Talk:Service-learning

Opposition

Anyone know of any organized opposition to service learning? I'm personally against it, as it violates the spirit of volunteering by forcing people to volunteer. Especially in the higher-education setting where students can be somewhat older. Is it appropriate to ask 35 year old students to engage in volunteer work for a grade in their class, for example? Forgive me if this is discussed in some other page, but at the very least there should be a link to such opposition somewhere in this page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.30.91.31 (talk) 03:32, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

There are other forms of service learning in higher education where the student takes a class as an elective knowing that the class is designed as a service-learning class which incorporates a 12 to 14-week set of services to a community project or goal and such service is known so the student voluntarily signs up for the class.

Also, other service-learning options for classes include the service part as an option so the student is not required to do the service to get a grade, but can do something else to get the grade

Boccherini1942 (talk) 22:52, 11 August 2016 (UTC)

Split page

I think that the engineering section should be moved to its own article, perhaps with a short mention of service-learning in engineering programs left here. Service-learning is much more widespread than this article suggests and it implies a disproportionate prevalence in engineering programs.Leep4life (talk) 20:28, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Bias

This page looks a little biased. 72.69.127.19 01:55, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

After looking over this page, the only real bias I saw was the first line 'Service-learning is a successful method of teaching' which I removed. Since I did not see any other bias, I removed the POV flag. Sorry if I missed anything. dimo414 21:36, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Merge

This definitely warrants a merge, with a redirect from here to the service-learning page.

There's much debate about whether service-learning is written with a hyphen or without, but i think making this page the redirect is acceptable. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Fishfly (talk • contribs) 19:33, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Some quick Google searching seems to back that up, so I'll perform the move. --AbsolutDan ^(talk) 19:52, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

The usual rule in English is that you hyphenate such terms as adjectives but not as nouns. In "Service learning is cool," "service" acts as an adjective modifying learning, so they occupy different jobs in the sentences and shouldn't (by the usual rule) be hyphenated. However in the sentence "Service-learning courses are cool" "service-learning" works as a single term to modify "courses". "Service" isn't able to directly modify "learning" in that sentence because "learning" is acting as an adjective and only adverbs can modify adjectives. That is to say, a Google search isn't helpful because it doesn't distinguish between different uses of the term. NickelShoe (Talk) 02:56, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Article improvement

If any user has suggestions for improving this page, I would be happy to be of service in any way. --Kenneth M Burke 01:53, 2 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm not an expert, but am researching the subject. Currently (July 20, 2011) the first sentence does not make sense. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.5.98.188 (talk) 00:11, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

I have rewritten the lead paragraph so that it is a clear reflection of the details in the rest of the article. I have followed the rules for hyphenation in English as instructed in another section of this talk page:

"Service learning" as a noun in its own right does not bear a hyphen just as "high school" does not bear a hyphen. Whenever the text shows "service learning' as a noun I deleted the hyphen.

"Service Learning" as an adjective as in "service-learning curriculum" must bear a hyphen. wherever "service learning" appears as an adjective in the text I added the hyphen.

The article is still quite redundant in supplying so many different definitions without a stated or implied rationale. The article could benefit by better organization.

A paragraph which summarizes the uses of service learning for differing pedagogical ends and also that clearly looks at the reciprocal nature of the benefits that are purported to accrue to learner and receiving agency would help give the article structure and improve cohesiveness.LBoccherini (talk) 08:13, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Peer review and responses during the educational assignment in Winter 2015

A few common themes I noticed throughout the article:

1. Usage of biased language
2. Content written in passive voice
3. Long, wordy paragraphs
4. Repeated content

I have left comments on the shared Google doc showing exactly where I saw those themes occurring.

For our Peer Review you asked us to focus specifically on the order of the content, and I have a few reorganization suggestions.

• Under the heading "Models of Service-Learning"

- I would consider moving National Youth Council, Youth Service California and Florida Department of Ed. into another section. To me that content read more like evaluation guidelines, rather than an explanation of a model of SL.

• Critiques before Lists

- I suggest moving the Critiques section before the lists of Supporting Programs and Notable People. In it's current order, I wonder how many folks will navigate away to one of the links before getting a chance to read the critiques section

Overall I think with some paring down, and a few language tweaks, that the article will be very strong. Great work so far!!

Dsmith80 (talk) 21:22, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

Sara's Peer Review: Basic comments:

1. Some general use of biased language (lots of shoulds, and musts)
2. Several quotes that were not properly linked to the wiki references
3. Inconsistent capitalization - the intro says "Service-Learning" and later it says "Service-learning"
4. In the intro it says "S-L" without a previous reference to that abbreviation
5. The section that reviews the different emphases on service and/or learning is a huge chunk that is pulled from somewhere else, not paraphrased or anything. These longer quotes happen a couple times through the wiki page.
6. Since you mainly focused on rearranging an existing page, I cannot give specific feedback on the three new paragraphs, new figure or table, or 6 references you would have added.
   

Since you mentioned wanting a strong introduction to the page, I left more content suggestions on the shared google doc. I highlight a few areas where I have questions about language, and some capitalization that changes throughout. Great work! That's a huge page to take on!

"Saramorganrose (talk) 00:10, 10 March 2015 (UTC)"

Response to Feedback

We edited all of the specific comments on the shared google doc related to spelling, grammar, diction and biased language. As you can see, the article is very long, and though we worked to remove bias from the original writing, we did not remove all of the bias. We think the current edit is a big improvement.

We heeded the feedback about the "Models of Service Learning" by adjusting the heading to include evaluation frameworks. We also moved the "Critiques" section before the list of supporting programs as the feedback suggested.

We standardized our use of "Service-Learning" instead of other alternatives used throughout the original text. We adjust the quotes that were cited inappropriately throughout the original article and also cleaned up broken links that were no longer linking to live pages. We worked to remove the biased language, as noted before, including "should" and "must".

We did add a new photo to the page, taken from the public domain linked in the powerpoint presented by the U of M librarians. This service learning photo is available for anyone to use.

As noted, we did not create new content because we felt our most important work was to re-organize the existing page so that it could be more useful for wikipedia users. There is more to be done, but we hope this is a good start.

Aweitzer (talk), 16 March 2015

We are currently editing the Service Learning Page by reorganizing many of the broad headings and synthesizing content

Page organization

I appreciate the good writing that has gone into this page but the organization leaves me a little confused. For instance, tucked away within under the major subheading of "Effect on Engineering Education" is the little section on Pedagogical Implications and Constructivism. This paragraph appears to deal with issues relevant to Service Learning as a whole, but it lies solely within the Engineering section. It might be better placed after this section (or related more directly to engineering.)

In general, it seems to me that the page as a whole is quite dominated by the engineering field. I was hoping to learn a good deal more about its usefulness in other areas and at different levels-- especially K-12--where its use is quite controversial. A wide-ranging discussion of both sides of the issue, with more examples, would be very helpful. Rosecrans 13:55, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

I am currently taking a service learning course this summer. I am reading the book "Where's the Learning in Service-Learning?" by Janet Eyler and Dwight E. Giles, Jr. Something that really stood out to me during my reading is that Service-Learning isn't simply trying to serve in a way where you can use Math or English during your project. I have a heart for the world and especially children who are at risk. That basically means kids who have difficult home and family lives. Through my service-learning project I want to be able to better understand the problems children in my own community are facing so that I can better help them overcome future and current obstacles that are in their lives. That is service learning. Making an impact in the lives of people in my community in the hopes that it will spread and overall make a positive change in the future of my community. Before I read that in my book I questioned if what I wanted to do for my project would count, but after reading that I know without a shadow of a doubt my desire to work with children who are in difficult circumstances to hopefully better their future lives definitely is something that is service-learning. Farther in the book it talked about how students who participate in Service-Learning have a greater appreciation and understanding for other cultures as well as a decrease in negative stereotypes towards other people groups. I am not a super judgmental person but I know I can clump people into stereotypes quickly before getting to know them. I am really hoping that during my service-learning project I can go in with an open mind and hopefully break down some of those stereotypes I currently have ingrained in my head. I want to be a person who is willing to get to know and experience people of all backgrounds and demographics. Savedbygrace17 (talk) 17:05, 29 June 2015 (UTC)Kaitlin WAGENKNECHT

References

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Eyler and Giles Jr. edits

This article gets many edits by brand new editors who add a large quantity of material. I assume this is because editing Wikipedia is assigned by an instructor in some way. Lately a large amount of this has been from books by Janet Eyler and Dwight E. Giles Jr. This most recent edit is a good example, but this has been happening since July 2015. There are two major problems with all these edits:

1. they are too lengthy for the few sources being used. By that I mean that they introduce a lot of relatively light-weight material based only on one or two textbooks (which I assume were assigned reading). Wikipedia should present material in proportion to its coverage in reliable sources.

2. they are not written from a neutral point of view. This means that additions should not function as advocacy for service-learning, and should be especially cautious of promoting the viewpoints of one or two sources beyond due weight. Service learning does have its critics, and using WP:PEACOCK and similar to gloss-over that is doing the project a disservice. Also, neither Janet Eyler nor Dwight E. Giles Jr. have been clearly established as being so prominent that their perspectives should necessarily take front-and-center. Wikipedia should not be used as a platform for advice or advocacy, per WP:NOT.

If a professor has been assigning this article as an assignment, please direct them to this talk page. There are resources for both students and teacher who wish to edit Wikipedia, but in this case, I think communication is the best first step. Thanks. Grayfell (talk) 04:23, 23 June 2016 (UTC)

Grayfell,

You are correct that this article has been assigned by a professor. I will give him a link to this talk page.

You are also correct that a book by Eyler and Giles is assigned reading. Personally, the reason I had solely cited Eyler and Giles was because in research on my main subject (Placement Quality) I was unable to find articles from other scholars. On the subject of Duration, however, after an extra hour or two of research, I was able to find other sources.

As for the material you deleted, I replaced it after a major edit based on your advice. I eliminated several sentences that could be perceived as service-learning advocacy or advice, added citations from two non-Eyler-and-Giles sources to buttress some of my material, and gave Duration its own separate section instead of setting it under Placement Quality.

Tell me what you think!

Talus9 (talk) 20:33, 23 June 2016 (UTC)

@Talus9: Thanks for answering my questions. This does look like an improvement, but there are still a lot of problems. Take a look at what you added in comparison to Service-learning#Effects, which is later in the article. I see a lot of redundancy there. How is "impact" on students different from "effect" on students? I'm pretty sure this section was also added as an assignment, as it's mostly supported by the same textbook.

I also still have some concerns over the neutrality of the content added, and those will take a bit more work. As an example: ...the quality of a service-learning project or program deeply affects the level of transformation that students experience. The words "impact" and "transformation" jump out at me as being positively loaded, and "deeply" is also highly subjective (see WP:PEACOCK). The words "effect" and "change" would be more neutral, and deeply can just be left out without any real change in meaning. In addition I'm not sure what this is actually saying beyond the obvious. "Better programs have a greater effect on participants." When phrased like this, it seems like filler, and the other section says similar things, which is a bad sign.

After consolidating references, there are now 13 refs for the 1999 edition, and 9 for the 2007 edition. At a glance, half the article looks like it's supported by this one source! The reference section is shows that there's a lot more sources available, so this one relatively obscure book is being leaned-on way, way too hard.

To briefly explain some technical issues: Ibid doesn't work very well with Wikipedia's "ref" tags, because tags can be reused, and frequently get moved around, meaning that it becomes difficult or impossible to find the original work in the references section (Service-learning#References). I can't actually find any information about the 2007 edition, by the way. Does it at least have an ISBN number? Worldcat and Amazon both only list the 1999 edition. Grayfell (talk) 23:34, 23 June 2016 (UTC)

@Grayfell:

You're right about the redundancies; however, my original section title was "Elements of Impactful Service-learning" (which I've changed to "Factors"). The ultimate focus of my section is on the factors involved in service-learning's impact, not on the impact itself, as in "Effects." Possibly my section could be made a sub-heading of "Effects"?

However, there are still redundancies between "Factors," "Effects," and "Service," which all mention placement quality, and between "Learning," "Factors," "Service," and "Effects," which all mention various effects of service-learning. Diversity is also discussed in at least two sections. Seems like a lot of work is needed here.

Talus9 (talk) 23:24, 24 June 2016 (UTC)