Class Presentation- Service Learning in Composition
What are everyone's thoughts on service learning? What do you think of the questions posed here?
Authority in the Classroom: Who Holds the Power?
In chapter 2 of Restaino’s First Semester: Graduate Students, Teaching Writing, and the Challenge of the Middle Ground , a lot of the discussion is about grading and the power dynamic in the classroom. One of the graduate assistants described in this chapter was Tess, whose concerns probably mirrored our own as first year graduate students: Concerns about grades, not knowing how to grade, feeling as if grades are the only way to maintain some kind of control and authority in the classroom. Yet, that very power over grades was the source of much personal and interactional turmoil between Tess and her students. This conversation was particularly relevant for me this week. As I am staring down the barrel of just under 50 papers to grade this week it can be a frightening experience. A lot of times, we as instructors––especially as first-year graduate students––feel that the only way we have to maintain control is through grades. Us as graduate students who have o...
Abbie,
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, thank you for showing your face. I have missed seeing humans that are not myself in the mirror.
So as for service learning, it was not something I was familiar with at all. Coming from a Christian Uni, you would think they would have focused on this, but...not really! I did none, and there was none offered at the course level. That's wild to me. So I'm thinking that perhaps my only experience of service learning would have been my own sought out internships in the psychiatric field - which then spurned on my interest in geriatrics in both psych and literature.
As for implementation...oh my gosh, I could not agree more that it would be difficult to implement, especially in the comp. field. It would be a lot easier in psych... But! I think it could be done with comp. Of course there are lots of kind of service you could do out there. I was thinking that for a comp class it might be interesting to get students into a library setting, or a setting where they are interacting with literacy/ book reading (I know. My Lit is showing). I think that having students interact with other people who are at different stages in their literacy (reading books to kids, helping adults who are illiterate read, etc) might be an interesting way to set up a literacy narrative assignment as well as get a conversation about privilege started. Just an idea.
Challenge wise, I have no clue how one might actually even begin to broach this topic. Not a clue. I don't know if paperwork is required, what forms or allowances would be needed. I'm not even sure how I would contact or set up a way for my students to do their learning. It's above my head right now. I think that scheduling is a HUGE conflict as well as accessibility, students desire to socialize or serve, ability to show up (cars and location), etc. I think there are so many icky lose ends. Do you know anything about required paperwork???
Hi Sarah,
DeleteI miss seeing your face as well.
Additionally, in terms of paperwork, to my understanding, it depends on what type of service-learning you are conducting with your students. I know (or at least think?) that you have to fill out some form of paperwork if you are going to be around children, as I vaguely remember having to sign something when I worked at the theatre, but I'm also not sure if that was just their practice, or if it was through the project.
Accessibility is a huge potential issue that I see with service-learning, which was the main one for myself as a student. I see two potential ways to approach this: 1) let students know from day 1 that your course requires that outside time and give them dates to work with or the chance for an alternative assignment if it is not possible OR 2) ensure that your project is accessible within the bounds of your class time, as we have working students, commuter students, students that are parents, and students with a variety of other potential accessibility concerns.
I think service-learning is great on paper, but yes, has a lot of lose ends that need to be addressed before it can be integrated smoothly into a course.
Abbie
Sarah,
DeleteSame! Fascinating that Christian universities don't place a stronger emphasis on serving others . . . hmm.
While I love the idea of incorporating service projects into a writing classroom and thus helping students to further connect writing to the larger world, I also agree with you that it would be a struggle to implement it into our comp classrooms in a sizable way. When the requirements for assignments are already laid out to some extent, I struggle to imagine how there would be time for a project like this. I can see it fitting into assignments--you could make it part of a research paper, as Herzberg's class did. But, as a new teacher, I think I would be overwhelmed taking on such a project with a class.
I'm curious what others think--would you be able to implement something like this into your class easily? Tips/thoughts?
Hi Shelbi,
DeleteIn terms of integrating this into our courses, I think the ideas and concepts would work well with our courses, but the implementation would be a bit difficult at first in terms of setting up the service learning and scaffolding it into a course. I have been a TA in courses with service-learning components before, and to be blunt, it can add a lot of additional work the both the students and the instructors.
Abbie
I went to a Catholic high school where community engagement was a big deal, so I had some experience doing service learning there, and then I got the opportunity to help Prof. Katy Didden run her creative writing workshop at the Muncie YWCA this past semester, which was an amazing experience.
ReplyDeleteThinking of both of these experiences, I wonder if the biggest obstacle to incorporating service learning into one of our classes wouldn't be connections and trust. Forming relationships with organizations out in the community takes times and respect, both of which we have in short supply as grad students. Katy has been doing the WYCA workshop for several years now, and brings a small number of faculty and grad students. Would they be willing to have 50 undergrads brought by a first-time instructor? If the university has standing relationships with community organizations, that would take care of some of those issues, but that's not going to cover the wide variety of issues to which we as instructors might want to expose our students.
Getting past any concerns, I think service learning could work really well in the context of a 103 course. One of my assignments this semester was a literacy narrative, and a service learning opportunity could be a way of having them gather their information in a way that contextualizes things for them. I would probably lean towards having it at the end of the semester, perhaps as the fourth major assignment. You mention the importance of context, so maybe a themed course with the service learning as the capstone would give the instructor time to spread that context throughout the semester?
I don't see myself incorporating service learning in a class anytime soon, and not because of any logistical issues. You mentioned the tension of having service learning still meet course goals, and as an instructor, I still don't know exactly what I want students to get out of my course, nor the best ways to go about that. Until I can get traditional in-class instruction down, I don't see myself being able to incorporate service learning into my class in a meaningful way.
Hi Lucas,
DeleteI definitely agree. I think establishing a community connection is a huge and central part of making a good service-learning project actually work. I know many instructors at IU East did service-learning, and their goals were to create projects that would outlast the course, meaning things that would continue to benefit the community, even after the course was over or the professor left or retired. I think approaching service-learning requires us to think about how we are not only impacting our students learning, but how we are impacting the community around them.
I think a themed course could work for service-learning, but you would definitely need to let students know what they are in for, as it could bring up accessibility issues of all sorts.
Abbie
Hello Friend!
ReplyDeleteIt was good to see your face! First off, I think you did a really great job adapting this for a video format instead of the same lively in-person discussion we would have had in class.
I definitely feel that contextualizing service learning is essential not just for your students to know why they are doing this and how it relates back to the class, but also in letting them actually see these situations for what they are. I think that utilizing service learning and linking it back in a concrete way to the content of the course will begin to show students how it all relates and why it actually matters. If we can then take it a step further and show students how this relates to their everyday lives, that’s even better. One of the best ways to do this in my opinion is to link course content back to lived experiences.
I have never personally participated in service learning, though I think it’s something I would really like to try at some point. I absolutely think that it would work well for an anthropology course (which is actually a rather common thing). However, one of the potential challenges I see in utilizing service learning (and now I see that Lucas mentioned this as well) is that it works best when you have connections to different organizations and the people who work at and run these organizations. You can’t just decide one day to swarm in with a group of 25 students. There is some pre-planning that’s involved in this.
Which brings me to the thought that service learning could be easier for instructors who have been in a community for some time and are familiar with what’s out there. So, for many of us who are just starting out and who maybe have just moved to the Muncie community, it could be a challenge to get up and running. Do we have time in these 2 years that we are here to actually make those necessary connections? I think the answer is yes, though it would take more effort may not reap the same long-lasting results because a lot of us will end up moving away. I personally know of a lot of organizations in the Muncie community (and some of the people involved) because I have lived here my whole life. Even so, I still think it would be a little awkward to get my foot in the door.
Hi Cassia,
DeleteThank you! I did my best.
I think service learning takes time and connections on the part of the instructor to be beneficial for sure. Getting the ball rolling, especially as grad students, I imagine would be difficult as we have not all had very long in the area to establish ourselves within the community. I think service-learning can be really beneficial, but takes a lot of setup to ensure it will have a chance to be successful.
Abbie
Thanks for this Abbie; it was so comforting to see/hear you another human being! This was a really great summary and a lot of good thoughts about both the desire for and the practicality of implementing service learning in the classroom. I definitely think that it could be one of those things that really helps in enabling their understanding of social responsibility. Saying that they have social responsibility is great and all but for some students it may not hit home without tangible experience.
ReplyDelete