Background: Service-learning is gaining recognition as a valuable pedagogy for students to gain both academic and psychosocial benefits. This high-impact practice allows students to achieve course learning objectives while contributing to their community's needs. A review from 2007 revealed a lack of research focused on the topic in the prior…

Over the past few decades, service-learning has surged in popularity. Although most programs are implemented in high school and college classrooms, service-learning has the potential for great impact in middle school. The present article evaluates a pilot service-learning program for fifth- and seventh-grade (N = 86) children in a large, urban,…

Analyses of 22 reflection journals of students enrolled in a service-learning-based child-development course at Connecticut College revealed 85 themes. Themes concerning initial adjustments and rapport building, setting limits on child behavior, and closure issues are discussed and accompanied with journal excerpts. Sharing these reflections with…

Addresses educational benefits of integrating community service into the curriculum and describes efforts toward achieving this goal. Involving students in community service can lead to social change by balancing individual rights and self-interest with collective responsibility to the community and society at large. (LP)