katierowlandsite

Through the articles and studies that I have read and evaluated along, the points of views from current and recently graduated high school and student teachers I collected, along with my own personal experiences, I believe that Service Learning should be an essential part of the curriculum for all grades across most subjects.

The research that I’ve studied indicates very positive impacts of service learning. Students who participated in service learning were more likely to vote, perform better academically, have better school attendance, and are more engaged in their learning. However, to be successful teachers implementing service learning in their classroom should be educated on the best and most effective practices. Service sites should be screened so that they are safe and effective places to perform meaningful service learning. Also it should be structured to where students know exactly what is expected out of the service learning assignment.

The personal interviews that I did helped me formulate my opinion of how service learning should be implemented. I think to some extent it should be used in every grade level K-12 so that students can learn at an early age the value of service to others and continue that throughout school and into adulthood. In younger grades I would suggest doing forms of service learning during the school day. This could be doing service for employees around school or in the form of a field trip around the community. During middle school service opportunities could be expanded to after school and outside of school depending on how accessible transportation is. Also in middle school, subjects like computer class, FACS, Ag and Spanish could all lead to new service learning opportunities. In high school is where I would expect service learning to really manifest itself. Students are older, more mature and can drive making it easier to incorporate service learning as an outside of school component of their grade or graduation.

I’m still unsure how service learning would be counted, as far as if it should be graded or just volunteer. I think this will depend on the type of service learning, the class and what the teacher wants to do.

I would love to bring service learning to the high school I will be teaching at in the fall. I will be teaching Spanish and have done service learning in my Spanish classes so I think implementing it will be practical and very beneficial to my students. I would love for my students to get involved tutoring younger students after school, teaching Spanish to elementary school kids during school, or volunteering during adult English classes.

I really enjoyed doing this Genius Hour project and think I will definitely implement service learning in my classroom because of the incredible benefits and positive impact it has on student learning and achievement.

I interviewed a couple of people about service learning being implemented in a K-12 setting. I asked each of them a couple of the following questions?

• If you were a high school student, how would you feel about service learning being a part of your class, let’s say your English class. You were required to spend 25 hours outside of class doing some sort of community service and writing about your experiences.
• If you were a parent of a student who had to complete service learning as part of their grade, how do you think you would feel about it?
• Do you think it should be a part of their grade?
• Can you think of any service activities right now you think would be beneficial for students to get involved with?
• What grades do you think should utilize service learning?
• What potential problems do you see with service learning?

 

Saranne Ezelle: 16 year old 10th Grader at Mary Persons High School

First I asked her what her favorite subject in school was and gave her an example of service learning that could be implemented in a math class (her favorite). For their service learning component they could be required to attend after school programs at the elementary school and help kids with their math homework.

In response to the questions she said: I think it would be very helpful having to have to explain and teach little kids. I think it would teach them responsibility  since they have to teach other students how to do something. They’re responsible for the learning of their student. I think it should be extra credit because the it would be beneficial for the people who  are willing to do it, because they are determined to do it. Some other service activities I can think of are picking up trash, going to nursing homes and tutoring after school. I think it should be implemented in 11th and 12 because they have cars and can drive. I cant think of any problems. It seems helpful and gives a lot to the students.

 

Carson Rowland: 18 year old Firefighter

I gave him the example of implementing service learning in a Spanish class. Their service learning project would be tutoring kids in a latino community, helping teach English in a latino community or volunteering in any organization within the latino community with the purpose of learning more about Spanish and the culture that speaks it.

I don’t think it’s too much trouble to implement service learning but I don’t think it should be be like an every week occurrence. I do think it would help with learning process and helping with interacting with people. I wouldn’t suggest doing it at a Spanish 1 level. I think it should be done individually or be allowed to work in small groups, but not the entire class all together. If I were a parent I think it would help a lot. It would help students get used to talking to people in Spanish. I think it should be done like this: do 5 hours of service learning at one of these particular places that have already been approved by the end of this month.  I think it should count as an assessment grade. I think using it in the high school range is preferred. They can drive and are older soit’s more convenient and not so dangerous.

 

Ashley Sapp: 22 Middle School Ag teacher

First we related service learning to how it could be implemented in an Ag classroom. Actually Ag has many versions of service learning such as the SAE.

She said, getting graded for service almost gives more value to the project because even if they don’t get anything out of service to learning itself, they get a grade. I think it can and should be implemented in any grade, even elementary school. Well maybe too young for elementary school because of the age of the kids and communicating with parents would be difficult. Maybe including service learning inside school or an after school program for younger kids who cant drive would be better than ann independent outside of school service learning project.

 

I found an article called “The Impact of Participation in Service-learning on High School Students’ Civic Engagement” done by the RMC Research Corporation in May 2005.

The study addressed investigated the extent to which students that participate in service-learning show increases over time in a variety of aspects of civic engagement and academic and civic knowledge and skill acquisition. They compared students that did participate in service-learning with other students in the same or matched schools that participate in classes on the same subject matter and do not participate in service-learning. Also the study investigated what teacher characteristics and practices serve to moderate outcomes of the service-learning projects.

Students in service-learning classes and students in non-serving learning classes in the same content area and grade level completed surveys in the fall and spring. Teachers completed surveys in the spring. Also, students and teachers participated in focus groups, classrooms were observed, and administrators were interviewed to collect data for the study.

A few of the findings the highlighted the benefits of service-learning are:

-Service-learning students were significantly more likely than comparison group members to report that they intended to vote.

-The hypothesis that service-learning was inherently engaging was supported in some schools and in some ways. Over half of the participants in service-learning said that they often or always work hard on their service-learning projects, pay attention, and try to learn from them.

-Duration of the service-learning experience was also significantly related to most of the outcome areas. Generally, those service-learning activities that were one to two months in duration had the highest academic impacts while those that were a semester long had the greatest civic impacts.

-Teacher characteristics were also found to be related to outcomes. Number of years of teaching experience was significantly related to students’ valuing school, enjoying math and science, civic skills, and civic dispositions.

-Service-learning teachers were more likely to use a variety of active strategies more often than teachers that did not implement service-learning. The use of active strategies, in tum, was highly related to student outcomes in the areas of valuing school, attachment to school, enjoyment of content areas, acquisition of civic knowledge, skills, and dispositions, and civic engagement.

I really enjoyed this article because while it looked at the benefits of service-learning, it concentrated on how good service learning programs are maintained. It’s no surprise that the teacher him/herself has a huge responsibility of making the program successful. These teachers in the study were carefully screened to be a good and experienced Service-learning teachers. I wonder what type of training or program these teachers participated in (if any) to become so successful in implementing service learning in their class. Another aspect I found to be interesting is the duration of service-learning programs. The study found that one to two month service learning projects had the highest academic impacts. The longer service-learning projects though had greater civic impacts. I’m interested to see if schools value higher academic or civic impacts and which duration they would choose given the research.

The link to the article is below.

 

http://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1002&context=slcek12

I’m starting my genius hour project investigation searching for articles that show how service learning is being implemented in a K-12 setting, and that investigate the effects service learning has on the students that participate in them and the school as a whole.

I found this booklet that is given to students and parents about the Student Service Learning (SSL) requirement issued by the Maryland State Department of Education. The booklet explains the 75 hour SSL high school graduation requirement. Also the booklet explains program facts,  what is meaningful community involvement, includes SSL documents, and beneficial outcomes of SSL.

Through this booklet I hope to understand how they’ve structured their program. I’m curious of when in their high school career the parents and students receive this booklet, and also the service learning opportunities the students can engage in to count towards hours. Also, what system do they use to keep track of hours logged? Is there a discussion session between students about their service? What role do teachers play in this? Have Maryland schools noticed a change in student achievement or well being since implementing this state wide graduation requirement?

Student Service Learning (SSL): Give a Little Time…Make a Big Difference. 2014-2015 Guide for Students and Parents

I also found an article that investigates how service learning affects student outcome. The article looks at a national network of 19 schools established by the National Center for Learning and Civic Engagement (NCLCE) that use service-learning as an instructional strategy . The schools were part of a three-year project to examine how the elements of service-learning might enhance key student outcomes, such as academic performance and civic engagement. This report focuses on the relationships observed between students’ participation in service-learning and academic performance and school attendance.

I expect this article to give me insight into the benefits of implementing service learning in K12 schools. I am particularly interested in how SSL affects school attendance. School attendance has been a major issue in education and if SSL has a significant effect on attendance this could serve as a catalyst to its implementation.

Service–Learning May Influence Some Students’ Attendance and Academic Performance

I’m still continuing to search for more articles and studies about service learning that will show me the different facets to implementing SSL. I would like to know reasons why schools choose not to implement SSL, what resources SSL requires and what students say about their experience.

 

For my Genius Hour Project I would like to investigate Service Learning and its relationship with student achievement in a high school setting. I want to research:

• What is service learning?
• What high schools have already implemented service learning as part of their curriculum?
• Have schools that utilize service learning seen an improvement in student achievement?
• What other benefits besides student achievement does service learning offer?
• In what types of classes is service learning more or less practical?
• What types of service learning are being used?

 

I first became interested in Service Learning after looking at Education Commission of the States website. Service learning sparked my attention because of my previous experience with it. My high school did not implement Service Learning into their curriculum but each year of my college experience I have had classes in which service learning was a requirement. Since I’ve had a wonderful experience tutoring, teaching ESL, and volunteering in the Athens community I began to wonder why this is not a thing widely used in Georgia high schools. According to the Education Commission of the States website, 33 states include service learning in their high school state academic standards, Georgia of which is not one. This especially made me more interested in the topic. If like the website says, ” that students engaged in high-quality service-learning learn to collaborate, think critically and problem solve”, then why is Georgia not taking advantage of this? Through this Genius Hour project I want to learn how service learning programs function and most definitely how I can implement this in my classroom and help fellow teachers create service learning programs as wel. As a future Spanish teacher I hope that service learning can be integrated into my curriculum.