Service-Learning
in Special Education:
From the ‘Deficit Model’ to a “Model of Empowerment”
Silva
Karayan Ph.D.
Director, Special Education Program
School of Education
California Lutheran University
Paul
Gathercoal, Ph.D.
Director, Curriculum & Instruction
School of Education
California Lutheran University
The character of students, as well as, teachers and even school administrators is now being questioned. There is a common perception that our schools are dangerous places. The fault is said to lie mainly with the children. The popular press touts that a sizeable proportion of today’s students lack socially acceptable values and morals, that they are disruptive and not interested in learning, that they lack even rudimentary social skills, and that many come from families who have no sense of what it is to live in a civil society. The problems include absenteeism, disinterest in education, and disrespect for teachers, classroom disruption, behavioral problems, and incidents of violence – and, although rarely mentioned as a concern, students graduate school with little understanding of what it means to be responsible citizens in a democratic society.
Educators have no defining policy, no consensus, and no agreed-upon approach for meeting these challenges. Many commercial packages are being sold to school administrators with the promise that they will improve school safety and teach character. Most are very punitive, based on behavior modification, on site police/security patrols, closed fenced campuses, with an emphasis on metal detectors and other security equipment. There was a time when only critics compared schools to prisons. Today many educators, believing they have no choice, are looking to their local police for a preferred model of best practices. When punishment fails, the students are declared incorrigible, and, in increasing numbers, they are expelled. For an ever-larger proportion of our population – and it is experienced most by those disadvantaged students who have the greatest need for education – we are, quite literally, abandoning our educational mission by kicking students out of school. There is, however, a much more positive approach.
Service-Learning is a curricular strategy whereby students learn and develop through active participation in strategically organized service that is conducted in and meets the needs of a community. It is integrated into and enhances the academic curriculum of students and helps them to develop as responsible citizens who deliberately strategize to fulfill civic responsibilities.
Several teacher education programs have included service-learning to make teachers more aware of their own biases and the role of schools in perpetuating inequity, and to prepare them to teach students with diverse ethnic and social backgrounds and handicapping conditions. Although teacher education institutions are increasingly utilizing service-learning, research on the effects of service experiences on preservice teacher candidates is only beginning (Root, 1997).
Traditionally students with special needs have been viewed as recipients and beneficiaries of service-learning projects. This phenomenon is commonly referred to as the ‘deficit’ model, which the general public promotes as “compassion for the less fortunate.” We believe that service-learning pedagogy can be used to transform the ‘deficit’ model, traditionally found in special education, into an “empowerment” model. Students with special needs and “at risk” youth will become active agents of change as service-learning projects and research is revised to focus on the whole individual, including internal and contextual influences. This will result in service learning projects and research that utilize individual strengths and experiences, as students learn by serving and serve by learning through active participation in service-learning projects.
John Dewey’s (1916) educational and social philosophy are quite relevant to the development of a theory of service-learning that includes learning from experience, reflective activity, citizenship, community, and democracy. Dewey believed that public education can and should build community.
A society which makes provision for participation in its good of all its members on equal terms and which secures flexible readjustment of its institutions through interaction of the different forms of associated life is in so far democratic. Such a society must have a type of education which gives individuals a personal interest in social relationships and control, and the habits of mind which secure social changes without introducing disorder. (p. 55)
Service-learning can complement this thinking as it helps students with special needs to avoid social and cultural alienation as they learn to be active and contributing members of a broader social entity.
Situated-learning focuses on the nature of the learning that takes place in a variety of contexts, typically outside the classroom. Given the impact contextual factors have upon an individual, it is important to identify and understand the individual and group characteristics of participating students when developing a service-learning project. We think that service-learning projects that are inclusive and that involve students with special needs in a process and expose them to social settings where they can make a social contribution or provide meaningful service to others empower them and help them to view themselves as worthwhile and productive individuals.
Our goal is to change the focus of service-learning in special education from a receiving orientation to a caring and sharing orientation, emphasizing reciprocal and like relationships with others. This empowerment model of service-learning will cultivate students with disabilities as joint partners in designing, planning and implementing service-learning projects.
A caring and sharing orientation emphasizes the reciprocal participation of all parties involved in the project as they learn and provide services to others. This empowerment model matches well with Gilligan’s (1982) two perspectives on moral reasoning, care and justice, and her posture on the relationship between charity and social activism as orientations of service and service learning. We advocate for service-learning projects that empower special needs students and ensure that all stakeholders are equal chance players.
Several studies have shown the impact of service-learning in producing increased personal and social responsibility and sense of competence (Weiler, LaGoy, Grane & Rovner, 1998), and acceptance of responsibility (Stephens, 1995). Melchior (1999) indicated that students who engage in quality service-learning programs reported greater acceptance of diversity. Recent literature concerning service-learning in special education indicates that service-learning occurring within the context of inclusive classrooms has potential. For example, Gent & Gurecka ( 1998) propose service-learning as a creative strategy for inclusive classrooms. They suggest that service-learning can be an effective alternative methodology in inclusive settings because of its flexibility and its focus on experiences in real life situations.
There is a growing body of research on the effects of service-learning projects where students with special needs act as service providers rather than passive recipients of service. Brill (1994) systematically studied the impact of service-learning on students with special needs with encouraging results: increased socialization skill, positive behavioral changes, improved functional skills, and academic gains. Brennan & Brennan (1999) describe how a job club at a rural high school helped students with disabilities by involving them in meaningful projects in the school and community. Through activities like recycling and other projects students with disabilities learned job skills, raised their self-esteem as they helped members of the community, especially general education students modify their perceptions of students with disabilities. Greene (1998) paired general education students with students with special needs to collaborate on a service-learning project. This service learning project increased the awareness of general education students about students with disabilities.
Muscott & O’Brien (1999) report that after participating in an inclusive after school program, 19 elementary students with behavioral and learning disabilities expressed personal responsibility, responded to ideas of cooperation and teamwork, learned to make new friends, and found learning about character to be rewarding.
Burns, Storey & Certo (1999) evaluated non disabled high school students’ attitudinal change toward students with severe disabilities through inclusion of special-education students in two service-learning projects, one in which disabled students contributed to the project and one in which they received the service. Findings indicated that the equal-participation project had the most positive attitudinal effects.
Yoder (1996) describes a program in which 12 seventh- and eighth-grade students with learning disabilities and/or culturally diverse backgrounds participated with non disabled peers in service-learning projects. The students improved their social skills and self-esteem through community service with younger students and senior citizens.
According to Krajewski (1998) service-learning can be adapted for high school students with moderate to severe disabilities. It provides benefits for students (work related skills, self-esteem), teachers (sense of service, raised expectations), and community organizations in which they serve diverse populations.
These recent studies in service-learning, with implications for character development, are compelling reasons to develop service-learning in all aspects of education. Historically, education in the United States has focused on character development from its inception (Field 1996). The very first law dealing with public education in 1640 made the development of character a central aspect of education. However, U.S. education has increasingly turned away from character since the 1930s. In fact, in the past two or three decades educators have largely excluded the teaching of character from the curriculum. Some attribute this situation to the reaction against the “values clarification” movement of the ’60s and ’70s. Educators too often tried to make education value free—a logical and behavioral impossibility—and consciously moved away from teaching anything that looked like character education. More recently, some have shied away from character education because the phrase has often been used as code language for promoting religion in the schools and other schools have simply declared it is not the school's job.
Schools seem to have been forgotten that the purpose of education in our country is to promote literacy and democracy, to help students succeed to the best of their abilities, and to enable them to lead healthy, personally enriching lives. As part of that charge, our schools need to educate our youth to be responsible citizens who understand and are capable of exercising their individual rights and responsibilities in a free, democratic society. They need to acquire knowledge, skills and dispositions for making moral and ethical decisions which reflect the values of our democratic society, they need to develop a self-concept which gives them a sense of responsibility for their own actions, and they need to believe that they are valued as individuals and as members of our democratic society. In short, character education cannot just be about obedience; it is about ethical and moral growth and development and service-learning helps to provide opportunities for students to experience and practice civic responsibility.
Methodology
This research employed a qualitative and quantitative design in which students’ service-learning projects were analyzed using elements of quality service-learning as criteria. This study differs from previous studies in its scope and its design. The sample population consisted of California Lutheran University special education preservice teacher candidates between Fall Semester 1996 and Spring Semester 2000.
Our research qualified all service-learning projects through a methodology called, “Portraiture” (Lawrence-Lightfoot & Davis, 1997). Portraiture is an important and appropriate research tool for analyzing service-learning projects. It encouraged us to use inclusive and comprehensive means to capture the essence of service-learning stories and those of others involved in the service-learning project. Lawrence-Lightfoot & Davis (1997) offer the following description of portraiture:
Portraiture is a method framed by the traditions and values of the phenomenological paradigm, sharing many of the techniques, standards, and goals of ethnography. But it pushes against the constraints of those traditions and practices in its explicit effort to combine empirical and aesthetic description, in its focus on the convergence of narrative and analysis, in its goal of speaking to broader audiences beyond the academy (thus linking inquiry to public discourse and social transformation), in its standard of authenticity rather than reliability or validity (the traditional standards of quantitative and qualitative inquiry), and in its explicit recognition of the use of the self as the primary research instrument for documenting and interpreting the perspectives and experiences of the people and the cultures being studied. (pp. 13-14)
Portraiture enabled us to see the growth and development of students and teachers involved in projects from multiple perspectives, as their behavior is seen in authentic, self-motivating ways. Portraiture’s emphasis on reflective inquiry makes it a viable research method for service-learning. It is a powerful methodology because it qualifies and values the input and participation of multiple voices.
Portraiture focuses on the strengths of service-learning and works on the weaknesses by building on the strengths, thus encouraging continued growth and empowering the involved. As Lawrence-Lightfoot & Davis (1997) explain:
Portraiture resists this tradition-laden effort to document failure. It is an intentionally generous and eclectic process that begins by searching for what is good and healthy and assumes that the expression of goodness will always be laced with imperfections. The researcher who asks first “what is good here?” is likely to absorb a very different reality than the one who is on a mission to discover the sources of failure. But it is also important to say that portraits are not designed to be documents of idealization or celebration. (p. 9)
Lawrence-Lightfoot & Davis (1997) continue to explain how portraiture thrives on multiple perspectives and angles of inquiry:
The portraitist is interested not only in producing complex, subtle description in context but also in searching for the central story, developing a convincing and authentic narrative. This requires careful, systematic, and detailed description developed through watching, listening to, and interacting with the actors over a sustained period of time, the tracing and interpretation of emergent themes, and the piecing together of these themes into an aesthetic whole. (p. 12)
As a result of our qualitative analysis of each service-learning project, we were able to place preservice teacher candidates’ projects into one of three categories, “deficit,” “empowerment,” and “reciprocal empowerment.” We used “Portraiture” to analyze each project and then categorized the projects using the following criteria. If the service-learning project indicates that it:
o Provides quality service (Real need in community) = “Deficit” model perspective.
o Provides quality service (Real need in community) and involves collaboration = “Empowerment” model perspective.
o Provides quality service (Real need in community), involves collaboration and represents all stakeholders’ voices = “Reciprocal Empowerment” model perspective.
This taxonomy was derived from the elements of high quality service-learning projects. We then quantified the results and determined percentages of service-learning projects that fell into each category over the years.
In 1996, sixty percent of the service-learning projects responded to a real need in the community, for example, preparing a Resource book for parents of students with special needs. While this project responded to a real need in the community, from the perspective of the preservice teacher candidate, it did not involve any collaboration or have the voice of the other potential stakeholders, like the parents of students with special needs, special needs students themselves, or community organizations. So, this project was quite high on quality service because it responded to a real need in the community but very low on collaboration and voice. This project was counted as a “deficit” model service-learning project. In 1997, while there was a modest increase in the quality service component and collaboration was more highly represented among the various service-learning projects, they still lacked the stakeholders’ voice. These service-learning projects were counted as “empowerment” model projects. An example of the “empowerment” model perspective is a website developed for individuals with disabilities and their parents informing them about the different types of disabilities. There was collaboration with community agencies and other specialists but there was no student voice involved n the process. In 1998, “Reciprocal Empowerment” model perspectives were more prevalent. For example, a lesson plan on Disabilities Awareness was developed and presented in three high school classes. Preservice teacher candidates worked with students with disabilities as a team. Together they developed and conducted the Disabilities Awareness presentation. Following the presentation, students with severe disabilities worked in the school cafeteria, greeting students, serving silverware, and serving snacks. Another example is when a student with visual impairment did a series of presentations about her disability to faculty members at the college level. In these examples, we find quality service, collaboration and a student voice. These service-learning projects qualified as “Reciprocal Empowerment” model perspectives.
Results and Discussion
The “Reciprocal Empowerment” model perspective became more prominent over the years of the study. Students with special needs were taking a more active role in the service-learning projects.
One of the themes that emerged from California Lutheran University’s service-learning portrait was “From prejudice and ignorance to… new understanding, acceptance, and support.” The following reflections of mainstream fifth graders who participated in a service-learning project that was designed to generate awareness about special needs students illustrate this emerging portrait from the “empowerment” model approach. The service-learning project involved special day school students and mainstream fifth grade students socializing with each other by playing kickball, once a week, and then having the mainstream students reflect on their experiences. Some of their reflections stated:
¹ “I felt sort of nervous because I thought that they were a little weird. Now I feel great being their friend because now I know that they are nice, cool, and friendly.”
¹ “I felt like I needed to be kind to them and if they drool on me or something not to be mad because they are special.”
¹ “I have learned that the kids in room 5 are just like us. So if we take the time to teach them they will learn.” and
¹ “I will be able to learn from other people who are different from me.”
By maintaining the foci for learning on mainstream fifth grade students, there is no true reciprocal service-learning situation. This learning remains consistent with the “empowerment” model even thought it could extend into the “reciprocal empowerment” model by encouraging the special day school students to reflect on their socializing with the mainstream students, and then having all students share their new-found perceptions with significant others and possibly each other. When designing service-learning projects, coordinators need to plan carefully and methodically well-designed projects to include the special needs student as a reciprocal partner in the service-learning process that will turn the “empowerment model” into the “reciprocal empowerment” model for service-learning.
Examples of “empowerment model” service learning projects conducted in October 1999 included:
¹ At-Risk students who made cards for patients in a local nursing home and then delivered them to the nursing home. Feedback indicated that some of the at-risk students chose to continue as volunteers at the nursing home after the one visit.
¹ A special day class provides the daily lunch service at their school. They gain listening, social and critical thinking skills in the process.
¹ Special Education high school students tutor second graders in different subject areas for an hour and a half each day. They write reflective essays indicating that they can be a positive influence on others and that service can be fun!
¹ Middle school special education students learn about the variety of foods available and create a class cookbook as a holiday gift for their families. Students indicated that they had a real sense of accomplishment in having constructed a gift for their families and having planned and implemented a feast.
Still other projects, had they thought more deeply about the “empowerment model” could have made some poignant changes to their “deficit model” service-learning projects to generate even more powerful outcomes. Examples of these service-learning activities in October 1999 include:
¹ A program involving police officers and elementary school staff presented a variety of lessons for at-risk students. At the end of the program some of the students stayed on to be mentors to the new students. By documenting this activity and placing it in a service-learning context, as an intention of the service learning activity, coordinators could move to an “reciprocal empowerment model” where at-risk students mentor others.
¹ A packet of materials was developed for at-risk students to help them prepare for an up-coming job fair. What if the at-risk students were asked to collaborate in the development of the packet of materials? Again, this project could be improved and made to fit the “reciprocal empowerment” model with careful planning by building on the strengths of the students with special needs.
Another service-learning project from October 1999, provides a perfect example of how the “reciprocal empowerment” model can assist mainstream students and students with special needs. It involves a service-learning project that has high achieving students mentoring at-risk students in a junior high school. They meet each week for lunch. The program resulted in both improved academic achievement and school attendance. As well, friendships were developed among students of various backgrounds who would not even have considered such a friendship in the past. Underachieving students realized that it is fun to talk to students who are high achievers and they increased their class attendance rate and improved their grades.
By October 2000, out of the one hundred and eighty-two service-learning projects completed for Special Education course credit at California Lutheran University, thirty percent of the projects fell under the “deficit model” category, forty-five percent of the projects fell under the “empowerment model” category, and twenty-five represent the “reciprocal empowerment model,” which is characterized by the true spirit of service-learning which encourages, equal, joint, collaborative participation of both mainstream students and students with special needs.
Another example of “reciprocal empowerment model” found in the work of California Lutheran University preservice teacher candidates work is the “Reading to See” project. In this project second graders who were practicing how to read with feeling and proper punctuation, were provided with an opportunity to record their read aloud versions of stories from Aesop’s Fables and they donated their recordings to an audiotape library at the Braille Institute. The students accompanied by their teacher and the preservice teacher candidate went to the Braille Institute to do a live recording or the fables and to donate their taped stories to the library. However, a big surprise was waiting for them at the Braille institute. After they were through reading their fables, one of the teenagers with visual impairment read a fable aloud using a Braille book.
Our research indicates that California Lutheran University’s special education preservice teacher candidates, over time, have been able to move away from the “deficit” model of service-learning to an “empowerment” model that benefits all participants. The rationale that emerges from our research for making this shift is sound and simple. Students need models from which to learn, and they need to practice citizenship if they are to live it. This research provides qualitative evidence supporting the notion that, students who participate as reflective learners in service-learning are enhancing their ability to fulfill their civic responsibilities. This seems to be true for students with special needs as well as for mainstream students.
Through the “empowerment” model, students with special needs and at-risk youth can become resources instead of problems for the community. By re-conceptualizing and deliberately structuring the learning environment and engaging students with special needs and at-risk youth in learning that centers on critical community issues, service-learning provides opportunities for them and other stakeholders to become contributors, problem solvers, and partners in improving communities.
Our research argues for the inclusion of the “reciprocal empowerment” model in service-learning. However, more research investigating the effects service-learning has on building an inclusive community of learners is needed. Research initiatives can investigate and will probably promote an awareness of disabilities, the empowerment of students with special needs, the development personal skill building and team collaboration, and an acceptance of students with special needs and at-risk students by general education students, faculty/supervisors and the community.
Our research invites discussion and further consideration of several broad generalizations supporting the idea that service-learning has a positive impact on students with special needs. As well, it suggests that service-learning has a reciprocal impact on general education students, preservice teacher candidates, faculty/supervisors and the general public. This research has generated naïve hypotheses for further investigation and research.
ü Does Service-Learning have a positive effect on reducing stereotypes and facilitating a positive understanding and acceptance of students with special needs?
ü Does it enhance a sense of responsibility and citizenship skills in both general and special education students?
Further Research Methods
There is strong support throughout the service-learning literature indicating that well structured reflection is the most critical element of service-learning (ASLER, 1993).
Much qualitative data has been gathered over the years of providing service-learning opportunities at California Lutheran University. An analysis of field notes, service-learning student focus group interviews, and stakeholders’ reflections, indicate that the “empowerment” model has had a multidimensional impact on students, faculty, community members and students with disabilities.
Technology can be used as powerful research tools for collecting, housing, organizing and analyzing field notes, stakeholders’ reflections, and conducting service-learning student focus group interviews. For example, webfolios are perfect for integrating service-learning activities, stakeholders’ reflections and field notes all in one portal. A webfolio system consisting of instructor assignments, learning resources, student artifacts, mentor feedback, and curriculum standards is used extensively throughout California Lutheran University’s Special Education program. It also supports continuous curriculum improvement and allows all educators to share teaching and learning strategies, learning resources, and assignments with their colleagues. A collaborative community of learners evolves around the development and use of the webfolio system. Students respond to course and program standards and assignments by generating multimedia WWW documents (artifacts). Mentors' provide feedback on a student’s work and the comments are kept as electronic logs and viewed only by the student who generated the artifact. A web-based system instantly organizes a student's work and presents the artifacts in a student webfolio, displaying not only the artifact, but also the associated assignments and activities. Any authorized webfolio user can comment on the student's reflections and place field notes in their webfolio. A student's webfolio starts when they enter the program, is continued throughout the student’s education, and archives a student’s lifelong learning and career development; as well as, showcasing the newest and finest achievements in the student’s life work. Many Schools and Departments of Education are trying to achieve full implementation of a webfolio system like the one already being used at California Lutheran University as it provides a dynamic tool for enhancing Service Learning and research in a single web portal.
Every student reflection presented in the webfolio system includes a brief description of the service-learning activity along with additional situated learning details, pointers to helpful Internet resources, and criterion referenced measures for assessment (a rubric). The instructor also ties each service-learning activity to curriculum standards, goals, learning categories and assignment types. This simple act involving a few mouse clicks combined with the assessment scores the instructor assigns to each student’s artifact can be used to address critical research questions, like:
ü Overall, have Service Learning goals been met or improved?
ü Have specific Service Learning goals been met?
ü Are individual students meeting Service Learning goals?
ü Is the Service Learning pedagogy designed for success?
The ProfPort webfolio system used at California Lutheran University exports selected information needed to address critical research questions. This information can then be imported into SPSS, SAS, EXCEL, and other analysis and graphical presentation packages. Graphs can be generated to indicate the percent of student artifacts assessed below, meeting, and exceeding expectations for multiple years. Charts can be produced that show how mastery of a Service Learning goal is being developed throughout the curriculum. The visual impact is to immediately convey whether there is proper scope and sequence within the Service Learning program to meet the goals of Service Learning and whether the pedagogy is helping students to achieve those goals.
Still another technology, useful in conducting focus
group interviews is Tapped In. Tapped In is used chiefly in real-time as teacher
educators meet in virtual classrooms with service-learning stakeholders. Tapped
In (a Multi-object Orientation [MOO] for educators) allows stakeholders and
researchers to meet in cyberspace in a text-based environment. Researchers
can ask questions of the stakeholders and their responses are recorded and emailed
to the researcher following the interview. The data can then be qualitatively
analyzed and cross-referenced with other data collected, field notes and reflections.
From these three methods we can paint a portrait of service-learning activities.
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