Talking Points #5

The Politics of Service Learning 
Joseph Kahne and Joel Westheimer 


Quote 1:
"Educators and legislators alike maintain that service learning can improve the community and invigorate the classroom, providing rich educational experiences for students at all levels of schooling. Service learning makes students active participants in service projects that aim to respond to the needs of the community while furthering the academic goals of the students."

Comments: 
I believe this statement is true in the fact that not only am i helping the students at the elementary school with a new approach to learning they are also providing me with feedback and helping me with the learning process as well. I analyze and watch the children in the classroom and they have goals that they want to complete and when I work with them I also want them to do the best that they can. It helps the students and myself to learn different approaches to the situations and the things they are learning and will also help me in the future.

Quote 2: 
"Similarly, many contemporary scholars focus on change over charity and argue that the lack of connection between individual rights and communal obligations within our culture has left us with a bankrupt sense of citizenship. Like the programs Hanna criticized more than 50 years ago, many current service activities emphasize altruism and charity and fail to call into question current notions of individualism or to encourage the type of political participation that furthers democracy."

Comment:
I believe this to be false in the sense that when you believe you are doing "charity" work you are actually improving and changing an individuals life. When doing service activities it isn't considered charity you are helping the less fortunate and encouraging different behavior which wouldn't be a bankrupt sense of citizenship in fact it would be helping the community in an overall sense. They are teaching less fortunate others to think on their own and make decisions that they wouldn't normally make and it isn't charity if they enjoy doing and helping these others.

Quote 3: 
"Efforts to integrate service learning activities into the curriculum have great potential and deserve the support they are now receiving. To date, however, little attention has been given to sorting out the goals and motivations that underlie the spectrum of service learning projects emerging in schools throughout the country."

Comment: 
Without a doubt there should be more service learning activities in school curriculums. This is the first class that I have been asked to do a service learning project and already I see a different approach that I have to school and see different point of views on how i'd like to teach in the future. Maybe it's not the exact location or place that I want to be in the future but it gives me a sense of what I am getting myself into before starting the program.