Reducing Barriers  – Prompt 3

In my interactive learning resource on Mental Health in Sports,  the Subtopic 3 focuses on helping athletes build strategies that support their wellbeing. One of the key activities in this section is the Personal Wellness Plan, where learners create a plan outlining stress‑management strategies and ways to seek support. When overlooking the project, we have to reduce barriers that unconsciously occur.

The biggest barrier is my activity may assume all students already know what a wellness plan looks like  or feel comfortable discussing mental health. My Blueprint states that learners will “create a wellness plan that includes strategies for managing stress and seeking support,” but many high‑school athletes may not have the background knowledge, vocabulary, or confidence to complete this independently or without research. Some may also struggle with organizing their ideas or may feel overwhelmed by the emotional content.

To reduce these barriers, I would redesign the activity using UDL principles:

  1.  Providing multiple examples of wellness plans in different formats, depending on how students learn perhaps a written template, a visual mind map, and a short video walkthrough.
  2. Include infographics about athlete mental health, such as visuals explaining stress responses, coping strategies, or the pillars of sports psychology. These support learners who process information better visually. 
  3. Offer multiple ways for students to express their wellness plan. Students are open to choose how they do the projects whether a written document, a short video, record an audio reflection, or design a visual plan.
  4. Including links to real mental‑health resources for athletes, such as the Canadian Centre for Mental Health and Sport or the IOC Mental Health Toolkit. Including short athlete videos,  like Simone Biles discussing mental health or Michael Phelps talking about anxiety.  This will normalize the topic and makes the students feel less alone/comfortable.

By adjusting the activity to assume learner variability rather than an “average athlete,” the Personal Wellness Plan becomes more accessible, more supportive, and more meaningful for all students.