Abstract
Educator preparation programs seek to provide teacher candidates with authentic learning experiences that support the learning process, and one means is to engage teacher candidates in service-learning. Elementary schools are tasked with improving the literacy outcomes of struggling readers, and community-based programs focused on literacy, seek to improve the literacy achievement of its’ citizens. This work explores how an educator preparation program collaborated with a community-based organization to provide elementary, struggling readers with 1:1 literacy instruction via teacher candidates from the local university. The aim is to showcase the process, procedures, and benefits of universities partnering with local PK-12 schools and community-based organizations.
Highlights
Two challenges face the implementation of service-learning in educator preparation programs: how to effectively impact the community and how to integrate praxis into the experience (Skinner & Chapman, 1999)
Research has consistently shown that many in-service teachers are not prepared to teach literacy (Pittman, Zhang, Binks-Cantrell, Hudson, & Joshi, 2019; Joshi et al, 2009; Moats, 1999); the researchers were interested in determining if service learning would increase teacher candidates in the aforementioned areas through a servicelearning experience
The analysis revealed that teacher candidates enrolled in the course that had a highly structured service-learning experience significantly increased their self-efficacy by the end of the course
Summary
Two challenges face the implementation of service-learning in educator preparation programs: how to effectively impact the community and how to integrate praxis into the experience (Skinner & Chapman, 1999). Given the importance of early intervention, one such community-based organization, SA Reads, currently provides community members with opportunities to tutor K-3rd grade students in literacy to improve students’ literacy attainment and combat Matthew Effects Given this match between the researchers’ objectives and SA Reads’ mission, the researchers sought to explore the following research questions: Does service-learning, via SA Reads, increase the acquisition of literacy knowledge and skills of teacher candidates, and does service-learning, via SA Reads, increase the efficacy of teacher candidates to teach literacy to K-3rd grade students. Account for every experience candidates have and when an opportunity exists to meet needs on multiple levels, as it does in service-learning, aligning all outcomes becomes crucial This alignment is critical because teacher candidates need to be prepared to teach, with efficacy, the more than 60% of students who are not reading at a level of proficiency when they reach fourth grade (National Assessment of Educational Progress, 2017). These activities are incorporated into classroom discussions, presentations, or directed writing (Skinner & Chapman, 1999)
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