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Flipping the Script: When Service-Learning Recipients become Service-Learning Givers

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Title: Flipping the Script: When Service-Learning Recipients become Service-Learning Givers
Language: English
Authors: Reed, Pam, Butler, Tamara
Source: Theory Into Practice. 2015 54(1):55-62.
Availability: Routledge. Available from: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. 325 Chestnut Street Suite 800, Philadelphia, PA 19106. Tel: 800-354-1420; Fax: 215-625-2940; Web site: http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals
Peer Reviewed: Y
Page Count: 8
Publication Date: 2015
Document Type: Journal Articles
Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: Higher Education
Postsecondary Education
Secondary Education
Descriptors: Service Learning, Urban Education, Urban Schools, Preservice Teacher Education, Preservice Teachers, Teacher Educators, Teamwork, Critical Theory, Social Justice, Transformative Learning, Educational Practices, Educational Strategies, Teaching Methods, Reflection, Secondary School Curriculum
DOI: 10.1080/00405841.2015.977663
ISSN: 0040-5841
Abstract: Urban education is a complex system that is often shrouded in stereotypes, labels, and barriers. Service-learning is well-entrenched in suburban institutions, but is a fledgling or grassroots organization in the urban education community. Often, suburban service-learning initiatives have taken the tone of community service in that it is often directed (albeit often inadvertently) at lower socio-economic families (e.g., to help the homeless, fill the food banks for the hungry, participate in clothing drives). Such initiatives leave some urban students feeling disenfranchised, powerless, and dependent. However, critical service-learning in urban schools can provide a connection to the community, as well as a sense of empowerment, confidence, and intrinsic motivation (Mitchell, 2007). When urban students see themselves as vital, powerful participants in giving back instead of being given to, they become critical partners, young leaders, and civically engaged citizens. Therefore, in this article, Pam, a middle school educator, and Tamara, a service-learning partner, examine how a teacher can institute critical service-learning programs in an urban classroom. By highlighting a teacher's intrinsic and extrinsic shifts, practical applications, and students' collaborations and reflections, this article illustrates how to move to critical service-learning in urban contexts. This examination has implications for how specific critical service-learning components can help teachers work with students to move toward socio-emotional growth.
Abstractor: As Provided
Number of References: 19
Entry Date: 2015
Accession Number: EJ1049787
Database: ERIC
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  Value: <anid>AN0100421826;tip01jan.15;2019Mar19.13:29;v2.2.500</anid> <title id="AN0100421826-1">Flipping the Script: When Service-Learning Recipients Become Service-Learning Givers. </title> <p>Urban education is a complex system that is often shrouded in stereotypes, labels, and barriers. Service-learning is well-entrenched in suburban institutions, but is a fledgling or grassroots organization in the urban education community. Often, suburban service-learning initiatives have taken the tone of community service in that it is often directed (albeit often inadvertently) at lower socio-economic families (e.g., to help the homeless, fill the food banks for the hungry, participate in clothing drives). Such initiatives leave some urban students feeling disenfranchised, powerless, and dependent. However, critical service-learning in urban schools can provide a connection to the community, as well as a sense of empowerment, confidence, and intrinsic motivation (Mitchell, 2007). When urban students see themselves as vital, powerful participants in giving back instead of being given to, they become critical partners, young leaders, and civically engaged citizens. Therefore, in this article, Pam, a middle school educator, and Tamara, a service-learning partner, examine how a teacher can institute critical service-learning programs in an urban classroom. By highlighting a teacher's intrinsic and extrinsic shifts, practical applications, and students' collaborations and reflections, this article illustrates how to move to critical service-learning in urban contexts. This examination has implications for how specific critical service-learning components can help teachers work with students to move toward socio-emotional growth.</p> <p>Two boys sat side by side, comfortably and friendly, around a picture book. This time it was Ke'Ron who was reading to Ray. He was carefully pronouncing the words, asking questions about the kittens in the story ("Do you think he will still be asleep?"), and telling his own stories about kittens and the time he could not find his mother. The smile on Ray's face was genuine as he leaned in closer to study the pictures. They were completely oblivious to me (Pam) standing behind them; watching and listening to their interaction. I carefully altered the reaction on my face to hide the joy I felt inside as I watched them.</p> <p>This might seem like a typical moment in any 1<sups>st</sups>-grade classroom: two boys sharing a favorite picture book. However, this was not first grade. This was an 8<sups>th</sups>-grade Reading in the Content Area class (RICA) in an urban middle school, and the boys were not two lovers of literature who were drawn like moths to these sources of illumination. Ke'Ron was a too tall, too strong African American man-child of 14 who was as quick to anger and fight as he was to laugh, joke, and completely catch others off guard with his affable personality. Ray had already failed eighth grade the previous year. He was white, Appalachian, and angry—raised on a steady diet of hatred, abandonment, regret, and loss.</p> <p>My own misconceptions and stereotypes about service-learning were produced, in part, through honest misunderstandings of how it could change students' lives. My students were most often the recipients of others' services, such as clothing drives, food banks, free coats in the winter, and adopt-a-family Christmas presents. In the beginning, I allowed my beliefs of why my classes could not participate in service-learning to become more important than the benefits of participating in it. Even as an educator, it is easy to fall into the learned helplessness syndrome that plagues so many students. Jensen ([<reflink idref="bib12" id="ref1">12</reflink>]) described this as an "adaptive response to life conditions" and warns of the dire consequences that result, including dropping out of school and experiencing teenage pregnancies (p. 29). Providing my students an opportunity to flip the script by not only being the recipients of service, but also the givers of authentic service through real and valuable learning (see Kinloch, this issue) gave them power to see beyond their current situations. What I learned through this experience is that a lack of resources and lower test scores should not prevent teachers from engaging students in high-quality critical service-learning.</p> <p>Teachers working in urban schools, in particular, should embrace the challenge that comes with implementing critical service-learning projects in the curriculum; they should not shun such opportunities. To paint a picture, if our school were the proverbial book judged by its cover, people would believe it is <emph>ghetto</emph>, <emph>violent</emph>, full of <emph>those kids</emph>, and <emph>less than</emph>. When people ask me (Pam) where I teach, I can easily sum it up with the name of our street. Street names can bring to mind a distinct connotation: Pennsylvania Avenue, Rodeo Drive, Michigan Avenue, and Wall Street all represent power, wealth, and influence. However, in our city, the street on which I teach is synonymous with crime, poverty, and violence in the eyes of students, community members, the local media, and some educators. Our students' lives are tinged with the reality of all those associations. The behaviors many associate with students in low socio-economic status (SES) schools are not just stereotypes; they are, in some ways, realities. To this point, Jensen ([<reflink idref="bib12" id="ref2">12</reflink>]) beckoned readers to understand that children raised in poverty are more likely to act out, display impatience and impulsivity, have a more limited range of behavioral responses, and demonstrate less empathy for others' misfortunes. Yet, by flipping the traditional script, we argue, service-learning can push back against this rhetoric. Through conversations and collaborations, teachers can help their students critique such deficit narratives and rewrite them as positive ones. The story about Ke'Ron and Ray, for instance, provides a much different story.</p> <p>In my 14th year at a Southside Middle School, I decided I would work with the lowest nonreaders at the school in my RICA class. I had an optimistic dream of <emph>if you build</emph><emph>it, they will come</emph>. I created a curriculum that included Sustained Silent Reading, weekly book talks from the local teen librarian, reading journals, discussions of novels with peers and me, and Book Boards for students to share their favorite novels by posting the names of books on bulletin boards. I overstocked my class library with popular reads and favorite series.</p> <p>It was a mild disaster. The silent, lamp-lit, relaxed beanbag library became a place to sleep. The muffled whispers, the shrugged shoulders, the fake reading, the blank stares when I would question them about their novel all indicated that I was failing at producing the love of reading I so desperately wanted them to feel. So, I regrouped and approached it from a different perspective. Armed with Trelease's ([<reflink idref="bib18" id="ref3">18</reflink>]) <emph>The Read Aloud Handbook</emph>, as well as case studies, statistics, graphs, and charts, I taught students the alarming price of illiteracy and aliteracy. We learned of the power of the bedtime story and how much children loved storytime in kindergarten. My goal was never to subjugate them by pointing the finger at them. Instead, we focused on what it was like for others. At one point, we had an impromptu discussion about what life would be like for the "little people in the world they love"—brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews and cousins—if they couldn't read or hated to read.</p> <p>One student, Susan, claimed: "If I could give them anything, it would be to love to read. I hate to read. I mean I <emph>really</emph> hate it." As her voice held genuine loathing, Susan continued: "It's probably why I hate school so much." I then asked everyone: "What would you give them, then? What do you think would make them love to read?"</p> <p>"We should read to them. I mean, no one ever read to me. Maybe if we read to them they would love it. What if we could save them from hating school and dropping out?" Ke'Ron was excited. "What if we did that? Saved some kids and changed their lives?"</p> <p>That is exactly what we set out to do, which leads us back to Ke'Ron and Ray huddled around their picture book about kittens. They were practicing the lessons they had created for our service-learning project, titled Reading Buddies. Our goal was to learn the value of literacy versus alliteracy and how to read with children and provide the service by reading to kindergarteners. The project emerged from students' honest desire and intention to make the world a better place than they found it, and to work with other young people in their community. Through trial and error over 4 weeks, students role-played, listened to guest readers, watched videotapes of me reading to my daughters, and practiced with each other to create their own read-aloud rubric. Using this rubric, they scored each other's performances and gave encouragement and constructive criticism: "Brad, you should talk louder." "Point out the pictures! They love the pictures." "Where were your questions?" This classroom—filled with 27 students who had been retained, suspended, expelled, truant, arrested, and/or given-up-on—now reveled in of their accomplishments. They showed authentic pride in their preparation, and they smiled and had fun with books. They gave themselves positive experiences with books that their families never had and that schools rarely provided.</p> <p>When we went to our feeder elementary school to partner with the kindergarten class, the eighth graders were confident in their abilities. They brought tried-and-true picture books they had practiced with, found comfortable places to read, and engaged squirmy, excited 5-year-olds for a nonstop hour of reading, questioning, connecting, and predicting. During the year, we visited with the kindergarten class four times in all, exchanged letters and cards, made picture books using the kindergartener's high-frequency words, and engaged their families. Many of my students started to read to their siblings and read novels on their own. They were more engaged in our regular reading/language arts classes, received fewer suspensions than the previous year, and demonstrated increased self-efficacy, self-confidence, and collaboration with others. To say this was successful was an understatement. It far exceeded the seemingly simple goals I had at the beginning of the year, which included getting them to like reading and increasing their reading fluency and simple strategies.</p> <hd id="AN0100421826-2">"Am I Doing Right by My Students?"—A Teacher's Intrinsic Shift</hd> <p>Even after I was first introduced to service-learning at a professional development opportunity designed through collaboration with a local university, our urban school district, and the teachers union, would never have dreamed of a project like Reading Buddies. In some tucked-away stereotype I had of service-learning, I envisioned it as something <emph>those</emph> schools did—those schools with higher test scores, higher socio-economic status, more technology, more parent support, fewer suspensions, and fewer fights. In other words, I saw the project as appropriate for schools with time to engage in the <emph>soft skills</emph> related to the socio-emotional learning that are vital to a child's success. Those schools were completely the opposite of my school. Being in the trenches of an urban middle school is a labor of love, blood, sweat and tears. The era of the testing regimen of No Child Left Behind, which engendered feelings of anxiety, failure, and hopelessness, among staff members and students—did not allow time or resources in our test-driven school day for a <emph>feel good</emph> program like service-learning. When I first heard the presenter's spiel on why service-learning was amazing, my heart and gut knew it was exactly what my students needed. However, my head spun with concerns about convincing my principal, connecting this kind of program to learning standards, raising funds, providing transportation, and gaining student buy-in. The logistical dimensions associated with starting a service-learning project seemed immensely challenging. I was buying into believing the same story of how urban schools can't do such work.</p> <p>However, the different story we tell begins with me, the educator. If I stay stagnant and stick with the tried and true versions of what I have always done, then am I really doing right by my students? Here, we think of Finn ([<reflink idref="bib8" id="ref4">8</reflink>]), who also taught young people living in poverty, and with chagrin, he recalled his early years of teaching: "I was schooling these children, not to take charge of their lives, but to take orders" (p. 3). Instead of teaching students to take orders, educators should engage in reflexive practice as they learn how to support the academic and social engagements of students. In this way, then, critical service-learning projects can help educators to more fully realize the potential of students to take charge of their lives. Students can be supported to work collaboratively and take each other in new directions that have deeper meanings for how they participate in their school and local communities as they flip the script.</p> <hd id="AN0100421826-3">Tighter, Truer, and Tougher: Coconstructing Critical Lenses</hd> <p>Sometimes a teacher changes with a bang. Sometimes it comes as a soft, quiet, and gentle realization, usually at 4 a.m., that what is being done is not working. Sometimes it arrives through modeling. But sometimes it emerges by through hearing exactly what you need at exactly the right moment. For years, I had taught a unit on prisons. We read <emph>Life in Prison</emph> by Stanley "Tookie" Williams ([<reflink idref="bib19" id="ref5">19</reflink>]), watched <emph>Redemption</emph> about Williams' life (Bugden, Langlais, Spurgeon, & Curtis-Hall, [<reflink idref="bib19" id="ref6">19</reflink>]), wrote persuasive letters to the editor, read and viewed "Knock Knock," a Def Poetry Jam poem by Daniel Beaty (Beaty, [<reflink idref="bib19" id="ref7">19</reflink>]), and studied incarceration in the United States. It was a popular unit—students loved the book, shared a multitude of stories about their families' incarcerations, and produced passionate writings infused with reflection. We even wrote Stanley Williams, at the time incarcerated on San Quentin's Death Row (he was executed in 2005), who responded with a lengthy letter in return. Despite the popularity and general success of the unit, I always knew something was missing. I could not identify the missing piece until I heard Marion Wright Edelman speak at a service-learning conference in 2012. Her impassioned speech on the Cradle to Prison Pipeline (CPP) and the plight of America's youth, particularly those of color, who are trapped in a generational cycle of poverty and incarceration, clearly provided the piece to complete the puzzle. Instead of just teaching about prison, I created a service-learning unit designed to flip the CPP into a Cradle-to-College/Career Pipeline. Now, students had a focus question that guided their inquiry: "___________ is the way out of the CPP." Through investigation, they arrived at their own understanding of how to get out of the CPP. Instead of randomly learning about prisons, students created a game plan to turn their own lives around. Students, of their own volition, examined the issues of oppression, social inequity, and injustice. As Hart ([<reflink idref="bib10" id="ref8">10</reflink>]) noted, when teachers engage students in problem-posing pedagogies and encourage them to be critical thinkers about their own lives and communities, "dichotomies of 'fortunate helping unfortunate,' or 'us doing for them,' are erased and replaced with 'us doing for us', essentially eliminating the perpetuation of dominant positions" (p. 27).</p> <p>As a result, the Cradle-to-College/Career Pipeline project emerged as a cyclical process built on reciprocity where students' lives changed as they collaborated to change the lives of others. Just as with the Reading Buddies unit, students sought to help other people, and as they helped others, I was aware that their own <emph>a-ha</emph> moment would come as they reflected on their own lives. Our preunit survey showed that 50% of our sixth graders had a parent currently incarcerated, and 80% of them had an incarcerated parent in their lifetime. Furthermore, 90% of our students did not want to be incarcerated, but had no plan of how to stay out of prison. Armed with this knowledge, the unit shifted from interesting to imperative. We read articles of children who had been born into the CPP and we answered student-designed questions about their lives using text evidence strategies. We watched a video of a young man named Roderick, and students collaborated in teams to decipher the various risk factors that can contribute to incarceration. We examined infographics, watched poems being performed, listened to "This I Believe" essays, viewed a special screening of <emph>The Blind Side</emph>, (Johnson, Kosove, Netter, & Hancock, [<reflink idref="bib13" id="ref9">13</reflink>]) read articles of Michael Oher (the young man whose life is chronicled by the film), and dissected excerpts from Michelle Alexander's ([<reflink idref="bib1" id="ref10">1</reflink>]) <emph>The New Jim Crow</emph>.</p> <p>Through their own reflection and examination of their place in the CPP, our students determined their own risk factors. To counteract this, we also explored the hope of the Cradle-to-College/Career Pipeline. Students discovered what they already had in place and what resources they needed to be successful. When students wrote their final persuasive pieces, they decided that two factors contributed to flipping the CPP into a Cradle-to-College/Career Pipeline: education and support from a caring adult. Therefore, this pushed to students to focus on others as they sought to ensure that all sixth graders in our school had access to both of these factors. Based on ideas shared by one of our invited speakers, a courageous young woman whose father had been incarcerated for part of her childhood, students decided they needed access to the same coping classes that helped her so much. We partnered with our city's public health department, and soon had 50 students meeting weekly with counselors during their lunch periods. The work did not stop there. To provide the support and education they found essential, the students designed SWAGG: Scholars with a Good Goal. They set strict requirements to be a part of the team, which became the mentoring and tutoring lifeblood of our school. They worked with elementary students in our feeder pattern, guided students with multiple handicaps through inclusive learning opportunities, and peer-tutored struggling sixth graders by providing them with strategies and support. The results were amazing. Students felt more empathy, efficacy, and excitement, and students with multiple handicaps felt included, valued, and respected. This was not just about feeling excited about the work, but also about reframing characteristics that were considered students' deficits into assets.</p> <hd id="AN0100421826-4">Reflexive and Reflective: Becoming a Responsive Pedagogue</hd> <p>When we reflect on the Flipping the CPP to Cradle-to-College/Career Pipeline project, we realized it was light years from the two-dimensional prison unit Pam had taught for years. Answers to the questions of how students might work to save themselves from a life of incarceration were now provided in an easy-to-read roadmap that the students designed themselves. The organic exploration allowed students to become arbiters of their own destiny, rather than passive listeners to a "sage on the stage" telling them that their lives need to change or else (King, [<reflink idref="bib15" id="ref11">15</reflink>]). In acknowledging "working class and poor lives are often caricatured, pitied" (p. 31), Jones ([<reflink idref="bib14" id="ref12">14</reflink>]/2010) cited literature that put poverty undeniably in front of the reader and in the context that children and adults who face financial hardships have the power to figure out their own life as they "move through it" (p. 32). We contend that it is never the educator's job to teach a child they are poor or hungry or likely to be potential inmates, dropouts, or welfare recipients. Instead, their job is to be intuitive listeners, responsive to the needs of students as they encourage students to discover their own truth. This point connects with Daigre's ([<reflink idref="bib7" id="ref13">7</reflink>]) call for teaching that is "ground[ed] in critical pedagogy that can provide students with an ideological framework that encourages their analysis of social problems from individual or personal explanations to a more systemic criteria" (p. 8). In other words, we believe that educators can provide students with respectful, intentional guidance as they both discover their own truths and question social problems.</p> <p>Walking beside students on this journey calls for the kind of critical pedagogy Biesta ([<reflink idref="bib4" id="ref14">4</reflink>]) described as "committed to the imperative of transforming the larger social order in the interest of justice, equality, democracy and human freedom" (p. 499). Granted, this transformation is a messy and sometimes painful act with nothing neat, tidy, or succinct about it. When we examine in-your-face issues like the CPP or compare bystanders in our school to bystanders in the Holocaust and Rwandan genocide, it is an intense and internally conflicting process. Students cry, become angry, question the status quo, and beat against their own constricting barriers. In fact, for most, it is the first time they acknowledge these barriers and question what it means to be born of color with money constraints in a society that, historically, does not value their educational pursuits. Our students, all of whom are from low SES backgrounds, have big dreams. Unfortunately, in the face of educational inequities and limitations imposed upon them by others, some give up in frustration. This is where the meshing of service-learning and critical pedagogy can provide ways for students to name these inequities, obstacles, and limitations as they pursue their goals.</p> <p>We advocate for teachers to ground their pedagogical practices and approaches in the lives of students, even if their lives appear messy. Christensen ([<reflink idref="bib6" id="ref15">6</reflink>]) expressed it in this sentiment:</p> <p>Many of my students experience injustice ... often they are targeted because of their race or language or immigration status. Their families are denied housing, jobs, fair wages, health care, or access to decent education. Connecting these issues to the literature that we read, as well as writing and talking about their concerns makes them visible, not just the stuff of nightmares that haunt us through the day. I want students to examine why things are unfair, to analyze the systemic roots of that injustice, and to use their writing to talk back. Putting students' lives at the center of the curriculum also tells them they matter—their lives, are important. (p. 4)</p> <p>Informed by critical pedagogy, service-learning allows students to view the injustices in their daily lives through the eyes of others before they have to see it themselves. Because of this, they can adjust progressively, instead of aggressively, as they discover their own way to view the world around them. In turn, they also realize how to affect change that directly impacts them and others. For example, when we studied Malala Yousafzai, the young woman from Pakistan who was shot by the Taliban for getting an education, students were asked to imagine Malala as a new student at our school. Through writing and discussion, students decided that she would be disappointed with how they take their education for granted. In fact, we started saying, "What would Malala do?" to mimic the popular rubber bracelets at the time. In this way, students crucially examined their own attitude toward education. By shifting this critical lens from the world and then to themselves, they could begin to question their educational choices and dispositions.</p> <hd id="AN0100421826-5">What We Need to Know: Collectively Unpacking the Realities of Inequity</hd> <p>Critical service-learning provided a genuine opportunity for examination of the rules of <emph>haves</emph> and <emph>have nots</emph> in a dialogical experience, as opposed to an angry finger-pointing session. We approached this by recognizing, as Beale ([<reflink idref="bib2" id="ref16">2</reflink>]) noted, that "it is incumbent upon the schools to foster the values and skills involved in democratic living. These include values such as respect for human dignity, equity, freedom, and social responsibility." There are ways to effectively address social inequities in this country without pointing the finger of blame and shame at students whose families have some financial hardships. We never want students to feel as Sapp ([<reflink idref="bib17" id="ref17">17</reflink>]) did when he wrote about how school consistently reminded him that he and his family were poor. Instead, we intentionally scaffold and model each potentially painful lesson with our own childhood experiences. For hooks ([<reflink idref="bib11" id="ref18">11</reflink>]), "Empowerment cannot happen if [teachers] refuse to be vulnerable while encouraging students to take risks" (p. 21). Therefore, before asking students to write the risk factors they believed could put them in the CPP, I wrote my own on the board. We never use the word <emph>poor</emph> in class; instead, we used anecdotal examples and analogies, including "living check to check" or "money struggles." When I share stories from my own childhood of wearing bread bags secured with rubber bands over my shoes instead of boots or paying for lunch with pennies, students comment, "Wow, that happened to you Miss Reed? And you're our teacher?" The class understands that we're all in this together, even during hard times.</p> <p>To pursue critical service-learning with efficacy, an educator must first embark on a journey inside and confront the stereotypes and fallacies she has about herself, her students, and education in general. There is a vast difference between the headline-grabbing community service projects that raise a lot of money or serve a lot of hot meals to the needy versus the reflective mirror and gut punch aha moment created by critical service-learning. An educator doesn't have to grow up marginalized to build an atmosphere of empathy, trust, and compassion that creates the soil ripe for planting the seeds of empowerment.</p> <p>Maxine Greene ([<reflink idref="bib9" id="ref19">9</reflink>]) asked, "What do we have to know, what do the schools have to teach to overcome divisiveness and group hostility?" (p. 172). To address Greene's ([<reflink idref="bib9" id="ref20">9</reflink>]) timeless questions, one has to know that critical service-learning in a low SES school involves turning the hard times, chips on shoulders, and rolling eyes into compassionate, informed, and empowered opportunities for students to break down the stereotypes that are often placed on them. Educators have to know that the soft skills investment that they make in their classroom enables students to push through tough times and realize that these skills make them more resilient and determined. Ray, for example, has lost both parents to drug overdoses and was forced to drop out of school. Instead of following in his parents' footsteps, though, Ray has chosen to pursue his GED, has a full-time job, and volunteers at the local recreation center at 17. When he came to the fork in the road and had choices that involved drugs or crime, he chose a different path. Instead, he, and others, embraced the challenge to flip the script. Teachers have to know that the steely-eyed resolve to make a difference in the world can come from any student regardless of zip code or street name. They have to know that their students do not ignore the issues of inequity that have the potential to stifle their stories. Therefore, educators have to teach in ways that evoke gritty dialogue, cultivate meaningful collaboration, and move toward engagement, which are embedded in critical service-learning projects.</p> <hd id="AN0100421826-6">Funding</hd> <p>This work was supported, in large part, by the "Bringing Learning to Life" national professional development grant facilitated by Valerie Kinloch, Rhonda Johnson, and Roberta Hantgan. Also, aspects of this article (including the theoretical framing and implications) were strengthened by the insights offered from Emily Nemeth, a research assistant for the grant.</p> <ref id="AN0100421826-7"> <title> References </title> <blist> <bibl id="bib1" idref="ref10" type="bt">1</bibl> <bibtext> Alexander, M. (2012). The New Jim Crow: Mass incarceration in the age of colorblindness. New York, NY: New Press.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib2" idref="ref16" type="bt">2</bibl> <bibtext> Beale, J. (2013). A common core of a different sort: Putting democracy at the center of the curriculum. Retrieved from <ulink href="http://www.amle.org/BrowsebyTopic/WhatsNew/WNDet.aspx?ArtMID = 888&ArticleID = 175">http://www.amle.org/BrowsebyTopic/WhatsNew/WNDet.aspx?ArtMID = 888&ArticleID = 175</ulink>..</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib3" type="bt">3</bibl> <bibtext> Beaty, D. (2013, December 17). Knock Knock. Retrieved November 18, 2014 from https://<ulink href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0jTeuBpn5s">www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0jTeuBpn5s</ulink>.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib4" idref="ref14" type="bt">4</bibl> <bibtext> Biesta, G. (1998). Say you want a revolution ... Suggestions for the impossible future of critical pedagogy. Educational Theory, 48, 499–510.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibl id="bib5" type="bt">5</bibl> <bibtext> Bugden, S., Langlais, R., Spurgeon, V. (Producers), & Curtis-Hall, V. (Director). (2004). 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San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Hart, S. (2006). Breaking literacy boundaries through critical service-learning: Education for the silenced and marginalized. Mentoring & Tutoring, 14, 17–32.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> hooks, b. (1994). Teaching to transgress. New York, NY: Routledge.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Jensen, E. (2009). Teaching with poverty in mind: What being poor does to kids' brains and what schools can do about it. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Johnson, B., Kosove, A., Netter, G. (Producers), & Hancock, J. L. (Director). (2009). The Blind Side [Motion picture]. United States: Warner Brothers Pictures.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Jones, S. (2009/2010). Adding salt to 'class' literature: Barbara O'Connor books for young readers. Rethinking Schools, 24, 32–35.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> King, A. (1993). From Sage on the Stage to Guide on the Side. College Teaching, 41(1), 30–35.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Mitchell, T. (2007). Critical service-learning as social justice education: A case study of the citizen scholars program. Equity & Excellence in Education, 40, 101–112.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Sapp, J. (2009). How school taught me I was poor. Teaching Tolerance, 35, Retrieved from <ulink href="http://www.tolerance.org/magazine/number-35-spring-2009/feature/how-school-taught-me-i-was-poor">http://www.tolerance.org/magazine/number-35-spring-2009/feature/how-school-taught-me-i-was-poor</ulink>..</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Trelease, J. (2006). The read-aloud handbook (6th ed.). New York, NY: Penguin.</bibtext> </blist> <blist> <bibtext> Williams, S. (2001). Life in prison. San Francisco, CA: Chronicle Books.</bibtext> </blist> </ref> <aug> <p>By Pam Reed and Tamara Butler</p> <p>Reported by Author; Author</p> </aug> <nolink nlid="nl1" bibid="bib12" firstref="ref1"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl2" bibid="bib18" firstref="ref3"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl3" bibid="bib19" firstref="ref5"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl4" bibid="bib10" firstref="ref8"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl5" bibid="bib13" firstref="ref9"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl6" bibid="bib15" firstref="ref11"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl7" bibid="bib14" firstref="ref12"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl8" bibid="bib17" firstref="ref17"></nolink> <nolink nlid="nl9" bibid="bib11" firstref="ref18"></nolink>
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  Data: Flipping the Script: When Service-Learning Recipients become Service-Learning Givers
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  Data: Urban education is a complex system that is often shrouded in stereotypes, labels, and barriers. Service-learning is well-entrenched in suburban institutions, but is a fledgling or grassroots organization in the urban education community. Often, suburban service-learning initiatives have taken the tone of community service in that it is often directed (albeit often inadvertently) at lower socio-economic families (e.g., to help the homeless, fill the food banks for the hungry, participate in clothing drives). Such initiatives leave some urban students feeling disenfranchised, powerless, and dependent. However, critical service-learning in urban schools can provide a connection to the community, as well as a sense of empowerment, confidence, and intrinsic motivation (Mitchell, 2007). When urban students see themselves as vital, powerful participants in giving back instead of being given to, they become critical partners, young leaders, and civically engaged citizens. Therefore, in this article, Pam, a middle school educator, and Tamara, a service-learning partner, examine how a teacher can institute critical service-learning programs in an urban classroom. By highlighting a teacher's intrinsic and extrinsic shifts, practical applications, and students' collaborations and reflections, this article illustrates how to move to critical service-learning in urban contexts. This examination has implications for how specific critical service-learning components can help teachers work with students to move toward socio-emotional growth.
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