Findings
_
Section One: Where Do
I Begin?
As the school year began, I felt excited and anxious about my action research plan. I was excited about the possibility of making my students’ learning more purposeful and applicable to real world situations. I was excited about assisting my students in making long lasting connections with other communities and community members. However, I was anxious as to how all of this was going to unfold. With so many different definitions of service learning and so many different methods of application, which definition and method would best benefit my class. Where was I going to start? I needed a strong foundation or baseline to begin my study so I decided to have my students take a preliminary survey (Appendix A). The preliminary survey was constructed to assess where students were in terms of understanding and participating in community service learning. I wanted see if my students had previously been provided opportunities to help others, and if so, what kinds of helpful activities were they participating in. I also wanted to gain insight into what my students enjoyed in school and how they preferred to work. I wanted to keep my students learning styles in mind when choosing community service-learning activities.
Several questions from the preliminary survey were of particular interest to me. It was important for me to see how my students felt about helping other people, since the main premise for community service learning was using student learning to help others. The results showed me that the majority of my students had a positive disposition with helping others:
As the school year began, I felt excited and anxious about my action research plan. I was excited about the possibility of making my students’ learning more purposeful and applicable to real world situations. I was excited about assisting my students in making long lasting connections with other communities and community members. However, I was anxious as to how all of this was going to unfold. With so many different definitions of service learning and so many different methods of application, which definition and method would best benefit my class. Where was I going to start? I needed a strong foundation or baseline to begin my study so I decided to have my students take a preliminary survey (Appendix A). The preliminary survey was constructed to assess where students were in terms of understanding and participating in community service learning. I wanted see if my students had previously been provided opportunities to help others, and if so, what kinds of helpful activities were they participating in. I also wanted to gain insight into what my students enjoyed in school and how they preferred to work. I wanted to keep my students learning styles in mind when choosing community service-learning activities.
Several questions from the preliminary survey were of particular interest to me. It was important for me to see how my students felt about helping other people, since the main premise for community service learning was using student learning to help others. The results showed me that the majority of my students had a positive disposition with helping others:
_
I was thrilled to see that all students reported that they
enjoy helping others and it makes them feel good. In fact, 76% of my students
(16 out of 21) said that they “love” helping others. This was a great
foundation for my action research project. I knew I wouldn’t need to convince
my students that community service learning was going to be a positive
experience. I was also particularly interested in the types of opportunities
presented to my students to regards to helping others. I wanted to know not
only how they felt, but also whom they helped. To acquire this data, I asked
the following open-ended survey question: “Tell
me about a time you helped someone. Who did you help? What did you do? How did
you feel about helping someone?” In a close analysis of their responses, I
found:
·62% of my students (13 out of 21) referenced helping a family member
·33% of my students (7 out of 21) referenced helping a friend
·5% of my students (1 out of 21) referenced helping an animal
·62% of my students (13 out of 21) referenced helping a family member
·33% of my students (7 out of 21) referenced helping a friend
·5% of my students (1 out of 21) referenced helping an animal
_
Below you will find a few individual student responses:
· “I helped my brother fix his bike. It felt amazing to help someone that you really care for!” –Yareli
· “One time my cousin’s dog fell off her toy and I picked her up from the ground and I felt very sad about the dog but I was proud about saving my cousin’s dog.” –Catiana
· “One time I helped my friend. How I helped her is when she was crying because she scrapped her knee. I helped her by giving her a hug and I felt really special.” –Maiquel
Students clearly saw their close friends and family members as the primary communities needing help. I was interested to see if students would list people/animals/objects outside of their immediate circles (i.e. children at a hospital, the elderly, other students who are not friends, etc.) after our community service-learning research activities. It was possible that students had never been presented the opportunity to help people outside their close friends and family.
I knew that my students had mostly positive feelings associated with helping others, but I wanted to know how my students felt when other people helped them. I found student responses to be equally positive to the question, “How did you feel when someone else helped you?”:
· “I helped my brother fix his bike. It felt amazing to help someone that you really care for!” –Yareli
· “One time my cousin’s dog fell off her toy and I picked her up from the ground and I felt very sad about the dog but I was proud about saving my cousin’s dog.” –Catiana
· “One time I helped my friend. How I helped her is when she was crying because she scrapped her knee. I helped her by giving her a hug and I felt really special.” –Maiquel
Students clearly saw their close friends and family members as the primary communities needing help. I was interested to see if students would list people/animals/objects outside of their immediate circles (i.e. children at a hospital, the elderly, other students who are not friends, etc.) after our community service-learning research activities. It was possible that students had never been presented the opportunity to help people outside their close friends and family.
I knew that my students had mostly positive feelings associated with helping others, but I wanted to know how my students felt when other people helped them. I found student responses to be equally positive to the question, “How did you feel when someone else helped you?”:
_
Students’ individual quotes below demonstrate their positive
dispositions towards being helped:
· “Last time my friend Ashly helped me pick up my toys on the ground and I felt really happy.” –Jalysia
· “My mom helped me. She helped me do my homework. I felt happy.” –Vania
· “My dad helped me get my cat off my leg. When my dad helped me I felt happy.” –Amanda
· “My friend helped me play soccer. She said you can do it.” –Lisbeth
I was surprised to see several more students (8 out of 21) did not directly respond to this question than the question, “How did you feel helping someone?” For example, Christopher stated, “Last time I scrapped my arm and it was bleeding a lot so my big brother called my dad and my mom.” He acknowledged who helped him but he didn’t note how it made him feel. It was possible that students did not associate any feelings with other people helping them, did not understand the question, or forgot to answer that question. Due to the scripted nature of our curriculum, students are rarely afforded the opportunity to reflect about how they felt after someone helped them. I knew that I wanted to make reflection an essential part of my community service learning curriculum.
Connecting Community Service Learning to the Curriculum and the Classroom
I took a very close look at the open-ended question that asked students what they liked most about school. According to James Howard (1993), community service learning must be connected to the learning currently taking place in the classroom in order for students to experience the greatest benefit. If community service learning is presented as a separate element (apart from the curriculum), students may have difficulty understanding the purpose and value of the experience. Keeping this in mind, I took a close look at students’ responses in order to designate an intentional content area to embed community service learning.
· “Last time my friend Ashly helped me pick up my toys on the ground and I felt really happy.” –Jalysia
· “My mom helped me. She helped me do my homework. I felt happy.” –Vania
· “My dad helped me get my cat off my leg. When my dad helped me I felt happy.” –Amanda
· “My friend helped me play soccer. She said you can do it.” –Lisbeth
I was surprised to see several more students (8 out of 21) did not directly respond to this question than the question, “How did you feel helping someone?” For example, Christopher stated, “Last time I scrapped my arm and it was bleeding a lot so my big brother called my dad and my mom.” He acknowledged who helped him but he didn’t note how it made him feel. It was possible that students did not associate any feelings with other people helping them, did not understand the question, or forgot to answer that question. Due to the scripted nature of our curriculum, students are rarely afforded the opportunity to reflect about how they felt after someone helped them. I knew that I wanted to make reflection an essential part of my community service learning curriculum.
Connecting Community Service Learning to the Curriculum and the Classroom
I took a very close look at the open-ended question that asked students what they liked most about school. According to James Howard (1993), community service learning must be connected to the learning currently taking place in the classroom in order for students to experience the greatest benefit. If community service learning is presented as a separate element (apart from the curriculum), students may have difficulty understanding the purpose and value of the experience. Keeping this in mind, I took a close look at students’ responses in order to designate an intentional content area to embed community service learning.
_
I found it interesting that the majority of the students
selected math as what they liked most about school. I wondered if I focused my
community service-learning project around an area such as reading, writing,
science, or social studies, more students would select those areas as what they
liked most about school in a follow-up survey. I was interested to see if there
would be correlation between student engagement and positive disposition
towards a certain subject area if community service learning were to be
integrated into that area. Using this data, I decided to begin by embedding
community service learning into a language arts based content area, such as
reading. I wondered if I would see an increase in the number of students who
liked reading or writing by participating in a community service learning
project focused around one of these content areas.
Finally, I looked closely at students’ responses to the multiple-choice question: “How do you like to work with other in class?” I found:
·43% of my students (9 out of 21) preferred working with a small group
·43% of my students (9 out of 21) preferred working with a partner
·5% of my students (1 out of 21) preferred working alone
·9% of my students (2 out of 21) listed an alternative response
Of the two students who listed alternative responses, one student said they preferred working with the entire class and the other student said they preferred working with a big group.
Finally, I looked closely at students’ responses to the multiple-choice question: “How do you like to work with other in class?” I found:
·43% of my students (9 out of 21) preferred working with a small group
·43% of my students (9 out of 21) preferred working with a partner
·5% of my students (1 out of 21) preferred working alone
·9% of my students (2 out of 21) listed an alternative response
Of the two students who listed alternative responses, one student said they preferred working with the entire class and the other student said they preferred working with a big group.
_
This survey question confirmed my belief that most students
prefer to work with others, as opposed to alone. It surprised me to see that
one of my students preferred to work alone. I planned to follow up with that
student to see if there were some specific reasons why he liked to work alone. I
also wondered if his preference would change after experience with community
service learning. Students seemed to be split between working with a partner
and working with a small group. I wondered if these choices would change if I
had defined a “small group” more specifically. For example, if I had said a small
group contained 6 students, would students’ preferences change or remain the
same? Overall, I was glad that I had created a learning environment where
students preferred to work with others. This lent itself nicely to the concept
of building community relationships.
After analyzing all the data from my preliminary survey, I was able to take away a few important concepts. I knew my students were happy and willing to help other people, helping others made them feel good, and students’ had little experience with helping communities outside immediate friends and family members. I knew I wanted to broaden my students’ knowledge of communities needing their assistance. I also found out that my students favored math more than other subjects and this helped me decide to focus my first community service-learning project in language arts in order to increase my students’ interest in that content area. Another important concept I took away was that students enjoyed working with others and this lent itself nicely to the concept of building community relationships within community service learning. It was important to me to incorporate as many of my students’ preferences as possible so that community service learning would be a positive experience.
Student Voice In Designing the Community Service Learning Projects
Now that I knew what content area to begin with, I wanted to solicit the assistance of my student in brainstorming some community service learning project ideas to begin with. I started by introducing the community service learning research project to my students. They were very excited. They seemed excited about the opportunity to help people with what they were learning in class. I gave them each a journal, called their “community service-learning journal”. I told them that we would be using this throughout the research process to write down any thoughts, ideas, feelings, etc. To get the ideas flowing, I had them begin their first journal entry addressing the following questions: What do you think about community service learning? Do you have any ideas? What are you excited about? Do you have any questions about community service learning?
After analyzing all of their responses, I noticed three themes emerge regarding ideas for community service learning. Students’ answers were categorized into ideas for helping the environment, ideas for teaching others, and ideas for doing things for other people. Out of 17 journals analyzed:
·23% of my students (4 out of 17) of my students noted ideas for helping the environment
·18% of my students (3 out of 17) noted ideas for teaching others
·59% of my students (10 out of 17) noted ideas for doing things for other people
My students’ individual responses can best exemplify their ideas:
Ideas for helping the environment:
· “I think I know how to help people by picking up trash because some people hurt themselves by tripping on trash.”
· “We can make the community look nice.”
· “I like to help others clean up garbage outside. I enjoy it because at my house they don’t pick up their stuff.”
Ideas for teaching others:
· “You can teach people how to cook and bake stuff because some of us don’t know how to bake and cook. You can teach them how to do math and reading.”
· “I like to help my grandma so she can learn a lot of English. She speaks a little bit of English and a lot of Spanish because she is Mexican.”
Ideas for doing things for other people:
· “I think we should help people in the hospital because they are lonely and I want to help them. I want to help old people because they can not take care of themselves.”
· “I want to make good food for people that need food to be healthy. I also want to be kind, helpful, and friendly to people that need care. The last time I did this, someone was hurt and I helped them to get up and take him home.”
· “My ideas are to send letters to children in the hospital and old people that are sad. They are sad because they miss their family and friends. I’m excited because I can help people and help my aunt because she has special needs.”
Overall, I noticed that my students were more than willing to help others. In fact, several students used the word “help” to explain their ideas. I could feel the excitement in their responses. Many students stated how helping others made them feel good and happy. I love how empowered my students were in knowing that they were able to help so many different people in so many ways. I was surprised by some of the ideas for community service learning. For example, Henry said, “I like to help my grandma so she can learn a lot of English. She speaks a little bit of English and a lot of Spanish because she is Mexican.” I hadn’t thought of this for a CSL project, but it was great idea!! I could also see that students weren’t quite cognizant of the fact that they were able to learn from helping others. I wanted my students to know that what they’re learning in class is purposeful and can be used to help others. I found that I would have to explain the difference between community service and community service learning.
I also saw many great character traits in my students’ responses. Yorel stated, “I also want to be kind, helpful, and friendly to people that need care.” I was hopeful for students to see that CSL could help them be people who are kind, helpful, friendly, empathetic, responsible, caring, etc. I wanted the learning in my class to help my students be better people. Another thing I noticed was that I should have separated the questions I asked my students to respond to. For this journal entry, I asked my students to respond to several questions at once. In doing this, some of my students didn’t respond to all of the questions. I took this into consideration when designing and formatting journal activities in the following project. I made sure to remind my students to respond to each question separately.
With my data and research goals in mind, I was beginning to envision our first community service-learning project. I really wanted to embed the community service learning process into my every day classroom instruction as much as possible. As I thought about the implications of my research for future educators, I really wanted my action research to serve as a model for how to incorporate big ideas into public education where district mandates regulate curriculum and teacher instruction. As I embarked on my research journey, I knew I would have to facilitate as many connections between what I was already doing with what I wanted to do. Without these connections, I would become inundated with the amount of tasks I would have to squeeze into a short amount of time. Any additional activities would conflict with the carefully scripted and planned for minutes of my day.
Section Two: A Visit From the Firehouse
After analyzing all the data from my preliminary survey, I was able to take away a few important concepts. I knew my students were happy and willing to help other people, helping others made them feel good, and students’ had little experience with helping communities outside immediate friends and family members. I knew I wanted to broaden my students’ knowledge of communities needing their assistance. I also found out that my students favored math more than other subjects and this helped me decide to focus my first community service-learning project in language arts in order to increase my students’ interest in that content area. Another important concept I took away was that students enjoyed working with others and this lent itself nicely to the concept of building community relationships within community service learning. It was important to me to incorporate as many of my students’ preferences as possible so that community service learning would be a positive experience.
Student Voice In Designing the Community Service Learning Projects
Now that I knew what content area to begin with, I wanted to solicit the assistance of my student in brainstorming some community service learning project ideas to begin with. I started by introducing the community service learning research project to my students. They were very excited. They seemed excited about the opportunity to help people with what they were learning in class. I gave them each a journal, called their “community service-learning journal”. I told them that we would be using this throughout the research process to write down any thoughts, ideas, feelings, etc. To get the ideas flowing, I had them begin their first journal entry addressing the following questions: What do you think about community service learning? Do you have any ideas? What are you excited about? Do you have any questions about community service learning?
After analyzing all of their responses, I noticed three themes emerge regarding ideas for community service learning. Students’ answers were categorized into ideas for helping the environment, ideas for teaching others, and ideas for doing things for other people. Out of 17 journals analyzed:
·23% of my students (4 out of 17) of my students noted ideas for helping the environment
·18% of my students (3 out of 17) noted ideas for teaching others
·59% of my students (10 out of 17) noted ideas for doing things for other people
My students’ individual responses can best exemplify their ideas:
Ideas for helping the environment:
· “I think I know how to help people by picking up trash because some people hurt themselves by tripping on trash.”
· “We can make the community look nice.”
· “I like to help others clean up garbage outside. I enjoy it because at my house they don’t pick up their stuff.”
Ideas for teaching others:
· “You can teach people how to cook and bake stuff because some of us don’t know how to bake and cook. You can teach them how to do math and reading.”
· “I like to help my grandma so she can learn a lot of English. She speaks a little bit of English and a lot of Spanish because she is Mexican.”
Ideas for doing things for other people:
· “I think we should help people in the hospital because they are lonely and I want to help them. I want to help old people because they can not take care of themselves.”
· “I want to make good food for people that need food to be healthy. I also want to be kind, helpful, and friendly to people that need care. The last time I did this, someone was hurt and I helped them to get up and take him home.”
· “My ideas are to send letters to children in the hospital and old people that are sad. They are sad because they miss their family and friends. I’m excited because I can help people and help my aunt because she has special needs.”
Overall, I noticed that my students were more than willing to help others. In fact, several students used the word “help” to explain their ideas. I could feel the excitement in their responses. Many students stated how helping others made them feel good and happy. I love how empowered my students were in knowing that they were able to help so many different people in so many ways. I was surprised by some of the ideas for community service learning. For example, Henry said, “I like to help my grandma so she can learn a lot of English. She speaks a little bit of English and a lot of Spanish because she is Mexican.” I hadn’t thought of this for a CSL project, but it was great idea!! I could also see that students weren’t quite cognizant of the fact that they were able to learn from helping others. I wanted my students to know that what they’re learning in class is purposeful and can be used to help others. I found that I would have to explain the difference between community service and community service learning.
I also saw many great character traits in my students’ responses. Yorel stated, “I also want to be kind, helpful, and friendly to people that need care.” I was hopeful for students to see that CSL could help them be people who are kind, helpful, friendly, empathetic, responsible, caring, etc. I wanted the learning in my class to help my students be better people. Another thing I noticed was that I should have separated the questions I asked my students to respond to. For this journal entry, I asked my students to respond to several questions at once. In doing this, some of my students didn’t respond to all of the questions. I took this into consideration when designing and formatting journal activities in the following project. I made sure to remind my students to respond to each question separately.
With my data and research goals in mind, I was beginning to envision our first community service-learning project. I really wanted to embed the community service learning process into my every day classroom instruction as much as possible. As I thought about the implications of my research for future educators, I really wanted my action research to serve as a model for how to incorporate big ideas into public education where district mandates regulate curriculum and teacher instruction. As I embarked on my research journey, I knew I would have to facilitate as many connections between what I was already doing with what I wanted to do. Without these connections, I would become inundated with the amount of tasks I would have to squeeze into a short amount of time. Any additional activities would conflict with the carefully scripted and planned for minutes of my day.
Section Two: A Visit From the Firehouse
_
Around the beginning of October every year, our grade level
reaches one of the pre-planned stories in our language arts district pacing
guide. It’s an old and outdated non-fiction story about a trip some students
take to a firehouse. It’s incredibly dry and boring and both students and
teachers dread reading it. Many of my students have never seen a firehouse, let
alone a fireman up close. They had minimal background experience to motivate
their interest in the story topic. I decided to make a change in our routine
reading of this text. I met with my grade level team, and suggested that we
contact a local firehouse and see if they would come to our school and speak to
our students. Since our district pacing guide leaves little room for lesson plan
modifications, I knew I would need to schedule a visit from the local fire
station quickly. I called the main San Diego fire headquarters, and they
willingly connected me with our local fire station. The gentlemen at the local
fire station were happy to come to our school. They stated that they are rarely
contacted for visits these days and that they would be happy to speak to our
students about the importance of fire safety. They also noted that the timing
was perfect because October was National Fire Safety Month.
I was very excited to announce the surprise twist in normal story routine to my students. I explained that we would be reading a story about some students who were visiting a firehouse. I told my students that instead of going to a firehouse themselves, the local firemen were coming to them! They were extremely excited and motivated to read the story. They analyzed and studied every new fire term and piece of information. They were energized to learn more about these community members. To go along with my action research, I also introduced the community service-learning connection to our story and firefighter visit. I explained that they would be using what they learned from the firefighters to teach other students at our school about fire safety. I wanted my students to see the purpose in their learning. As their excitement grew, they asked to reread the story in their free time. They counted the days until the firemen arrived. I was helping my students create a background experience that could be drawn from in the future; something that my low-income students rarely got to do.
When the special day finally arrived, students were eager to review important firehouse vocabulary. Our grade level assembled and squished into one classroom. Even with 75 students crammed in one small room, a pin drop could be heard when the firemen entered. They spent ample time reviewing fire safety information. They asked for student volunteers to simulate various scenarios. They allowed the children to touch different pieces of equipment. When all seemed to come to an end, the firemen announced that they had a special surprise for the students outside. They asked the children to meet them at the school baseball field after the presentation. Students nervously awaited the next activity. They chatted about their favorite part thus far and detailed what they would tell their parents when they got home. As I gazed around the room, I noticed the smiles on my teaching partners’ faces. They could see how alive their students had become and were elated to see how powerful their students’ learning had become. I walked over to one of my partners and asked them what they thought so far. She responded, “I can feel the passion I had when I first started teaching.” I found that community service learning was not only going to have a powerful impact on my students but also on my grade level teaching partners.
I was very excited to announce the surprise twist in normal story routine to my students. I explained that we would be reading a story about some students who were visiting a firehouse. I told my students that instead of going to a firehouse themselves, the local firemen were coming to them! They were extremely excited and motivated to read the story. They analyzed and studied every new fire term and piece of information. They were energized to learn more about these community members. To go along with my action research, I also introduced the community service-learning connection to our story and firefighter visit. I explained that they would be using what they learned from the firefighters to teach other students at our school about fire safety. I wanted my students to see the purpose in their learning. As their excitement grew, they asked to reread the story in their free time. They counted the days until the firemen arrived. I was helping my students create a background experience that could be drawn from in the future; something that my low-income students rarely got to do.
When the special day finally arrived, students were eager to review important firehouse vocabulary. Our grade level assembled and squished into one classroom. Even with 75 students crammed in one small room, a pin drop could be heard when the firemen entered. They spent ample time reviewing fire safety information. They asked for student volunteers to simulate various scenarios. They allowed the children to touch different pieces of equipment. When all seemed to come to an end, the firemen announced that they had a special surprise for the students outside. They asked the children to meet them at the school baseball field after the presentation. Students nervously awaited the next activity. They chatted about their favorite part thus far and detailed what they would tell their parents when they got home. As I gazed around the room, I noticed the smiles on my teaching partners’ faces. They could see how alive their students had become and were elated to see how powerful their students’ learning had become. I walked over to one of my partners and asked them what they thought so far. She responded, “I can feel the passion I had when I first started teaching.” I found that community service learning was not only going to have a powerful impact on my students but also on my grade level teaching partners.
_
As the children filed outside to the baseball field, cries
of excitement and bewilderment erupted as they saw the large, bright red fire
engine waiting for them. The firemen took the children around the fire engine
for a tour. After the tour, the firemen hooked up the long fire hose and let
each and every single child spray the powerful hose. Student faces were frozen
in happiness. They had heard the firemen explain how the fire hose was used to
extinguish hefty fires, but they had never imagined being able to use the fire
hose themselves! As the visit ended, students posed around various parts of the
fire engine for photos. As pictures were being taken, the firemen received a
completely unscripted emergency call. They quickly packed up their things and
boarded their fire engine within seconds. Students witnessed the fire engine
light up and roar away, complete with a siren, right before their eyes. It was
a perfect ending to a memorable community experience.
When my students returned to my class, they were excited to get started on their community service-learning project. I had some ideas in mind for what kind of projects they could do, but I wanted my students to feel empowered and have choice. The first community service-learning project may not have been the right venue to exercise student choice, but I would never know until I tried it. I presented three options for student fire safety projects: make fire safety cards with your top three fire safety tips/pieces of information, make an ABC fire safety book (with a fire safety tip for every letter of the alphabet), or draw a house plan showing two ways out of your house in case of a fire. Each of these projects would be shared with a kindergarten class at our school. Students got to decide which project they wanted to participate in. For this first community service-learning project, I wasn’t quite sure what I wanted it to look like, how it would progress, and what the final product would look like. I had ideas in mind, but I kind of just wanted to see where the experience would take our class. I didn’t provide a lot of structure or guidelines to my students. I truly wanted my students to feel like they were the owners of this project and that they were not being “forced” to learn something nor help someone.
Towards the end of the project, I saw how disorganized and haphazard things were becoming, so I gently stepped in a provided more support and guidance. I tried to offer my support as suggestions as opposed to mandates. I saw that it might have helped my students to see examples (prototypes) of what their finished fire safety projects could have looked like. I believe this would have guided them and provided a final goal to aim towards. For future community service-learning activities, I knew that I would need to find the right balance of student choice, structure, and guidance.
I collected data as my students worked on their projects in the form of anecdotal observations and journal entries. Anecdotal observations occurred when students were working on completing their fire safety projects to share with the kindergarteners and journal entries were completed at the close of specific activities. Just a few days before our scheduled visit to the kindergarten class, I observed students working well together. They were all excited about the task at hand. As the projects progressed, aside from the disorganization and chaos, I could see the excitement growing. I observed several students helping each other with their projects, offering help on spelling, punctuation, word choice, and picture ideas.
When my students returned to my class, they were excited to get started on their community service-learning project. I had some ideas in mind for what kind of projects they could do, but I wanted my students to feel empowered and have choice. The first community service-learning project may not have been the right venue to exercise student choice, but I would never know until I tried it. I presented three options for student fire safety projects: make fire safety cards with your top three fire safety tips/pieces of information, make an ABC fire safety book (with a fire safety tip for every letter of the alphabet), or draw a house plan showing two ways out of your house in case of a fire. Each of these projects would be shared with a kindergarten class at our school. Students got to decide which project they wanted to participate in. For this first community service-learning project, I wasn’t quite sure what I wanted it to look like, how it would progress, and what the final product would look like. I had ideas in mind, but I kind of just wanted to see where the experience would take our class. I didn’t provide a lot of structure or guidelines to my students. I truly wanted my students to feel like they were the owners of this project and that they were not being “forced” to learn something nor help someone.
Towards the end of the project, I saw how disorganized and haphazard things were becoming, so I gently stepped in a provided more support and guidance. I tried to offer my support as suggestions as opposed to mandates. I saw that it might have helped my students to see examples (prototypes) of what their finished fire safety projects could have looked like. I believe this would have guided them and provided a final goal to aim towards. For future community service-learning activities, I knew that I would need to find the right balance of student choice, structure, and guidance.
I collected data as my students worked on their projects in the form of anecdotal observations and journal entries. Anecdotal observations occurred when students were working on completing their fire safety projects to share with the kindergarteners and journal entries were completed at the close of specific activities. Just a few days before our scheduled visit to the kindergarten class, I observed students working well together. They were all excited about the task at hand. As the projects progressed, aside from the disorganization and chaos, I could see the excitement growing. I observed several students helping each other with their projects, offering help on spelling, punctuation, word choice, and picture ideas.
_
I asked some of my students to describe their work and
answer some journal questions in their journal. Questions were as follows:
1. Describe your fire safety project to me….
2. How will your fire safety project help others?
3. What have you learned from working on this project?
One student’s responses superseded the level of CSL understanding I had anticipated from my students. When asked to describe the fire safety project she was working on Yareli stated, “I’m doing a book because I figured it could be a good plan because it will teach the kindergarten kids so much more. I would like it if I could just make the world change. Once I do it, I’ll see I did it.” It appeared that a seemingly small project like making a fire safety book meant so much to her. Her responses encouraged me to make more of my students’ learning purposeful. When asked how her project would help the kindergarteners she stated, “You could be safe and learn so much more because if you get burned by fire you might not survive. It is so hard for me to see people die because I feel I could of helped them. I would love to make a difference.” She found value in her work. All of my students may not have found this same level of significance in their projects, but Yareli’s comments reminded me that it’s important to include a wide variety of learning activities because you never know which activities will resonate with a particular student until you try them. When asked what she learned from working on her fire safety project she stated, “I have learned that I can save so many people and save the country and that it could be a huge difference once it is done. It would be a pleasure to be a part of the community service because it is so fun to help others that still have survived. I love community service.” I wanted to see how her thoughts would evolve as she continued on this CSL journey. Above all, I loved how passionate this 7-year-old girl was about changing the world and making a difference. Her comments go to show that CSL is possible and powerful in a second grade classroom.
As for other students, I categorized the responses into two categories: students who learned how to help others and students who learned fire safety content. 23% of my students (3 out of 13) wrote about learning how to help other people. 69% of my students (9 out of 13) wrote about learning fire safety information. One student responded that she learned about both how to help other people and content about fire safety. Of the 13 student samples included, 8 students understood how their learning/work could help others.
1. Describe your fire safety project to me….
2. How will your fire safety project help others?
3. What have you learned from working on this project?
One student’s responses superseded the level of CSL understanding I had anticipated from my students. When asked to describe the fire safety project she was working on Yareli stated, “I’m doing a book because I figured it could be a good plan because it will teach the kindergarten kids so much more. I would like it if I could just make the world change. Once I do it, I’ll see I did it.” It appeared that a seemingly small project like making a fire safety book meant so much to her. Her responses encouraged me to make more of my students’ learning purposeful. When asked how her project would help the kindergarteners she stated, “You could be safe and learn so much more because if you get burned by fire you might not survive. It is so hard for me to see people die because I feel I could of helped them. I would love to make a difference.” She found value in her work. All of my students may not have found this same level of significance in their projects, but Yareli’s comments reminded me that it’s important to include a wide variety of learning activities because you never know which activities will resonate with a particular student until you try them. When asked what she learned from working on her fire safety project she stated, “I have learned that I can save so many people and save the country and that it could be a huge difference once it is done. It would be a pleasure to be a part of the community service because it is so fun to help others that still have survived. I love community service.” I wanted to see how her thoughts would evolve as she continued on this CSL journey. Above all, I loved how passionate this 7-year-old girl was about changing the world and making a difference. Her comments go to show that CSL is possible and powerful in a second grade classroom.
As for other students, I categorized the responses into two categories: students who learned how to help others and students who learned fire safety content. 23% of my students (3 out of 13) wrote about learning how to help other people. 69% of my students (9 out of 13) wrote about learning fire safety information. One student responded that she learned about both how to help other people and content about fire safety. Of the 13 student samples included, 8 students understood how their learning/work could help others.
_
Section Three: The
Final Products and Presentation:
Once students finished their fire safety projects, we organized our visit with the kindergarten class. I reached out to a colleague who taught kindergarten and explained my action research and the community service learning project my students were working on. I asked her if she would be willing to let us come and teach her students about fire safety. She was very accommodating and said we were welcome anytime. I described what the visit would look like to my students. We would bring our projects over to the kindergarten class, partner up, disseminate information, and finally engage in a collaborative activity. Students eagerly waited for the scheduled visit day to arrive and carefully checked and rechecked their projects for any errors, missing parts, or areas of improvement. Again I observed my students assisting other classmates. They willingly stepped in where help was needed and offered kind words of encouragement to classmates who were having difficulty finishing a particular project part. My observations have led me to conclude that this community service-learning project provided ample collaborative group opportunities where students were able to work together and foster healthy peer relationships.
Once students finished their fire safety projects, we organized our visit with the kindergarten class. I reached out to a colleague who taught kindergarten and explained my action research and the community service learning project my students were working on. I asked her if she would be willing to let us come and teach her students about fire safety. She was very accommodating and said we were welcome anytime. I described what the visit would look like to my students. We would bring our projects over to the kindergarten class, partner up, disseminate information, and finally engage in a collaborative activity. Students eagerly waited for the scheduled visit day to arrive and carefully checked and rechecked their projects for any errors, missing parts, or areas of improvement. Again I observed my students assisting other classmates. They willingly stepped in where help was needed and offered kind words of encouragement to classmates who were having difficulty finishing a particular project part. My observations have led me to conclude that this community service-learning project provided ample collaborative group opportunities where students were able to work together and foster healthy peer relationships.
_
When the kindergarten visit day arrived, students impatiently
organized their projects and made their way to the receiving classroom. Students
quickly partnered up and began showing their kinder buddies their projects,
carefully explaining every little piece of fire safety information. I had to
give very little guidance or corrective behavior feedback. I observed my
students to be very caring, kind, and empathetic towards their kinder buddies. Most
students were actively engaged and beaming from ear to ear. I observed one
student sitting quietly with a frustrated look on his face. When I approached
Octavio and questioned him about his experience, he said he was having a
difficult time because his partner wasn’t saying anything at all. He said it
was as if she didn’t understand a word he was saying to her. When I asked the
kinder teacher about the situation, she informed me that the little girl had
recently come from China and didn’t know any English. Surprisingly, after the
experience had concluded, when asked how Octavio felt about the visit and his
partner, he stated, “I loved working with the kindergartener. I felt happy but
I want to do it two times more. I helped my partner with a fire safety card and
I loved it. I would love to do it again.” Even though he struggled with overall
communication, he still had a positive experience. Octavio wasn’t the only
student who commented on wanting to “do it again”. According to Clary, Snyder,
& Stukas, “Studies also show that students who engage in service learning
indicate that they are likely to continue serving in the future and believe it
an important thing to do” (1999, p. 7).
As the visit concluded, my second graders gave big hugs to their kinder buddies and waved goodbye. Once we got back, my students begged to go back again. They asked me what the next community service learning project was and when it would start. Using their community service learning journals to wrap up the day, I asked students to respond to the following questions: Did you like working with kindergarteners? Why? How did you feel? Students wrote ferociously. I could witness how eager they were to get their thoughts out on the paper. I found that I was able to get many more responses from my students in this journal entry as compared to previous journal entries. Several of my students who weren’t typically fluent writers, wrote several decodable sentences. It may be because my students were so excited after working with the kindergarten students or because they had become more comfortable with writing down their thoughts regarding CSL. I have found that my students are more apt to write about topics they enjoy and are excited about, aside from their level of writing proficiency. I believe I might have gotten even more detailed responses if I had provided more time to reflect. Our time with the kindergarteners was going so well that it was extended a bit, which cut into our reflection time. I wanted to ensure that my students were able to reflect on the day’s events before the end of the school day. This only allowed my students about 10 minutes of reflection time. In the future, I would like to better schedule our CSL activities to allow appropriate reflection time, which is a key component of CSL curriculum. Through reflection, students are able to connect the community service learning experience to learning in the classroom (Clary, Snyder, & Stukas, 1999). With more structured and planned out reflection time, I hope to see my students making these connections as well.
Several of my students noted that they want to work with the kindergarteners again. For example, Vania stated, “I felt awesome because I never worked with kindergarteners. I wish we could go again.” The fact that students “want to do it again” confirms that CSL is fun, engaging, and purposeful, and assists my students in building better relations with outside communities. It also reaffirms my belief that my second grade students will enjoy CSL projects and helping others with what they are learning in the classroom. I saw many themes emerging from their responses. Some of these themes were compassion, empathy, pride, happiness, and joy. My students’ pride surprised me. I expected my students to be happy, joyful, and compassionate, but I didn’t expect the CSL project to help my students feel pride in themselves as well as in their work. I believe that this helps support the idea of selecting an audience for our work. When students know that a designated audience will see their work, they put forth more effort and feel proud of their accomplishments.
Section Four: Children’s Hospital Project
With the first community service project completed, I began thinking about our next possible opportunity. We were currently working on writing friendly letters in class and I pondered how I could incorporate that learning into a new community service-learning project. I knew I wanted to provide more structure and guidelines than were provided in the fire safety project. I saw how a purposeful and designated audience helped my students write more fluently and willingly in the last project, so I started thinking about beneficial communities we could write friendly letters to. My students liked working with other kids so I thought about having my students write friendly letters to other children at a children’s hospital. I proposed the idea to my students and they seemed to be very interested in the possible project. When asked how she felt about writing letters to children in the hospital, Valeria stated, “I felt really excited to help the children in the hospital and I always wanted to help the children at the hospital.”
With my students’ approval of the new community service project, I proceeded to contact the community liaison at Rady’s Children’s Hospital. Within a matter of days, our project idea came to a halt. It turns out that we were unable to write letters to patients under the age of 18 due to confidentiality issues. It was time to go back to the drawing board. The community liaison didn’t want to squelch our enthusiasm, so she suggested another possible service opportunity. She suggested that we hold a toy donation drive at our school and use the toys to put together activity bags for children to play with while waiting for doctor visits and/or operations. I pondered how I would connect the new project idea to current learning in the classroom. Our last CSL project had an emphasis in language arts, so I decided to focus on mathematics this time around. Our learning connections would be sorting, classifying, and graphing. After collecting donated items, my students would classify the items according to attributes, sort them into similar groups, tally the number in each group, and graph the total number of each group. Using their graphs, students would be able to analyze the data and answer related questions about the types and amounts of items that were donated for Children’s Hospital. Students would also be able to use their graphs to see how many of each item could be placed into a single hospital “goody” bag.
I proposed the new project to my students and they thought it was a good idea. When asked how he felt about the new project idea, Alejandro said “I feel good because we are giving to others. I am happy because we are giving to children who need.” In addition to discussing the potential project with my students, I also met with my administrator and a few fellow colleagues. My principal was very supportive and immediately asked what she could help with. She suggested we involve our PTA members to help promote the toy donation drive. She also suggested having parents and students donate a toy or activity for admission to our upcoming school dance. Student council leaders volunteered to make signs about the donation drive and post them around school. They also volunteered to decorate empty boxes for donations and place them in highly trafficked areas at school. My fellow colleagues were also supportive and agreed to let students play a free game at their booth at the upcoming Winter Festival in exchange for a donated item. Everyone quickly came together to help make this a possible service project for my class. I found that many school and community members were more than willing to help out and provide support when needed.
With the toy donation drive well under way, my students quickly set into action. As the toys and activity items were collected at the end of each day, my students sorted them into various categories. They brainstormed category names that items could be placed into. They settled on the following categories: stuffed animals, coloring utensils, arts & crafts supplies, toy cars, activity books, clothing items, board games, puzzles, and activity bags (bags that were already put together). Students worked in groups to keep track of the amount of items in each category. I observed students taking their work very seriously. They negotiated which category to place certain donated items. They carefully checked and rechecked total amounts.
As the visit concluded, my second graders gave big hugs to their kinder buddies and waved goodbye. Once we got back, my students begged to go back again. They asked me what the next community service learning project was and when it would start. Using their community service learning journals to wrap up the day, I asked students to respond to the following questions: Did you like working with kindergarteners? Why? How did you feel? Students wrote ferociously. I could witness how eager they were to get their thoughts out on the paper. I found that I was able to get many more responses from my students in this journal entry as compared to previous journal entries. Several of my students who weren’t typically fluent writers, wrote several decodable sentences. It may be because my students were so excited after working with the kindergarten students or because they had become more comfortable with writing down their thoughts regarding CSL. I have found that my students are more apt to write about topics they enjoy and are excited about, aside from their level of writing proficiency. I believe I might have gotten even more detailed responses if I had provided more time to reflect. Our time with the kindergarteners was going so well that it was extended a bit, which cut into our reflection time. I wanted to ensure that my students were able to reflect on the day’s events before the end of the school day. This only allowed my students about 10 minutes of reflection time. In the future, I would like to better schedule our CSL activities to allow appropriate reflection time, which is a key component of CSL curriculum. Through reflection, students are able to connect the community service learning experience to learning in the classroom (Clary, Snyder, & Stukas, 1999). With more structured and planned out reflection time, I hope to see my students making these connections as well.
Several of my students noted that they want to work with the kindergarteners again. For example, Vania stated, “I felt awesome because I never worked with kindergarteners. I wish we could go again.” The fact that students “want to do it again” confirms that CSL is fun, engaging, and purposeful, and assists my students in building better relations with outside communities. It also reaffirms my belief that my second grade students will enjoy CSL projects and helping others with what they are learning in the classroom. I saw many themes emerging from their responses. Some of these themes were compassion, empathy, pride, happiness, and joy. My students’ pride surprised me. I expected my students to be happy, joyful, and compassionate, but I didn’t expect the CSL project to help my students feel pride in themselves as well as in their work. I believe that this helps support the idea of selecting an audience for our work. When students know that a designated audience will see their work, they put forth more effort and feel proud of their accomplishments.
Section Four: Children’s Hospital Project
With the first community service project completed, I began thinking about our next possible opportunity. We were currently working on writing friendly letters in class and I pondered how I could incorporate that learning into a new community service-learning project. I knew I wanted to provide more structure and guidelines than were provided in the fire safety project. I saw how a purposeful and designated audience helped my students write more fluently and willingly in the last project, so I started thinking about beneficial communities we could write friendly letters to. My students liked working with other kids so I thought about having my students write friendly letters to other children at a children’s hospital. I proposed the idea to my students and they seemed to be very interested in the possible project. When asked how she felt about writing letters to children in the hospital, Valeria stated, “I felt really excited to help the children in the hospital and I always wanted to help the children at the hospital.”
With my students’ approval of the new community service project, I proceeded to contact the community liaison at Rady’s Children’s Hospital. Within a matter of days, our project idea came to a halt. It turns out that we were unable to write letters to patients under the age of 18 due to confidentiality issues. It was time to go back to the drawing board. The community liaison didn’t want to squelch our enthusiasm, so she suggested another possible service opportunity. She suggested that we hold a toy donation drive at our school and use the toys to put together activity bags for children to play with while waiting for doctor visits and/or operations. I pondered how I would connect the new project idea to current learning in the classroom. Our last CSL project had an emphasis in language arts, so I decided to focus on mathematics this time around. Our learning connections would be sorting, classifying, and graphing. After collecting donated items, my students would classify the items according to attributes, sort them into similar groups, tally the number in each group, and graph the total number of each group. Using their graphs, students would be able to analyze the data and answer related questions about the types and amounts of items that were donated for Children’s Hospital. Students would also be able to use their graphs to see how many of each item could be placed into a single hospital “goody” bag.
I proposed the new project to my students and they thought it was a good idea. When asked how he felt about the new project idea, Alejandro said “I feel good because we are giving to others. I am happy because we are giving to children who need.” In addition to discussing the potential project with my students, I also met with my administrator and a few fellow colleagues. My principal was very supportive and immediately asked what she could help with. She suggested we involve our PTA members to help promote the toy donation drive. She also suggested having parents and students donate a toy or activity for admission to our upcoming school dance. Student council leaders volunteered to make signs about the donation drive and post them around school. They also volunteered to decorate empty boxes for donations and place them in highly trafficked areas at school. My fellow colleagues were also supportive and agreed to let students play a free game at their booth at the upcoming Winter Festival in exchange for a donated item. Everyone quickly came together to help make this a possible service project for my class. I found that many school and community members were more than willing to help out and provide support when needed.
With the toy donation drive well under way, my students quickly set into action. As the toys and activity items were collected at the end of each day, my students sorted them into various categories. They brainstormed category names that items could be placed into. They settled on the following categories: stuffed animals, coloring utensils, arts & crafts supplies, toy cars, activity books, clothing items, board games, puzzles, and activity bags (bags that were already put together). Students worked in groups to keep track of the amount of items in each category. I observed students taking their work very seriously. They negotiated which category to place certain donated items. They carefully checked and rechecked total amounts.
_
For a two-week period, I collected data in the form of
anecdotal observations, journal entries, exit cards, and class discussions. After
a particular day of sorting, classifying, and counting donated items, I held a
class discussion. I asked students to discuss how they felt about the project
so far and what they had done on that specific day. While analyzing my data, I
saw that students enjoyed working together and had fun because they were
helping other people. Here is what students had to say:
How do you feel about our new community service-learning project?
· “I feel proud of myself because I had a lot of fun. I was excited and I was so happy that I can’t wait to give it to the people in the hospital waiting for surgery, shots, cast, and stitches. It feels like I’ve done more than just helping people but we are helping the world by making our world a better place. I love being a part of the community service learning team.” –Yareli
· “I feel excited because we get to get in groups with a partner. Even with our partner we get to get a bag with stuff inside it and we sort them in different sections.” –Catiana
· “I love helping the children’s hospital because it is fun and the kids that are in the hospital get to play.” –Octavio
What did you do today?
· “We sorted out the toys and put it in different groups. It was so fun. I love community service learning. I love helping people that is sick and have cancer. It is so sad to see sick people like this.” –Lisbeth
· “I sorted the toys and counted a lot of other things like activity books and stuffed animals, and I put them in groups with my partners Victoria and Christian. I worked kindly and nice with my two partners. The total of the tally marks was fourty-seven.” –Henry
· “We sorted the objects. Then we counted how many things we had. Next, me and my friend double-checked and we got 30 in all. Today my favorite thing was counting because there were lots of cool things to give them [children] today. I wonder what they are going to think about us doing something nice for them. I am very happy for them. That’s all I have to say today.” –Alejandro
The Power of Working Together
Throughout our discussion and from these sample quotes, I noticed several students mentioning the ability to work in partners and/or groups. For example, Henry referenced working with his partner/partners unprompted. Yareli and Catiana also talked about enjoying working with a partner and feeling like a part of a team. It’s possible that community service learning has helped them see the importance of community and working together “kindly” to gets things done. Their responses also showed me the importance of productive group work. The ability to work in partners/groups was not consistently referenced in the beginning of my research. It’s possible that participating in community service learning has increased my students’ awareness of the immediate communities (i.e. their classmates/classroom community) around them and the importance of working well together to get something done.Yorel stated, “What I did today was sort 29 arts and crafts with Lisbeth. She did the tally marks and I counted the arts and crafts. I enjoyed helping to put things where they go.” He mentioned important components of effective and productive group works. Specifically, each member in his group had a specific task, of which were decided by group members and not the teacher.
The Power of an Older Audience
After all items were classified, sorted, counted, student began working on their data representations, specifically, bar graphs. In class, we were learning how to create bar graphs with a scale of 2 and appropriately titling and labeling each axis on the graph. We had a lot of data to place into our graphs, so students worked carefully and diligently to make sure they accurately graphed the correct amount of each item. Since students had worked so hard on their bar graphs, we decided to show our work to an upper grade class. From our first project cycle, I learned that my students thrived when their work had an audience. When asked what she had worked on for the week, Catiana stated, “First, we sorted them [donated items] in groups. Then we counted them. When we were done with the counting, we did it into a graph altogether. Then the next day we decided to go to Mr. Mac’s class and show the children what we did in class.” Lisbeth was excited about showing her work to another class that she stated, “Another favorite thing to do is go to Mr. Mac’s class. We showed people are tables. It was so fun. I want to do it again.”
How do you feel about our new community service-learning project?
· “I feel proud of myself because I had a lot of fun. I was excited and I was so happy that I can’t wait to give it to the people in the hospital waiting for surgery, shots, cast, and stitches. It feels like I’ve done more than just helping people but we are helping the world by making our world a better place. I love being a part of the community service learning team.” –Yareli
· “I feel excited because we get to get in groups with a partner. Even with our partner we get to get a bag with stuff inside it and we sort them in different sections.” –Catiana
· “I love helping the children’s hospital because it is fun and the kids that are in the hospital get to play.” –Octavio
What did you do today?
· “We sorted out the toys and put it in different groups. It was so fun. I love community service learning. I love helping people that is sick and have cancer. It is so sad to see sick people like this.” –Lisbeth
· “I sorted the toys and counted a lot of other things like activity books and stuffed animals, and I put them in groups with my partners Victoria and Christian. I worked kindly and nice with my two partners. The total of the tally marks was fourty-seven.” –Henry
· “We sorted the objects. Then we counted how many things we had. Next, me and my friend double-checked and we got 30 in all. Today my favorite thing was counting because there were lots of cool things to give them [children] today. I wonder what they are going to think about us doing something nice for them. I am very happy for them. That’s all I have to say today.” –Alejandro
The Power of Working Together
Throughout our discussion and from these sample quotes, I noticed several students mentioning the ability to work in partners and/or groups. For example, Henry referenced working with his partner/partners unprompted. Yareli and Catiana also talked about enjoying working with a partner and feeling like a part of a team. It’s possible that community service learning has helped them see the importance of community and working together “kindly” to gets things done. Their responses also showed me the importance of productive group work. The ability to work in partners/groups was not consistently referenced in the beginning of my research. It’s possible that participating in community service learning has increased my students’ awareness of the immediate communities (i.e. their classmates/classroom community) around them and the importance of working well together to get something done.Yorel stated, “What I did today was sort 29 arts and crafts with Lisbeth. She did the tally marks and I counted the arts and crafts. I enjoyed helping to put things where they go.” He mentioned important components of effective and productive group works. Specifically, each member in his group had a specific task, of which were decided by group members and not the teacher.
The Power of an Older Audience
After all items were classified, sorted, counted, student began working on their data representations, specifically, bar graphs. In class, we were learning how to create bar graphs with a scale of 2 and appropriately titling and labeling each axis on the graph. We had a lot of data to place into our graphs, so students worked carefully and diligently to make sure they accurately graphed the correct amount of each item. Since students had worked so hard on their bar graphs, we decided to show our work to an upper grade class. From our first project cycle, I learned that my students thrived when their work had an audience. When asked what she had worked on for the week, Catiana stated, “First, we sorted them [donated items] in groups. Then we counted them. When we were done with the counting, we did it into a graph altogether. Then the next day we decided to go to Mr. Mac’s class and show the children what we did in class.” Lisbeth was excited about showing her work to another class that she stated, “Another favorite thing to do is go to Mr. Mac’s class. We showed people are tables. It was so fun. I want to do it again.”
_
Although my students thoroughly enjoyed showing all
audiences their work, they were particularly motivated by older students who were
able to provide supportive feedback and ask specific questions about their
learning process. Students particularly connected to sharing their work with
the fifth grade classroom because it was the same classroom they went to for
weekly reading buddies. Students already had a longstanding relationship with
the fifth graders and therefore greatly enjoyed sharing their work to them. The
fifth grade classroom audience made more of an impact to my students than the
kindergarten classroom, where relationships had not previously existed. Our
visits to upper grade classrooms were continuously referenced as memorable and
impactful events in students’ community service learning journals.
After our information was graphed, students began putting together individual activity bags for the children at the hospital. Students used their graphs to decide how many of each item they could place into each bag. While we were dividing our items into equal groups (another math standard we were learning about in class), students asked if they could decorate the bags as well. They believed that the children at the hospital would enjoy their personal artistic touches. I agreed. As we assembled and decorated bags, I interviewed a few students about their work. I asked students to reflect on their community service learning tasks for the week. Below you will find quotes describing what students had to say about their work around community service learning for the week.
What have you worked on this week for community service learning?
· “This week we went to a class and the teacher’s name was Mr. Mac. We also got to decorate a bag. All of them look so pretty. When I did this it was fun. I felt happy to help the kids at the hospital.” –Valeria
· “I have done graphing, decorating bags, putting stuff in the bags, and we also showed Mr. Mac the graphs we made. We also made tables. I loved it.” -Yareli.
· “We put some toys in bags for the children at the hospital because they are sad. They want to do stuff like skate boarding, play with their friends, and make food with their parents. So we gathered some toys for the children at the hospital so they can be happy that they got toys. So they can be happy and not sad.” -Jalysia
· “This week I have been making tables, graphs, and sharing with people.” -Yorel
· “I made a bag to put the toys in. I also made a chart to see how many toys there are. I like doing it because it was fun.” -Lindsey
Many students noted our visits to other classrooms as great experiences. They loved showing their work to other students and teachers. In fact, more than 65% of the interviewed students (9 out of 13) referenced visiting another classroom and sharing their graphs. I think this speaks well to the audience piece. Throughout my research, I have found that students work more diligently and purposefully when they know a selected audience will view their work. They also feel proud of their work when that audience sees it. Their work has more value to them when it is created and crafted with a purpose.
Once the activity bags were completely finished, I contacted the community liaison from Rady’s Children’s Hospital to schedule a pick-up date. The liaison, Alex, came the following week and collected the bags. She was so thankful for the service and the large amount of bags created. She presented each student a certificate of recognition and explained specifically how the activity bags would help children in need at the hospital. The children beamed with happiness and held their certificates proudly. They couldn’t believe that an actual hospital employee would come all the way to their school and thank them for their services.
After our information was graphed, students began putting together individual activity bags for the children at the hospital. Students used their graphs to decide how many of each item they could place into each bag. While we were dividing our items into equal groups (another math standard we were learning about in class), students asked if they could decorate the bags as well. They believed that the children at the hospital would enjoy their personal artistic touches. I agreed. As we assembled and decorated bags, I interviewed a few students about their work. I asked students to reflect on their community service learning tasks for the week. Below you will find quotes describing what students had to say about their work around community service learning for the week.
What have you worked on this week for community service learning?
· “This week we went to a class and the teacher’s name was Mr. Mac. We also got to decorate a bag. All of them look so pretty. When I did this it was fun. I felt happy to help the kids at the hospital.” –Valeria
· “I have done graphing, decorating bags, putting stuff in the bags, and we also showed Mr. Mac the graphs we made. We also made tables. I loved it.” -Yareli.
· “We put some toys in bags for the children at the hospital because they are sad. They want to do stuff like skate boarding, play with their friends, and make food with their parents. So we gathered some toys for the children at the hospital so they can be happy that they got toys. So they can be happy and not sad.” -Jalysia
· “This week I have been making tables, graphs, and sharing with people.” -Yorel
· “I made a bag to put the toys in. I also made a chart to see how many toys there are. I like doing it because it was fun.” -Lindsey
Many students noted our visits to other classrooms as great experiences. They loved showing their work to other students and teachers. In fact, more than 65% of the interviewed students (9 out of 13) referenced visiting another classroom and sharing their graphs. I think this speaks well to the audience piece. Throughout my research, I have found that students work more diligently and purposefully when they know a selected audience will view their work. They also feel proud of their work when that audience sees it. Their work has more value to them when it is created and crafted with a purpose.
Once the activity bags were completely finished, I contacted the community liaison from Rady’s Children’s Hospital to schedule a pick-up date. The liaison, Alex, came the following week and collected the bags. She was so thankful for the service and the large amount of bags created. She presented each student a certificate of recognition and explained specifically how the activity bags would help children in need at the hospital. The children beamed with happiness and held their certificates proudly. They couldn’t believe that an actual hospital employee would come all the way to their school and thank them for their services.
_
Section Five: Fire
Safety or Children’s Hospital?
At the conclusion of the children’s hospital project, I thought it would be insightful to ask students which project they enjoyed most, the fire safety project or the children’s hospital project. Using their community service learning journals, I asked students to respond to the following question: Which community service-learning project do you like more: fire safety or children’s hospital? Why? Of the 13 student entries collected, all students stated that the liked the children’s hospital project more.
At the conclusion of the children’s hospital project, I thought it would be insightful to ask students which project they enjoyed most, the fire safety project or the children’s hospital project. Using their community service learning journals, I asked students to respond to the following question: Which community service-learning project do you like more: fire safety or children’s hospital? Why? Of the 13 student entries collected, all students stated that the liked the children’s hospital project more.
_
I wondered if the majority of my students listed the
children’s hospital project as their favorite because it was the project most
recent to them or because it was a project that felt more necessary and
important. For many of my students, sick children were of higher priority than
kindergarteners. This is interesting because students weren’t able to meet the
children in the hospital, making it a less of a direct audience than the
kindergarteners. Students’ responses to this question revealed two themes in
why they favored the hospital project.
Helping Others Makes Students Feel Good and Proud of Themselves:
· “I liked Children’s Hospital because we made bags. I felt super happy because I sorted things and helped people at hospitals. I love to help others who are sick.” –Yorel
· “I liked Children’s Hospital more better than fire safety because you get to help the children in the hospital with some kind of disease. We made graphs and tables and we showed Mr. Mac the table. I wish I can do that again for two years. I love doing this. I love helping children in the hospital. I made bags too. I love to do this again. I feel happy helping children in the hospital. I wish I can do it again.” –Octavio
· “I like Children’s Hospital because we are giving to others and while they are waiting they get to play with toys and stuff. I love this project because they will have fun. They’ll be proud of us because we are giving toys for them. It’s fun because we did lots of cool things like the bar graph. I had fun doing the bar graph because we got to count how many things there were. I’m proud.” –Alejandro
Students Enjoy Showing Their Work to Other People (specifically older students):
· “Children’s Hospital because we made a graph about the Children’s Hospital. We even got to show Mrs. Sheppy’s class and Mr. Mac’s class our awesome graph.” –Henry
· “First, we sorted them [donated items] in groups. Then we counted them. When we were done with the counting, we did it into a graph altogether. They the next day we decided to go to Mr. Mac’s class and show the children what we did in class.” – Catiana
· “This week was a good week. We did community service learning. I felt good. My favorite thing to do is decorating the bags. Another favorite thing to do is go to Mr. Mac’s class. We showed people are tables. It was so fun. I want to do it again.” – Lisbeth
I was happy to see several of my students mentioning graphing as something they enjoyed doing. Not only were my students helping children in need, they were also learning and practicing important mathematical skills. This project highlighted my personal definition of community service learning: using community service as an avenue of learning important classroom material, developing appropriate social skills, and fostering characteristics of empathy, caring, kindness, and community belonging. The concept of being proud came up again in this project. I have never seen or heard my students be as proud of their work as during our community service learning journey. In a highly tested society, students rarely hold up their test-prep worksheet and declare how proud they feel about themselves or how proud someone else is of them.
As I reflect on the two projects, I noticed that more students enjoyed helping the children in the hospital than the kindergarteners because they felt that the children in the hospital needed their service more. They felt prouder of themselves because they were helping children who were sick and battling cancer. Isela said, “I liked Children’s Hospital more than fire safety because some children are really sick and some children have cancer that is really bad. And sometimes that can’t get better and that makes me really sad.” Helping sick children was of a higher priority and more necessary then helping healthy children in kindergarten, therefore making their work more important and necessary. When my students feel as if their work is highly important and necessary, they work harder, enjoy it more, and feel proud of themselves. I also noticed that the fire safety project, where students worked with kindergarteners, did not include opportunities to show students’ work to older audiences. One major reason students enjoyed the hospital project more was because they were able to show their work to fifth and sixth students and teachers. In future community service learning projects, I will be mindful of including this type of audience for my students’ work.
Section Six: Looking At Student Growth: “I learned that helping someone is a very kind and thoughtful thing to do.”
At the conclusion of the two community service learning projects, I had my students take the same survey they took at the beginning of our journey. I wanted to see if my students’ thoughts and ideas had changed or evolved over time now that they had learned about and participated in community service learning. I noticed a slight change in how my students felt about helping other people. On a multiple-choice survey question, more students (20 out of 22) reported that they “loved” helping other people than previously.
Helping Others Makes Students Feel Good and Proud of Themselves:
· “I liked Children’s Hospital because we made bags. I felt super happy because I sorted things and helped people at hospitals. I love to help others who are sick.” –Yorel
· “I liked Children’s Hospital more better than fire safety because you get to help the children in the hospital with some kind of disease. We made graphs and tables and we showed Mr. Mac the table. I wish I can do that again for two years. I love doing this. I love helping children in the hospital. I made bags too. I love to do this again. I feel happy helping children in the hospital. I wish I can do it again.” –Octavio
· “I like Children’s Hospital because we are giving to others and while they are waiting they get to play with toys and stuff. I love this project because they will have fun. They’ll be proud of us because we are giving toys for them. It’s fun because we did lots of cool things like the bar graph. I had fun doing the bar graph because we got to count how many things there were. I’m proud.” –Alejandro
Students Enjoy Showing Their Work to Other People (specifically older students):
· “Children’s Hospital because we made a graph about the Children’s Hospital. We even got to show Mrs. Sheppy’s class and Mr. Mac’s class our awesome graph.” –Henry
· “First, we sorted them [donated items] in groups. Then we counted them. When we were done with the counting, we did it into a graph altogether. They the next day we decided to go to Mr. Mac’s class and show the children what we did in class.” – Catiana
· “This week was a good week. We did community service learning. I felt good. My favorite thing to do is decorating the bags. Another favorite thing to do is go to Mr. Mac’s class. We showed people are tables. It was so fun. I want to do it again.” – Lisbeth
I was happy to see several of my students mentioning graphing as something they enjoyed doing. Not only were my students helping children in need, they were also learning and practicing important mathematical skills. This project highlighted my personal definition of community service learning: using community service as an avenue of learning important classroom material, developing appropriate social skills, and fostering characteristics of empathy, caring, kindness, and community belonging. The concept of being proud came up again in this project. I have never seen or heard my students be as proud of their work as during our community service learning journey. In a highly tested society, students rarely hold up their test-prep worksheet and declare how proud they feel about themselves or how proud someone else is of them.
As I reflect on the two projects, I noticed that more students enjoyed helping the children in the hospital than the kindergarteners because they felt that the children in the hospital needed their service more. They felt prouder of themselves because they were helping children who were sick and battling cancer. Isela said, “I liked Children’s Hospital more than fire safety because some children are really sick and some children have cancer that is really bad. And sometimes that can’t get better and that makes me really sad.” Helping sick children was of a higher priority and more necessary then helping healthy children in kindergarten, therefore making their work more important and necessary. When my students feel as if their work is highly important and necessary, they work harder, enjoy it more, and feel proud of themselves. I also noticed that the fire safety project, where students worked with kindergarteners, did not include opportunities to show students’ work to older audiences. One major reason students enjoyed the hospital project more was because they were able to show their work to fifth and sixth students and teachers. In future community service learning projects, I will be mindful of including this type of audience for my students’ work.
Section Six: Looking At Student Growth: “I learned that helping someone is a very kind and thoughtful thing to do.”
At the conclusion of the two community service learning projects, I had my students take the same survey they took at the beginning of our journey. I wanted to see if my students’ thoughts and ideas had changed or evolved over time now that they had learned about and participated in community service learning. I noticed a slight change in how my students felt about helping other people. On a multiple-choice survey question, more students (20 out of 22) reported that they “loved” helping other people than previously.
_
Community Service
Learning Broadens Students’ Knowledge of Communities Needing Service
In the open-ended survey question asking students to reflect on a time the helped someone, I noticed that the range of people being helped by my students had widened. On the preliminary survey, I could categorize my students’ responses into three distinct categories: helping a family member, helping a friend, and helping an animal. Now, students mentioned helping people outside these specific communities.
In the open-ended survey question asking students to reflect on a time the helped someone, I noticed that the range of people being helped by my students had widened. On the preliminary survey, I could categorize my students’ responses into three distinct categories: helping a family member, helping a friend, and helping an animal. Now, students mentioned helping people outside these specific communities.
_
I found that community service learning broadened my
students’ knowledge of potential communities needing service. Before community
service learning, students were not aware that they could be of service to
other classrooms or to children in other areas such as a hospital. After
community service learning, students were beginning to develop the idea that
they could be of service to not only their immediate class and family
communities, but to others outside of their neighborhood. In the reanalysis of
the survey question, “How did you feel when someone else helped you,” students’
responses varied more when compared to the pre survey. It’s possible that community service
learning has helped my students become more aware and specific with their
feeling because they have developed a greater knowledge of what helping someone
can look like and feel like.
_
When interpreting the data, I had to look closely as to why
a few of my students associated feeling of being scared and sad when someone
helped them. In looking at their entire responses, I could see that the act of
being helped wasn’t what made them “scared” or “sad”, it was the situation
requiring help that caused them to feel that way. For example, one student felt
sad about being helped because she realized that she didn’t actually need the
help. Knowing when and when not to ask for help is an important concept to
learn at such a young age. Students’ individual quotes below illustrate how
students are sad or scared about the situation requiring help as opposed to
being helped. In the last quote, the student is showing how she’s thinking
about the other person more than herself, which is a powerful understanding at
such a young age.
· “In kindergarten I got stuck and then the yard duty helped me down. I felt really scared.” –Maiquel
· “My mom helped me because I hurt my arm. I felt sad.” –Jenna
· “My mom helped clean my room for me because I didn’t want to clean it and you know how I felt? I felt sad because that’s my job to do and I’m supposed to do it, not her.” –Jalysia
Working With Others
I noticed a significant growth in data between my pre survey and post survey on the question asking how my students preferred to work with others in class. On the pre survey, 39% (9 out of 23) students selected a small group as their preferred setting (as opposed to working alone or with a partner). On the post survey, 77% (17 out of 22) students selected the small group setting. It appears as if community service learning has increased the amount of opportunities students have to work with each other, and therefore increased their positive disposition towards working in a small group setting. This was apparent in the children’s hospital project, where several students positively referenced their ability to work with others.
· “In kindergarten I got stuck and then the yard duty helped me down. I felt really scared.” –Maiquel
· “My mom helped me because I hurt my arm. I felt sad.” –Jenna
· “My mom helped clean my room for me because I didn’t want to clean it and you know how I felt? I felt sad because that’s my job to do and I’m supposed to do it, not her.” –Jalysia
Working With Others
I noticed a significant growth in data between my pre survey and post survey on the question asking how my students preferred to work with others in class. On the pre survey, 39% (9 out of 23) students selected a small group as their preferred setting (as opposed to working alone or with a partner). On the post survey, 77% (17 out of 22) students selected the small group setting. It appears as if community service learning has increased the amount of opportunities students have to work with each other, and therefore increased their positive disposition towards working in a small group setting. This was apparent in the children’s hospital project, where several students positively referenced their ability to work with others.
_
Reflecting On Our
Learning: What it means to help and why we help each other.
An important question on the survey was, “Did you learn anything when you helped someone. What did you learn?” Throughout the entire research process, I have continually come back to “what have my students learned”. I realized that no matter how a lesson/project/activity is designed, each one of my students would take something different from it and learn in their own personal way. Some students will remember the content, some students will remember the people involved, and others will remember how they felt or the importance of what they are doing. I am happy with any sort of impact community service learning has had on my students. Below are a few of my students’ quotes about what type of learning they have taken away from community service learning.
Students who learned why we help others:
· “I learned that helping someone is a very kind and thoughtful thing to do.” –Maiquel
· “I learned that helping people is nice.” –Vania
· “I learned that you’re not just helping them [people] but your also caring about them.” –Yareli
· “I learned that helping is good and helpful and so nice. I will help anyone because that is very nice to help.” –Lakita
Students who learned how to help:
· “I learned to be helpful.” –Brandon
· “I learned that when someone is hurt we have to be kind and help them.” –Yorel
Students who learned about people:
· “I learned that you should help kids with cancer.” –Virginia
Students who learned about content:
· “I learned about fire safety. I learned that you have to make a plan and you have to feel the door before you open the door.” –Lisbeth
Students who learned about reciprocity:
· “I learned that it is good to help people because when you don’t feel good they will help you.” –Amanda
Students who learned about themselves:
· “I learned that when I help a person, I felt helpful because I helped that person do something.” –Catiana
· “I learned that when you help somebody it’s like you feel really good to help them.” –Brandi
Students who learned about empowerment:
· “I learned that I could help. It’s the best thing I could do.” –Antonio
· “Yes, I learned that you can help people be safe.” –Lindsey
Students who learned about helping a broader community:
· “Yes, I learned that it’s good to help Children’s Hospital.” –Henry
Looking back, I too have learned. I have learned that community service learning is an excellent vehicle for increasing student engagement and participation. I have learned that my students thrive and have increased motivation when an audience views their work. Community service learning has also been a means of allowing the frequency and quality of my students’ collaborative opportunities to improve. Through this research, I have learned how to make my students’ learning more purposeful. I have watched my students become more kind, caring, and empathetic towards each other and towards members of other communities. I’ve seen their writing proficiency and reflective thinking increase, their self-esteem grow, and their knowledge of communities needing assistance broaden. Most importantly, I have learned that my learning never ends.
An important question on the survey was, “Did you learn anything when you helped someone. What did you learn?” Throughout the entire research process, I have continually come back to “what have my students learned”. I realized that no matter how a lesson/project/activity is designed, each one of my students would take something different from it and learn in their own personal way. Some students will remember the content, some students will remember the people involved, and others will remember how they felt or the importance of what they are doing. I am happy with any sort of impact community service learning has had on my students. Below are a few of my students’ quotes about what type of learning they have taken away from community service learning.
Students who learned why we help others:
· “I learned that helping someone is a very kind and thoughtful thing to do.” –Maiquel
· “I learned that helping people is nice.” –Vania
· “I learned that you’re not just helping them [people] but your also caring about them.” –Yareli
· “I learned that helping is good and helpful and so nice. I will help anyone because that is very nice to help.” –Lakita
Students who learned how to help:
· “I learned to be helpful.” –Brandon
· “I learned that when someone is hurt we have to be kind and help them.” –Yorel
Students who learned about people:
· “I learned that you should help kids with cancer.” –Virginia
Students who learned about content:
· “I learned about fire safety. I learned that you have to make a plan and you have to feel the door before you open the door.” –Lisbeth
Students who learned about reciprocity:
· “I learned that it is good to help people because when you don’t feel good they will help you.” –Amanda
Students who learned about themselves:
· “I learned that when I help a person, I felt helpful because I helped that person do something.” –Catiana
· “I learned that when you help somebody it’s like you feel really good to help them.” –Brandi
Students who learned about empowerment:
· “I learned that I could help. It’s the best thing I could do.” –Antonio
· “Yes, I learned that you can help people be safe.” –Lindsey
Students who learned about helping a broader community:
· “Yes, I learned that it’s good to help Children’s Hospital.” –Henry
Looking back, I too have learned. I have learned that community service learning is an excellent vehicle for increasing student engagement and participation. I have learned that my students thrive and have increased motivation when an audience views their work. Community service learning has also been a means of allowing the frequency and quality of my students’ collaborative opportunities to improve. Through this research, I have learned how to make my students’ learning more purposeful. I have watched my students become more kind, caring, and empathetic towards each other and towards members of other communities. I’ve seen their writing proficiency and reflective thinking increase, their self-esteem grow, and their knowledge of communities needing assistance broaden. Most importantly, I have learned that my learning never ends.