Service Learning In Speech Therapy
If I am passionate about anything in my personal and professional life, it is helping others through giving.
My husband and I tragically lost a daughter to a rare brain condition in 2017, and we honor her memory by holding a Play Doh drive for a local hospital, donating books and games to a local school, and raising money for families and research institutions in our community. Impacting my community is something that brings me so much joy, and I am really proud of my work.
When I first learned about service learning, I immediately knew that it was something I was going to love. What could be better than helping kids improve their speech and language skills while doing something incredible or the community? To date, our students have completed 4 service-learning projects, and I know there will be many more to come. I’ll detail our projects in future blog posts, but for now, I want to explain the premise of service learning and how you can implement service-learning into your curriculum.
What is service learning?
Service learning is learning through an authentic experience of helping others. There are many ways that service learning can be executed, but there are several factors that are important for all service learning projects:
projects should be student-led
projects should solve a problem
projects help others through advocacy, education, donations, or service
Educational research studies have documented positive outcomes from service learning in the classroom including:
increased motivation for learning
greater understanding of the subject matter
improved ability to apply skills to the “real world”
improved inter-personal skills
I think you can target pretty much every speech, language, and pragmatic goal through a service learning project. You can target vocabulary related to your chosen topic and receptive language while completing research tasks. You can practice expressive targets while sharing research, journaling, or completing an advocacy project. You will certainly target empathy, perspective, and problem solving throughout the project, and your students will naturally engage, negotiate, and collaborate with one another from start to finish.
Sounds Great! How does it work"?
Service learning can “look” very different depending on your setting and goals. I am going to outline how I have approached service learning as a component of speech therapy.
Choose your students I co-teach a high school Resource Room English class 1 day a week. These students have higher needs and are approaching graduation and employment. These students are working on a variety of goals, but their needs really boil down to life skills. Service learning is perfect for these students. Whichever students you choose, you will easily be able to work in expressive, receptive, or pragmatic targets through a service learning project.
Choose a topic In 3 out of the 4 service learning projects we’ve completed, the students have chosen their topic. I usually give them lots of ideas and we narrow it down though discussion and a vote. Students should consider what problem they want to solve in their school, community, state, or even the world! The how is not as important right now as the why.
Learn! The next step in the process is learning about the topic. You may want to use a KWL chart as a starting point. Next, students should do background research about their chosen topic. For example: if the students want to do a project to beautify a park, they should learn about why people litter, the detrimental effects of litter, flowers that grow well in your region, etc.
In the past, I’ve made a deck of Slides with a question on each Slide. I assign each Slide to a student to research the question. Once everyone is done researching, each person shares their question and answer. This strategy gives the students ownership over their learning and gives them a chance to learn from one another.
YouTube and NewsELA are also great places to find information that is easily digestible and can spark conversation about the chosen topic with your students.
Another great learning opportunity is bringing in an expert. to speak about the subject. Experts often have really good insight into how the students can help through their service project. For example, a nurse who works on an oncology floor can share some of the biggest issues cancer patients face and can give the students ideas of how they can help. Experts can bring a level of empathy that is more impactful than reading an article or watching a video. Experts give the students a chance to ask questions and dig deeper into the the topic that they’ve chosen.
Reflect and empathize At this point in the project, I like to take a step back and have the students reflect on the topic they’ve chosen. We think about the problem, how the problem impacts us or others, and what we can do about it. We typically do this through a journal prompt paragraph which hits expressive , social and ELA targets.
Make a plan Depending on the topic you choose, you may have an idea of the project you will complete before you begin researching. For other projects, your students will need to learn and reflect before they will be able to come up with a plan for how they can make an impact. Typically, I have an idea of what projects will be impactful and achievable and I ever so gently steer the students in that direction. We usually complete a brainstorming session and talk about what is realistic when it comes to time, money, and resources. (I’ll never forget one student’s adamant insistence that we give all homeless people homes!)
Nuts and bolts Now that you know what project you’d like to complete, you have to decide how you’ll get the project off the ground. If you’re asking for monetary or physical item donations, you have to figure out how to spread the word. If you’re doing a service project, you have to determine the logistics of getting the work done. If you’re completing an advocacy or education project, you have to decide how you can best make an impact on your target audience. There are so many life skills students can work on during this step including problem solving and time/resource management. There are also many possible expressive and pragmatic language skills you can work on during this step. Students can write announcements to be read to the student body, and they can work together to make posters or make plans for the project. The possibilities are infinite!
In the past, our students have used Canva to make beautiful posters and social media posts. This is an amazing free tool that you can use in your classroom, and I can’t recommend it enough! It also requires a certain level of following directions and asking for help which are two things my students are always working on!
Dreams become reality Now that you’ve got everything planned, the project is the easy part! Raise money! Collect items! Spread awareness or kindness! Serve the community! Whatever you do, it will be so meaningful to your students and the people you help.
Celebrate In my opinion, this is one of the most important parts of the project! The students deserve recognition for their hard work, and truthfully YOU do too! Our metro area has an annual service learning summit (we’ve only gone once…thanks COVID). If yours has one too, try to take your students. It is an amazing way to celebrate and network with other local schools.
I don’t think you can toot your horn too loudly when it comes to a service learning project. Consider sharing your project with your administration, local media, and students’ families. Also, everyone loves a party, so throwing a party to celebrate your hard work is a really fun way to end the project.
This is an extremely basic framework of how I approach service learning. Each topic presents unique opportunities for learning. I encourage you to be creative, have fun, and let your students take the lead!
Whatever you do, I am sure it will be amazing!
Have more questions about service learning in speech? I learned a lot of what I know from an organization that our district partners with called Partnerships for Authentic Learning and Leadership. They have a much more detailed framework for service and project based learning. Your district may have a similar partnership, or check out their amazing programming. You can also leave a comment or email me kelly@highschoolslp.com!
