Developing Multiple Literacies in Academic English Through Service‐Learning and Community Engagement

Abstract

Research on service‐learning offers compelling evidence of the advances student learners make in moral development, orientation to prosocial behavior, and curricular content retention. But who are those student learners? Most studies focus on native, dominant‐culture, dominant‐language students serving marginalized populations. Studies of the United States, for example, primarily focus on English‐speaking U.S. citizens serving either linguistically and culturally similar populations marked by economic, educational, or health vulnerabilities, or linguistically and culturally different populations to facilitate the acquisition of another language or cultural tradition, such as tutoring at a Latino community center in order to learn Spanish. Much less research has focused on English language learners as agents of service in the United States, volunteering at U.S. social service agencies in order to increase their own acquisition of the English language and U.S. culture. This study addresses that gap in the research by analyzing results of a language immersion program that aimed to develop multiple literacies in academic English through service‐learning and community engagement. The study documents significant gains in intercultural awareness and advanced language acquisition over 8 weeks of service‐learning, recommending service‐learning as an exceptional pedagogical mechanism for domestic and international programs in intercultural development and second language acquisition.