| Urban
Education 554 - Service Learning & Community Development in Urban Settings
Dr. Novella Ketih; novella.keith@temple.edu
Subject/Discipline: Education
School: Temple
University
Project Area: Schooling/Education/Youth
Fall 2004
INTERDISCIPLINARY URBAN EDUCATION PROGRAM
Service Learning & Community Development
in Urban Settings
Urban Education 554, Fall 2004
Instructor: Dr. Novella Keith
Ritter Hall 242; 215-204-6940
Mondays, 5:00-7:30, Ritter Hall 108
novella.keith@temple.edu
Course Description
Service learning is growing in use among
faculty at all levels and in all disciplines and is now a graduation requirement
in many school districts, colleges, and states (including Philadelphia
and Temple’s Teacher Preparation program). This growth is accompanied
by a healthy debate about the purposes of service learning, the ways it
should be linked to a curriculum, how and what participants learn from
it, how it should relate to the community, who benefits from it, and how.
In this course, we will explore these issues
and relate them to the practice, research, and theory of service learning
in the urban context. The course involves hands-on experience, readings,
discussion, and reflection. Each of you will select a particular
focus and become involved in a service learning project that will be an
important source of personal and class reflection throughout the term and
will be presented orally, visually, and in writing at the end of term.
The service learning you undertake may
relate to something with which you are already involved or you may choose
to participate in an existing service learning project to which I will
provide entry. This may include working with the undergraduate Service
Learning course (Education 224) in the Teacher Education Program.
Education 554 is one of four courses comprising
the Graduate Certificate of Study in Urban Education. Consult with
me for more information on the certificate.
Course organization
The course will be run as a seminar, so
expect to participate fully and contribute your own prior (and developing)
knowledge. I hope we will have many interesting discussions in class,
for which all of us will provide leadership. Throughout the term, you will
be asked to select topics/readings which you will present and on which
you will lead discussion. The first three weeks of classes will be
devoted to general discussions and course organization. Thereafter,
each class session will include student-led (small group) presentation
and discussion of a weekly topic that relates to the class’ interests.
Typically, student-led discussions will take one-half the class period;
I will organize/lead the remainder of the class period. This is negotiable;
to the extent possible, I would like to plan the entire class session with
student presenters, so as to have an integrated approach. This will
normally require our meeting prior to the class you are leading.
Some class meetings may take us to selected service-learning sites, and
may involve meeting on days/evenings other than when the class is scheduled.
In order to sustain your work in class and in the field, I will strongly
encourage the formation of support groups among the students (and possibly
including community partners and others).
You will be asked to keep a journal in
which you will record experiences and reflections on your service project.
At the end of the course, you will make an oral and visual presentation
of your project. A portfolio that demonstrates your learning, to
be developed throughout the course, will also be due at the end.
We will discuss this requirement in class. Portfolio items may include
(1) a biographical essay that relates to service learning issues; (2) your
learning goals and accomplishments; (3) at least one critical incident
reflection; (4) journal entries; (5) site and asset/need research and analysis;
(6) analyses and reactions to selected readings; (7) description and analysis
of your service learning project (proposed; actual; relate to literature);
(8) field logs; (9) final critical reflection paper; and (10) plan for
class presentation. These will be described on separate handouts
that will include assessment rubrics. Assignments will be graded
as they are completed and collected. However, final evaluation for
overall course grade will be made at the end of the course, based on the
portfolio as a whole.
Required texts
Timothy Stanton, Dwight Giles, & Nadine
Cruz (1999). Service-Learning: A Movement’s Pioneers Reflect on
its Origins, Practice, and Future. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
ISBN 0-7879-4317-7 (note: this ISBN is for the cloth edition; there is
a paperback edition)
Stephen Fishman & Lucille McCarthy
(1998). John Dewey and the Challenge of Classroom Practice.
New York: Teachers College Press. ISBN 0807737267
Janet Eyler & Dwight Giles (1999).
Where is the Learning in Service Learning. San Francisco:
Jossey Bass Publishers. ISBN 0787944831
Jeff Claus and Curtis Ogden, eds. (1999).
Service Learning for Youth Empowerment and Social Change.
New York: Peter Lang. ISBN 0820438588.
Robert A. Rhoads (1997). Community
Service and Higher Learning; Explorations of the Caring Self.
Albany, NY: SUNY Press. ISBN 0791435229
Marilynne Boyle-Baise (2002). Multicultural
Service Learning; Educating Teachers in Diverse Communities.
New York: Teachers College Press.
Other readings will be assigned.
To the extent possible, these will be put on the class’ Blackboard site
(please note you will need a Temple e-mail address to access the site).
CLASS SCHEDULE
Note: Readings are to be completed by the
class date in which they are listed.
8/30 Week 1: Introduction to the
course
1. Discussion of course organization
& assignments
2. Experiential exercise:
What is service learning? Building on our collective knowledge.
3. Discussion: what do we know about
community development and community building? What do we want/need
to know about it? How do we identify “community” needs?
4. Reflection exercise
5. Discussion of student interests
and possible sites/projects (to be confirmed by 9/20 and written up as
a formal project proposal by 9/27)
Note that a written autobiographical reflective
essay will be due by next class (see below). A sample essay will
be provided.
9/13 Week 2: Origins and definitions
of SL
1. What is service learning (continued)
2. What is community development/building
(continued)
3. How should we think/do SL in
urban settings?
4. Presentation/discussion of your
ideas for your projects
5. Class organization: selecting
topics/dates for student-led discussion
Reading assignment
1. Stanton, Giles, & Cruz, 1999
(all).
2. Keith, N.Z. (1996). Can urban
school reform and community development be joined? The potential
of community schools. Education and Urban Society, 28(2):
237-268.
3. Keith, N. Z. (1998). Community
service for community building: the School-Based Service Corps as border
crossers. Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning,
5: 86-96
4. Explore the web sites at the
end of the syllabus (and any other interesting ones you find -- do a Google
search for “service learning) and be prepared to discuss how they contribute
to your developing understanding of community development/ community building
and service-learning, in the context of urban schools and communities (take
a look at all of them, but select a few key entries/readings to look at
in-depth -- it should be content that “grabs” you).
5. Sign up for the national Service-learning
Network Listserv (service-learning@csf.colorado.edu)
Written assignments
1. Draft 1 of autobiographical reflection
statement (written; be prepared to share at least some of it): Who
is the self you bring to service learning? Which (one or two) of
the pioneers (Stanton, Giles & Cruz) do you connect with and why?
What do you want to explore and learn during this class? How would
you like to grow? (These are your “learning goals”).
2. Reflection on service learning
readings/web research: what grabbed you most? A) Select the
ONE NEW idea that grabbed YOUR interest the most; explain it. B)
analyze what makes this idea new and interesting for you; and how this
relates to your assumptions and what you may know about service learning;
explain; C) consider this new idea in light of what you want to learn and
practice with regard to service learning.
Come to class prepared to:
1. Discuss possible site(s)/communities
for your project; the general focus/area of your project; your goals; and
the questions you might explore through your project. This means
that, between 8/30 and 9/13 you need to contact potential community partners
and have begun to explore mutual needs and interests.
2. Present/discuss aspects of the
readings/web research with which you strongly connected.
3. Share your written reflection
as part of class discussion on reflection.
9/20 Week 3: Reflection and critical
reflection
Reflection exercises; discussion; the “what,
so what, now what” reflection cycle.
Reading assignment
1. Fishman & McCarthy, 1998
(all)
2. Deborah S. Yost, Sally M. Sentner
& Anna Forlenza Bailey (Jan/Feb 2000). An examination of the
construct of critical reflection: Implications for teacher education
programming in the 21st Century. Journal of Teacher Education,
51 (1), 39-49.
3. Michael Reynolds (June 1998).
Reflection and critical reflection in management learning.
Management Learning, 29 (2), 183-200.
4. What can a body know? Refiguring
pedagogic intention. Journal of Teacher Education, 45 (1),
53- (Jan. 1994).
5. Kate Ronald & Hephzibah Roskelly
(May 2001). Untested feasibility: Imagining the pragmatic possibility
of Paulo Freire. College English, 63 (5), 612-632.
Recommended reading: Stephen Brookfield,
Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher (selections from the book)
Reflection assignment
1. Reflect on your interaction with
your site/partners: what issues stand out? Who are you in relation
to them? Who are they? How did you feel about them?
What did you know about them before the interaction? What did you
learn about them and about yourself, through the interaction? What
might you do/think/feel differently as a result of this?
2. Reflect on one of the readings
that especially stood out for you. Again, what did you know about
the issues presented? What assumptions did you become aware of?
What else did you learn? How does this knowledge influence your thinking/feelings/actions?
(Note that “knowledge” is not only intellectual
but also emotional; your reflections should focus on your feeling/emotional/personal
and other sides of learning, as well as the intellectual side of learning).
3. Bring draft 2 (may be final draft)
of your autobiographical statement to class (see handout “SL Project Guidelines,”
Proposal -- whole proposal is due next week).
The rest of the syllabus is based on input
by past students; it is suggestive and may be modified based on your own
goals and interests. Starting from Week 4, you will begin to take
more responsibility for part of the class, including suggesting reading
assignments.
9/ 27 Week 4: Best practices in
service learning
Presentation/discussions with service learning
practitioners.
SL Project Proposal due
Reading assignment
1. Shelley H. Billig (May 2000).
Research on K 12 school based service learning: The evidence builds.
Phi Delta Kappan 81 (9), pp. 658-664
2. Bob Leonard, The Selma Project;
Understanding the Struggle for Community. In Onda Faye Burhnam &
Steve Burnham (1998), The Citizen Artist. Gardiner, NY: Critical
Press, pp. 259-268. (handout).
3. Below are a number of sites to
visit before class on Monday. Please search the following sites for
one (at least) example of a great or not so great service learning practice.
I ask that you to take some simple notes on the program/practice you've
selected, so that you can describe it to the class and allow us to collaborate
on a critique.
http://www.needindeed.org
go to success stories
and our approach
http://www.phila.k12.pa.us/teachers/frameworks/main/index.htm
go to best practices
then to project based learning
http://www.compact.org
1. select "resources"
on the left of the screen, then under "quick find," select "model programs"
2. also on the
"resources" page, under "Educating Students for Active Citizenship and
Engaging with Communities: Practices in
Higher Ed", select "EPICENTER" to explore some government run programs
like AmeriCorps
http://www.americorps.org
or http://www.learnandserve.org
About the government's
involvement in service learning practice
http://www.centerforliteracy.org
This is an interesting
and exclusively community based program; we can discuss the SL
potential of
such programs.
http://www.communityarts.net
This is the clearinghouse
for everyone doing anything in community arts addressing social
issues,
community needs, service, reflection, community bridges.
Also see sites at end of syllabus.
10/4 Week 5: Evaluating
service learning programs
We will be working in small groups to
apply the readings below to different service learning projects, so it
would be best to read a couple of these thoroughly and be familiar with
the rest. The focus will be not only on the program/project but also
on the relationships practitioners develop (including yourself) through
SL projects.
Reading assignment
1. Alan Waterman (chapters
on evaluation, handout)
2. Fishman & McCarthy,
ch. 7 (“John Dewey and the Challenge of Classroom Practice”)
3. Center for Human
Resources, Brandeis University and ABT Associates (July 1999). National
Evaluation of Learn and Serve America. Available from
http://www.learnandserve.org/research/lsreport.pdf
4. Other resources on service learning
evaluation – see sites at end of syllabus.
10/11 Week 6: Integrating
experiential and academic learning
Critical Incident Analysis due
Come to class prepared to discuss your
critical incident analysis in relation to the readings assigned for Week
3.
Reading Assignment
Review all readings for Week 3.
Focus especially on Dewey and curriculum integration; and different approaches
to reflection.
10/18 Week 7: Service learning
for empowerment
Reading Assignment
1. "More Power Than We Know", Chapter
3 in Hope and History by Vincent Harding, 1990
2. Service Learning for Youth
Empowerment and Social Change (read all, selectively; focus especially
ch. 5, "An Empowering, Transformative Approach").
3. Beverly Gordon (1991).
African American Cultural Knowledge and Liberatory Education, and Potentials
in a Post Modern American Society. In Mwalimu Shujaa (ed.), Too
Much Schooling, Too Little Education.
4. Web research.
10/25 – 11/29 Weeks 8 –
13: Student selected topics, connected to own SL projects
Weeks 8 & 11 (10/25 & 11/15)
Field log & reflection journals due
Part of the class to be devoted to reflection
exercises on your own work.
12/6 Week 14
Service learning project/final portfolio
due.
12/13 Week 15
Final presentations/celebration (invite
your community partner/s & others to attend).
Useful Websites
Service learning practitioners and researchers
constitute a very active Internet community. You will find vast amount
of information on the web. Below is a sampling of sites.
National Service Learning Clearinghouse
- Home page
http://www.servicelearning.org/
Higher Education Service Learning Clearinghouse
(UCLA) - home page
http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/slc/index.html
Campus Compact -- community service, service
learning, university-community partnerships, with reference to higher education
http://www.compact.org
National Service Resource Center (Corporation
for National and Community Service)
http://www.nationalserviceresources.org/
Corporation for National Service, National
Service and Education Resources (includes links to NW Regional Education
and other Education Labs)
http://www.nationalservice.org/areads/resources/cnsresources.html
Peace Corps -- World Wise Schools (curriculum
guides, country information, maps, etc.)
http://www.peacecorps.gov/wws/educators/index.html
http://www.peacecorps.gov/wws/guides/voices/
Effective service learning practices (Corporation
for National and Community Service)
http://epicenter.nationalserviceresources.org/index.taf?_function=list&Layout_0_Keywords=service
learning
National report on the state of service
learning -- http://servicelearningcommission.org/learningindeed.pdf
Evaluation and Research (UCLA)
http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/slc/research.html
Evaluation Toolkit (empowerment evaluation)
http://www.projectstar.org/star/library/toolkit.html
(AmeriCorps)
http://www.projectstar.org/star/Generic/usersguide.htm
Performance measures and evaluation (Project
Star)
http://www.projectstar.org/star/Generic/relatedlinks.htm
Danika M. Brown, Pulling it Together: A
Method for Developing Service-Learning and Community Partnerships Based
in Critical Pedagogy. Corporation for National Service, July 15,
2001
http://www.nationalserviceresources.org/filemanager/download/453/brown.pdf
Other relevant websites:
New York Times Learning Network
(“These special news packages from
The Learning Network take a closer look at some of the historic and current
issues that have changed our world. Each includes numerous classroom resources,
such as lesson plans, quizzes, questionnaires, slide shows, crosswords
and historical Times articles.”)
http://www.nytimes.com/learning/
National Community Building Network
http://www.ncbn.org
Civic Practices Network, especially youth
section http://www.cpn.org/sections/topics/youth/youth.html
Institute for Policy Research (John Kretzmann
& John McKnight)
http://www.nwu.edu/ipr
Teachers College Record
http://www.tcrecord.org;
go to “social context” and “urban education”
Forum for Youth Investment (non profit)
- youth-centered school reform
http://www.forumforyouthinvestment.org/issues/ythcntrdreform.htm
http://www.forumforyouthinvestment.org/issues/ythcntrdreformother.htm
Forum for Youth Investment (non profit)
- youth policy
http://www.forumforyouthinvestment.org/issues/policyforum.htm
White House Task Force for Disadvantaged
Youth
http://www.forumforyouthinvestment.org/whitehouse/actioncenter.htm |