Saige Peterson and Julie Morrison, along with their 4th grade classmates at Heber Hunt Elementary School in Sedalia, Missouri, started a literacy campaign with a closet full of used books. Their Trade-a-Book program invited students in the school to add a book to the collection and take one with them to read. Building on this success, the 4th graders became reading buddies for kindergartners at their school and then wrote a request for a small grant to purchase board books for newborn babies and their families at the Bothwell Regional Health Center. The elementary students also wrote letters to accompany the books, extolling the virtues of reading.
Saige and Julie's literacy campaign is an exemplar of community service learning, a teaching strategy in which students use their academic skills and knowledge to meet school or community needs. Community service learning has been widely acknowledged as a promising approach for enhancing students' academic, social, and civic development and strengthening a school's connections with the community.
Yet the prevalence of service learning in U.S. schools decreased during the past decade. One recent survey of more than 2,000 K–12 public school principals revealed that only 24 percent of their schools include service learning experiences in the curriculum, compared with 32 percent in 1999 (Spring, Grimm, & Dietz, 2008). Why the decrease? Only 12 percent of the principals said that they believed service learning could increase academic achievement in core subjects.
Service Learning and Academic Achievement
Academic achievement has always been a centerpiece in public schools, but never as much as during the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) era. NCLB has spawned an array of practices aimed at improving students' test scores, particularly in literacy and math. High-stakes assessments have driven schools to adopt a rigorous and focused approach to reading, writing, and math instruction that takes up the majority of the day in many schools. Seeing service learning as a practice that produces mainly affective or civic outcomes, some educators have decided that there is no time for it.
Two related facts challenge this conclusion. First, high-quality service learning engages students; and second, engagement is crucial to academic achievement (Collins & Valentine, 2010). High school graduation rates in the United States peaked in 1969 at 77 percent. Last year, nearly one in three students didn't graduate (Melville, 2006). Highlighting the importance of service learning, David Eisner, former CEO of the federal Corporation for National and Community Service, noted,
The number of students failing to graduate is rising to epidemic proportions. Yet we see that many schools are missing a key opportunity to use this proven strategy to help their students become more motivated and engaged both in and out of the classroom. (quoted in Scott, 2008)
Debating the pros and cons of various teaching strategies is irrelevant if we can't prevent students from dropping out of school. Service learning is one avenue for keeping students interested.
Teachers across the United States have found ways to involve students in meaningful service while enhancing their learning. Age is no barrier to these kinds of projects: kindergarten students can count pennies or canned goods donated to help the hungry, and high school students can use discrete mathematical modeling to develop the most efficient route to deliver Meals on Wheels to homebound seniors. Service learning projects can incorporate facts and skills in any subject area, but keeping the focus on literacy and math may be most beneficial for schools concerned with upcoming state tests.
Literacy and Service Learning
Let's take a closer look at the literacy campaign that Saige, Julie, and their classmates initiated. How many 4th graders do you know who have written grant proposals? Writing the grant proposal, along with reading books that others traded in, supporting kindergarten reading buddies, and writing letters to accompany the board books for local newborns required these 4th graders to grow in their literacy skills. The students also developed presentation skills when they presented their project at the state and national service learning conferences in 2010.
Julie and Saige's literacy campaign demonstrates how high-quality service learning combines engagement with academic skill development. So although it may seem like the testing train and the service learning trolley are headed in opposite directions, a focused approach to service learning can get both vehicles on the same track. See "Projects That Support Literacy Learning" for more ideas for projects in which students can use literacy skills to help others.
Math and Service Learning
When Kathy Phillips's high school math classes at Inola High School in Inola, Indiana, researched, designed, and built kiosks for the school's outdoor classroom walking trail, Phillips noticed a difference in her students' learning. "Students who could not understand precision when taught in the classroom from the book truly understood the concept when we were building the kiosks," she said.
In another class, students used their geometry skills to address the problem of hunger locally by building raised vegetable gardens. Partnering with other classes (a science class grew the seedlings) and the community (businesses, churches, and local organizations provided garden space and made sure that the vegetables were distributed to those in need) contributed to students' success. And the academic connections were abundant. Students used a host of geometrical concepts: perimeter, surface area, volume, similarity, ratio, proportion, scale drawings, properties of shapes, and angle measures.
Students can also incorporate economics and math in projects that focus on developing and selling a product. Karin Gratz, a Lead to Succeed program consultant in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, worked with high school students to design and sell custom rain barrels. In the fall, students gathered data on the benefits of rain barrels. In the spring, they designed and decorated rain barrels that they sold to residents, businesses, and community organizations. Proceeds from such projects can be used to further the student-run business or be donated to a cause related to the project. (In the case of the rain barrel project, proceeds were donated to the International Water Resources Association.)
From the simplest computation strategies to advanced uses of statistical data and math functions, students of all ages can use their math skills to address school and community needs. See "Projects That Support Math Learning" for additional service learning project ideas.
Principles for Project Development
Whether teachers choose to develop a literacy-oriented activity or a project that makes use of students' math skills, the same essential principles apply. Teachers can ensure that their service learning projects attend to both students' learning and relevant community needs by answering the following questions:
- What skills or knowledge do I want my students to learn or use?
- Who in our community needs these skills and knowledge or could benefit from my students' use of these skills and knowledge?
- How can students use their skills or knowledge to help others?
Let's say you are a 5th grade teacher who wants your students to develop and practice the skill of identifying the main idea in a text. Two populations who could benefit from this skill are seniors in nursing homes who have difficulty reading or comprehending and very young children who are learning to read. A possible project with the seniors might be to read newspaper articles to them and discuss the main idea. With young children, the 5th graders could read picture books to them and develop comprehension questions that focus on the main ideas in the text.
The National Youth Leadership Council's K–12 Service-Learning Standards for Quality Practice (available at http://nylc.org/sites/nylc.org/files/files/Standards_Oct2009-web.pdf) provides further guidance in planning projects.
Service Learning Builds Community
Although educators must keep their eyes on how any teaching strategy, including service learning, contributes to academic achievement, there are many other benefits of service learning. Enhanced self-esteem and social responsibility have always been strong outcomes (Wade, 1997). Service learning not only helps the community, but also helps to build community in increasingly diverse U.S. neighborhoods. Jill Peterson, service learning coordinator at Heber Hunt Elementary, noted,
We have worked very hard to gain the trust of the Latino community, and service learning has been a huge part of that. It has made a big difference in that relationship. [Latino parents] are finally feeling comfortable with the school where before they were afraid to ask questions or get help. We have made it a goal to get all parents into the building more, and often because of that, they have taken more of an interest in their child's education, which will hopefully show on our state assessments.
High-quality service learning holds promise for increasing student engagement, enhancing academic achievement, providing authentic uses for students' literacy and math skills, boosting self-esteem, teaching social responsibility, and providing fertile ground for nourishing a rich and diverse school community. Educators at all levels would be wise to take advantage of all that service learning has to offer.
