Title: The Community Classroom: Serving to Learn and Learning to Serve
Abstract: Service-learning is characterized by students' engagement in their local communities to apply and learn course concepts. Communities afford students venues in which to practice solving authentic real world problems with tangible outcomes. Service-learning includes collateral benefits to academic programs and to the local community. Students learn course objectives and the value of becoming contributing citizens of the greater community. In turn, communities benefit from students' provision of needed programs and services. However, without careful course construction, instructors run the risk of providing `feel-good' activities that are not linked to learning objectives. This article discusses the philosophy of students' serving to learn and learning to serve and provides examples of establishing meaningful links between course learning objectives and service-learning activities. ********** Educational philosopher, John Dewey, at the beginning of the twentieth century expressed the need for experiential learning. The great waste in Education, according to Dewey was that learning was not connected to the surrounding community (Dewey, 1933). Real knowledge, Dewey would have agreed, comes only through the experience of learning that occurs within a meaningful context (Dewey, 1938/1963). Learning occurs when the learner constructs meaning from the interaction of knowledge and the experience. Acquiring knowledge and demonstrating on paper and pencil exams is one way to look at academic learning. However, many cognitive scientists now believe that more meaningful and deep processing of information comes when students have the opportunity to apply course material (Bransford, Brown, & Cocking, 1999). This type of learning is constructed by the learner and is more than merely answering questions regarding facts and figures on an exam. The purpose of this article is to explore an alternative pedagogical method, service-learning, for constructing meaning in college courses. The authors will suggest benefits of service-learning and offer suggestions for developing meaningful learning outcomes. A recent resurgence and interest has emerged in service-learning in university academic programs during the last decade (viz., Bringle, Games, & Malloy, 1999; Claus & Ogden, 1999; Eyler & Giles, 1999; Stanton, Giles, & Cruz, 1999; Zlotowski, 1997). The establishment in 1985 of Campus Compact, a coalition of college and university presidents committed to helping students develop the values and skills of citizenship through participation in public and community (Stanton, et al., 1999), brought service-learning to the forefront of desirable educational practices. What is Service Learning? Although many definitions of service-learning appear in the literature (Stanton, 1987), for the purposes of this article, service-learning is defined as the pedagogy of learning through service (Chisholm, 1987, page 3). Service-learning is characterized by the students' engagement in their local communities to apply and learn course concepts. It is distinguished from volunteerism by the nature of the relationship of the students to the community. Volunteerism suggests a paternalistic, one-way relationship in which the community is the sole beneficiary of services, while not recognizing the benefits received by students (Stanton, et al., 1999). Communities afford students venues in which to practice solving authentic real world problems with tangible outcomes. Service-learning involves a reciprocal relationship between academic programs and community. Through service-learning, students go beyond merely observing problems to actually assuming the role and responsibility of contributing to the solution of the problem. From dealing with real world problems, students have the opportunity to recognize social injustices, appreciate the difficulties and advantages of working with people within the community from different backgrounds, and develop confidence and skills in their own abilities to critically think and solve problems. …
Publication Year: 2001
Publication Date: 2001-09-01
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 22
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