Harmony/VISTA Service Learning Demonstration Project

Service Learning

Overview | Service Learning Project Examples | Service Learning Resources | Home

Overview

Service learning is a teaching strategy in which students learn classroom material through meaningful involvement in the community. Service learning is not simply incorporating community service into class instruction. Students identify real community needs, plan, and take action to meet those needs. Reflection and celebration are also important components of service learning. Student voice and leadership, strong community partnerships, and a desire to make a difference are core values of service learning.

The Harmony VISTA Project works with teachers to implement service learning in the classroom. VISTA Volunteers help students and teachers identify com munity needs and create solutions. They help make connections between schools and community organizations that meet service learning goals. Since VISTAs' primary focus is anti-poverty work, many service learning projects have an ultimate goal of helping to alleviate poverty or spread awareness on poverty related issues.

Harmony VISTA members have helped connect schools with over 70 community organizations and businesses throughout Indianapolis and Bloomington.

Service Learning Project Examples LEAPS Projects LEAPS (Leadership, Education, and Public Service) is a small school at Emmerich Manual High School in Indianapolis, IN that has adopted service learning as a primary tool for instruction. One VISTA member worked with LEAPS teachers to write a Learn and Serve grant to integrate service learning into all LEAPS classes. She helped establish a student service learning advisory board which helps design service learning for students in the LEAPS Academy. Some of the service learning projects are listed below.

Bookmobile and the Red Cross--Students travel to elementary schools with the Bookmobile to help young students learn to read.

Flash--Student use photography to build awareness around community issues. At the end of the year, they host a public art show to raise money for local organizations. Previous shows have focused on local violence and HIV/AIDS.

Latino Youth--This group meets twice a month to talk about issues facing Latino youth in Indianapolis. The group also offers homework help Spanish-speaking students who need help with English and English-speaking students who need help with Spanish. They have focused many of their meetings on building awareness around the Dream Act, a piece of legislature going through Congress that would grant temporary citizenship to children raised by undocumented immigrants so they can go to college.

Word Out Awareness Carnival--Students planned and put on a carnival for freshmen focusing on smoking prevention. They will take their carnival to two middle schools.

Troop Talk--A sophomore English class read Antigone and decided to write letters to troops in Iraq. They want to compare the experiences of troops in Iraq to Indiana veterans from previous wars. They will put these letters and stories into a newsletter and hold a banquet for troops and veterans at the end of the year.

YES Club In 2001, the VISTA at Manual High School supported students in developing the Youth Engaged in Service (YES) Club based on the students' desire to fight illiteracy. Students wrote lesson plans and tutored elementary students in reading once a week.

Key Learning Community CLOs The Key Learning Community is a K-12 public school whose curriculum is based on Howard Gardner's theory of Multiple Intelligences. Every week, the entire high school participates in Community Learning Opportunities (CLOs) during which they go out into the community and participate in activities related to the school's semester theme. The Harmony VISTA member worked with students and teachers to create a program in which the entire high school plans service learning projects and uses CLO time once a month to take action in the community. Each adivsory class plans a service pr oject and partners with a community organization to carry it out. The program has been very successful and is fully integrated into the high school curriculum.

Wildlife Habitat Projects Through the Indiana Department of Natural Resources Project WILD habitat grants, one Harmony VISTA member worked with the Key Learning Community and New Beginnings High School in 2003 to receive funding to build and restore two wildlife habitats. At the Key Learning Community, the VISTA helped organize a habitat clean-up day in which students planted trees, weeded, watered, and generally restored the seven wildlife habitats at the school. At New Beginnings, the art and biology teachers teamed up to build a butterfly garden in an empty lot on the side of school.

Summer Cylcing Program In the summer 2004, the Harmony VISTA member at the Harmony School developed a summer cycling program in which middle school students biked around Bloomington, learned bicyle safety and maintenance, and participated in several service projects in partnership with many local organizations. At the end of the summer, over 100 Bloomington residents participated in a community bike ride that the students organized.

Service Learning Resources

To find out more about service learning, click on the links below.

National Service Learning Clearninghouse

Service Learning Partnership

Learning In Deed: National Commission on Service Learning

National Youth Leadership Council