A Service Learning Program Proposal

by johnhain courtesy of pixabay.com

I am enrolled in the EdTechTeam Teacher Leader 2 course. The first unit for this course is service learning. After studying the work of  Cathryn Berger Kaye and engaging in dialogue with other members of the cohort about their schools, I have undertaken writing a high school-based service learning plan. I envision a program for 9th graders that will set the tone for how they approach learning for the rest of their time in high school. In my grand vision all rising 9th graders would participate in a full quarter (if not semester) of “boot camp” for lack of a better term. It could be kicked off during freshmen orientation. The boot camp experience would be a deep dive into design thinking, problem solving, and service. The normal bell schedule and daily routine would not apply to 9th graders during this marking period. The program would provide 9th grade students guidance developing what we know are critical life (not just learning) skills: critical thinking, empathy, collaboration, problem solving, communication, creativity, flexible thinking and comfort with ambiguity. There is also room for computational thinking and entrepreneurship. All of this can lead to global mindfulness and an innovator’s mindset. Emerging from this experience students would be well prepared to engage in two years of problem-based learning curricula and transition into an internship and continual service-oriented senior year.

Imagine if all teachers of 9th graders from all disciplines as well as the guidance counselors and library media faculty participated in design thinking professional learning as well as orientation to service learning. Then they could rotate through the program facilitating the work of the students, lending their expertise and support to projects that align with their areas of interest and skill set. Ultimately this would be an eight week, full day program which would then carry into the advisory groups of the students throughout the duration of the year.

The type of service in which each student engages will be determined by the student. As they undertake an examination of the needs of the school, the community, and the wider world, students will choose the focus of their service and design an approach that marries their skills and resources with the needs of the group they choose to serve. Ultimately, I imagine students would engage in multiple forms of service and will collaborate on combined interests to maximize the services offered and the impact of their work.

Students might address the prevalence of juuling in their school in the interest of promoting community wellness. They might tackle intersectionality which is a particularly potent topic where I live in the wake of a proposal in our state general assembly that a mostly white and affluent district be merged with a neighboring district that has a multi-ethnic population and significant funding challenges in its schools. There are so many possible ways students can work to improve their school, their community, and the wider world and the skills they learn in the process will be essential to the rest of their education and life beyond school.

As part of their experience, students will create a social media campaign through which they can document and publicize their research and service in order to inform the community of their work and recruit participation in order to sustain and even scale up their projects. These networks and means of telling their stories, which can also include student blogs and school newsletters, will allow for ongoing reflection on the work they are doing and the value of service as well as provide a channel of communication which can also facilitate the development of empathy among the various members of the community.

As facilitators of the boot camp, all teachers of 9th grade will be able to integrate the students service learning into the curriculum throughout the year. Advisory and other student groups and clubs will also serve as a means of continuing the reflective dialogue about the importance of service in learning and beyond.

Disrupting Gen Z

Earlier this week one of my students said something that stopped me in my tracks. He remarked:

"I want to be able to learn how to drive myself someday."

It was more a lament than a remark.

My daughter learning to drive stick.
Yes, we drive old-school in our house!

Let me put his lament in context. In his class, Digital Literacy, we have been doing a lot of design thinking work focused on solving the problems of social media (discussed in three parts starting here). As we await feedback on our prototypes, we engaged in an Applied Digital Skills exercise from Google focused on the role of technology in current events. This student chose to focus his study on self-driving cars and the impact they will have on teenage drivers.

He examined issues of driving safety including distracted and impaired driving as well as the implications of self-driving cars on the insurance industry. Then he stopped what he was doing when, out loud, he wondered: "Will we even need to get our license anymore?" And after a pause, came his lament; something he has aspired to do, a suburban teenage rite of passage, may someday (someday soon?) become a thing of the past, no longer something to which he and his peers will aspire. The class was a little sad at that prospect. And I was a little giddy.

Why? Because there it was, the perfect example of technological innovation as a disruptive force and it was an example that resonated deeply with my students. And, as a disruption that hasn't yet occurred but is one they can anticipate, they feel the tug of resentment over how technology will change their lives. For that moment, we understood each other across the gap of a generation.

This student's epiphany prompted a very interesting and organic dialogue. We talked about the difference between the manual transmission cars that I learned to drive -- and still drive today -- and automatic transmissions. About why a driver might prefer one or the other. About how an automatic was a luxury when I was learning to drive. And designers have continued to improve on the automatic design with the development of the continuously variable transmission. Only the student who is a fan of race car driving even knew what a manual transmission is. Some students shared the self-driving features of their parents cars like warnings when drifting out of lane, alarms that indicate another car in the driver's blind spot, auto parallel parking features, etc. And talked about whether they trust that technology and how it feels when it is operating.

As excited as they got talking about the coolness factor of these features that are becoming standard on new cars, my self-driving car researcher said again: "I still really want to get my license." And they all got quiet again.

Today he presented his research, and having come to the realization that the self-driving car will not be ubiquitous before he is of driving age, his mind was put at ease and the discussion he facilitated for the class focused more on how the auto insurance industry and legislation will have to respond to this automotive innovation. His presentation was followed by another student whose research focused on robotic disruption in the labor force. Given their brief engagement with the potential loss of licensing privileges, the class embarked on a discussion during that presentation that had more potency than it might have otherwise. It was definitely an unanticipated way in which a student found the personal relevance of his learning and it helped the class develop empathy with people that they otherwise might not have considered as carefully.