More on Service Learning

Contributed by Nicole Ruge, National Consultant Team, Georgia

Service learning often gets confused with community service so let’s define it further. Service Learning is a multi-step process; students will have the opportunities to engage in problem-solving while they are gaining knowledge of a specific topic related to their service learning project and the challenges that the community face.

Service Learning should be cooperative not competitive. We, as teachers, should promote the use of their teamwork and citizenship skills. The students will have more immediate results which will promote deeper learning. There will be no “right” answers and everyone will feel success from this type of project.

Furthermore, service learning is a way for students to take the knowledge they learn from the textbook and apply it to the needs of the community. Service learning is a great way to build bridges between students and their local community.