Service Learning: An Element of a Course

1. Service Learning: An Element of a Course Tennessee Teaching and Learning Center  Dr. David Schumann, Director  Dr. Taimi Olsen, Assistant Director  Kelly Ellenburg, Graduate Research Intern  Dori Stiefel, Graduate Research Intern A special thanks to Lynn Champion, Sherry Cable, Bob Kronick, Nissa Dahlin-Brown, and Mamosa Foster for their contributions.

2. Workshop Agenda Pre-Session: Agenda continued on following page

3. Workshop Agenda Pedagogy Key: Games involve students in some sort of competition or achievement in relation to a goal. Many games are simulations, that is they attempt to model some real-life situation. Future thinking involves students applying their learning to the facilitation of change. This can happen through collaborative discussion, research and essay writing, student presentations, and many other methods. Role play is a type of simulation in which students act out a situation that could occur in the field. Through guided discussion, instructors facilitate and encourage student discourse on a specific topic. This technique often involves the use of prompts to generate discussion and keep students on topic. Case studies are examples of real-life problem situations in the field intended to challenge students to think about the correct response or solution. Reflective writing involves students recording their memories of the experience, paying special attention to the meanings behind each incident or exchange. Peer learning is a technique in which students teach each other through various pedagogical methods, thus facilitating their own learning in the process.

4. Session One What is the dream?

5. Exercise 1 What is the Dream? • What is your dream for service learning? Page 1

6. Exercise 2 Reactions to the Dream #1 Summary of the dream #3 Reaction? Question? #2 Reaction? Question? Page 2

7. Session Two Planning the Service

8. Service-Learning Definitions Page 3

9. Exercise 3 Planning the Service Page 4

10. Session Three Integrating Service with the Course

11. Principles for Good Practice in Service-Learning Principles by J. Howard; text modified • Academic credit is for learning, not for service Students earn academic credit by demonstrating they have learned course content and skills. This is no different in community service learning courses. Academic credit is not awarded for doing service or for the quality of service, but rather for the student’s demonstration of academic and civic learning. 2. Academic Rigor is uncompromised A community service assignment can be a new requirement, replace another requirement, or recognized by additional credit, but it should not lower academic learning expectations. Adding a service component, in fact, may enhance the rigor of a course because, in addition to having mastered the academic material, students must also learn from community experience. 3. Setting learning goals for students All courses should have clearly defined learning objectives for which students are accountable. However, it is especially necessary and advantageous to establish clear learning objectives in service-learning courses. The addition of the community as a learning context multiplies the learning possibilities. Deliberate planning of course academic and civic learning objectives is necessary for students to prioritize their learning and to leverage the bounty of learning opportunities offered by community service experiences. 4. Provide educationally sound mechanisms to harvest the community learning Learning in any course is achieved by an appropriate mix of learning strategies and assignments that correspond to the learning objectives. In service-learning courses, learning strategies must be employed that support learning from service experiences and enable its use toward meeting course learning objectives. Learning interventions that promote critical reflection, analysis, and application of service experiences enable learning. Page 5

12. Principles, continued 5. Prepare students for learning from the community Most students lack experience extracting and making meaning from experience, let alone merging it with other academic and civic course learning strategies. Instructors can support students’ learning through service by providing opportunities to acquire skills for gleaning the learning from the service context (e.g., participant-observer skills), and/or examples of how to successfully complete assignments (e.g., making available exemplary papers and reflection journals from previous courses to current students). 6. Minimize the distinction between the students’ community learning role and classroom learning role Classrooms and communities require students to assume different learner roles. If students are passive learners in the classroom and active learners in the community, the contrast may challenge and even impede student learning. The solution is to reshape the traditional classroom to value students as active learners. 7. Rethink the faculty instructional role Commensurate with the preceding principle’s recommendation for active student learning, this principle advocates that service-learning instructors also rethink their roles. An instructor role that would be most compatible with an active student role shifts away from a singular reliance on transmission of knowledge and toward mixed pedagogical methods that include learning facilitation and guidance. 8. Be prepared for variation in, and some loss of control with, student learning outcomes In traditional courses, the learning strategies are constant for all enrolled students and under the watchful eye of the faculty member. In service-learning courses, given variability in service experiences and their influential role in student learning, one can anticipate greater heterogeneity in student learning outcomes and compromises to faculty control. Even when service-learning students are exposed to the same presentations and the same readings, instructors can expect that classroom discussions will be less predictable and the content of student papers/projects less homogeneous than in courses without a service assignment. Page 6

13. Notes for Sherry’s Case Study Page 7

14. Exercise 4 Refining Course Objectives In light of the service-learning definitions and your reactions in the last exercise, how might you refine your course objectives? Page 8

15. Pre-Service During-Service Post-Service Exercise 5 Planning Classroom Pedagogies Future thinking Games and simulations Case studies Games and simulations Case studies Games and simulations Case studies Reflective writing Role play Guided discussion Role play Guided discussion Role play Guided discussion Peer learning Peer learning Peer learning Page 9

16. Exercise 6 Planning Assessment The following are ideas for assignments you could use to assess student learning throughout the service-learning experience. What assignments do you feel are most appropriate to your course? Page 12

17. Exercise 7 Planning Assessment Considering your chosen course objectives and pedagogies, take a few moments to record ideas on how you might assess your students’ learning. Page 13

18. Exercise 8 Example Rubric When planning assessment of student learning, it is helpful to you and your students to have a grading rubric to reference. Below is an incomplete example of a rubric for a service-learning course. Take a moment to fill in a few boxes and get a feel for how you might build your own rubric. Page 14

19. Session Four Making it Happen

20. Thinking About the Details Use this space to take notes on issues related to the logistics of the service-learning project, such as who to call, what forms you might need, how to coordinate community and students, etc. Page 15

21. Helpful Resources Campus Compact. 2003. Introduction to Service-Learning Toolkit: Readings and Resources for Faculty. Providence, RI: Brown University. (LC220.5.C36) Barbara Jacoby and Associates. 1996. Service-Learning in Higher Education: Concepts and Practices. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers. (LC220.5.S45) Bringle, Robert G., & and Julie A. Hatcher. 1996. Implementing Service Learning in Higher Education. The Journal of Higher Education, 67(2), 221-239. Campus Compact Program Models: http://www.compact.org/category/program-models/ Penn State Service-Learning: http://www.schreyerinstitute.psu.edu/Tools/ServiceLearning/ Internet Resources Page 16

22. Helpful Resources Barbara Jacoby and Associates. 2003. Building Partnerships for Service Learning. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers. (Net Library) Howard H. Baker Jr. Center for Public Policy. 2010. Developing a Service Learning Course Checklist. Knoxville, TN: University of Tennessee. (Manuscript draft) Reardon, Kenneth M. 1998. Participatory Action Research as Service Learning. New Directions for Teaching and Learning, 73, 57-64. Learn and Service: America’s National Service-Learning Clearinghouse http://servicelearning.org/ Association of American Colleges and Universities: Tools for Civic Engagement http://www.aacu.org/resources/civicengagement/index.cfm Internet Resources Page 17

23. Helpful Resources Billig, Shelley & Furco, Andrew (ed.). 2001. Service-Learning: The Essence of a Pedagogy. Connecticut: Information Age Publishing. McKeachie, Wilbert J. & Svinicki, Marilla. 2010. Teaching tips: strategies, research, and theory for college and university teachers (13th ed.). Boston: DC Heath. King and Kitchener’s Seven Levels of Reflective Judgment http://web.missouri.edu/~woodph/rjstages/rjstages.html University of Wisconsin Milwaukee Institute for Service-Learning http://www4.uwm.edu/isl/faculty/pedagogy.htm University of Delaware: Problem-Based Learning http://www.udel.edu/pbl/ Rubistar http://rubistar.4teachers.org/Bonner Program: http://www.bonner.org/resources/resources.htm Connors, Kara & Seifer, Sarena (ed.). 2007. Community Campus Partnerships for Health. Faculty Toolkit for Service-Learning in Higher Education. Scotts Valley, CA: National Service-Learning Clearinghouse. Internet Resources Page 18

24. References Fitch, Peggy & Steinke, Pamela. 2007. Assessing service-learning. Research and Practice in Assessment, 1,2. Hesser, G. 1995. Faculty assessment of student learning: outcomes attributed to service-learning and evidence of changes in faculty attitudes about experiential education. Michigan Journal of Community Service-Learning, 2, 33-42. Howard, J. 1993. Community service-learning in the curriculum. In Praxis I: A faculty casebook on community service learning, ed. J. Howard, 3-12. Ann Arbor, MI: OCSL Press. Hugg, Robert & Wurdinger, Scott. 2007. A practical and progressive pedagogy for project based service learning. International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, 19, 2, 191-204. McDade, Sharon A. 1995. Case study pedagogy to advance critical thinking. Teaching of Psychology, 22(1), pp 9-10. Online Resources: