Service learning Archive

Last month, I participated in the annual Lilly Conference on Evidence-Based Teaching and Learning, in Anaheim, CA. The theme of the conference was “Active and Engaged Learning.” I was invited to present on “Teaching Intercultural Communicative Competence and Social Engagement”—a subject I have been implementing in my courses and currently researching through the BLC Fellowship.…

Thanks to a BLC Travel Grant I was able to attend the Building Just Communities conference that took place from October 8 to 11, 2015, at Howard University in Washington D.C. The conference was organized by the Association of Contemplative Mind in Higher Education (ACHME), an interdisciplinary organization that brings together educators from 1,100 universities…

Forming Global Citizens: Volunteering locally and abroad Language and Service Abroad: A meaningful experience? Richard Feldman, Second Language Studies, Cornell University After defining service learning and discussing some recent initiatives at Cornell, I’ll describe two approaches to language teaching and service learning: one where an abroad program was refocused on student agency and volunteerism, and…

Panel Discussion: Exploring Service Learning in Foreign Language Teaching Introduction Victoria Robinson, Suzan Akin, UC Berkeley Download Cal Corps handout as PDF Victoria Robinson on Engaged Scholarship, https://vimeo.com/46095742 Service-Learning in German:  A win-win for students and community participants Josef Hellebrandt, Professor in Modern Languages, Santa Clara University, South Bay Deutscher Schulverein Efforts to engage German…

Teachers' Forum There is growing interest in including service-learning courses in higher education, and abundant literature exists on this subject. Less researched is binomial service learning, specifically related to civic learning and legal translation. Studies on the goals of combining foreign language instruction with civic participation in the Hispanic community through translation have revealed very positive outcomes. This paper presents two different community-related translation activities in a Spanish course for specific purposes (specifically, Legal Spanish), and the corresponding students’ reflections. One is related to El Salvador and to asylum and refugee claims in the US, while the other is linked to a Health Center in Trenton, NJ. The conclusion summarizes the results and evaluates their significance in the context of community-learning service and their success in bringing students closer to a reality that is far beyond their context, while critically thinking about justice-related issues.

This article investigates a project that used student-centered teaching and languages for specific purposes to increase university students’ motivation to study Spanish and willingness to communicate. After reflecting on their personal goals and interests, students were required to choose ...

This article investigates a project that used student-centered teaching and languages for specific purposes to increase university students’ motivation to study Spanish and willingness to communicate. After reflecting on their personal goals and interests, students were required to choose a purpose or context in which they might use Spanish in their future. Then students were encouraged to seek opportunities to foster their own language and culture learning related to the unique purposes that each student had selected. Data sources included ...