, L., Hazen, N., Herman, J., Katz, E. S., Kheirandish-Gozal, L., Neubauer, D. N., O’Donnell, A. E., Ohayon, M., Peever, J., Rawding, R., Sachdeva, R. C., Setters, B., Vitiello, M. V., Ware, J. C., & Adams Hillard, P. J. (2015). National Sleep Foundation’s sleep time duration recommendations: methodology and results summary. Sleep Health, 1(1), 40–43. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sleh.2014.12.010

Micha, R., PeƱalvo, J. L., Cudhea, F., Imamura, F., Rehm, C. D., & Mozaffarian, D. (2017). Association Between Dietary Factors and Mortality From Heart Disease, Stroke, and Type 2 Diabetes in the United States. JAMA, 317(9), 912. https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.2017.0947

Warburton, D. E. R., Nicol, C. W., & Bredin, S. S. D. (2006). Health Benefits of Physical activity: the Evidence. Canadian Medical Association Journal, 174(6), 801–809. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1402378/

Webster, E.A., & Hadwiin, A.F. (2015). Emotions and emotion regulation in undergraduate studying: examining students’ reports from a self-regulated learning perspective. Educational Psychology, 35(7), 794-818. doi: 10.1080/01443410.2014.895292