R&L Education
Pages: 208
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Trim: 8¾ x 11⅛
978-1-57886-366-2 • Paperback • September 2006 • $57.00 • (£44.00)
Margaret Rizzo has been a middle school library media specialist for more than three decades. For several years, she also served as District Department Chair of the Library Media Department. During her time in the middle school, she co-advised the National Junior Honor Society and organized many community service activities for middle school students. Joyce Brown has taught family and consumer science for the past thirty and is a member of the New York State Association of Family and Consumer Science Educators. Both authors have coordinated a middle school community service day for the past ten years. They are also coadvisors for the National Junior Honor Society, an organization that promotes character, leadership, scholarship, and service to the community.
Chapter 1 Getting Started
Chapter 2 The Agencies
Chapter 3 The Students
Chapter 4 The Teachers and Staff
Chapter 5 The Chaperones
Chapter 6 Transportation
Chapter 7 Publicity
Chapter 8 Preparing the Students
Chapter 9 The Community Service Day
Chapter 10 In-School Projects
Chapter 11 Follow-up Lessons
Chapter 12 Evaluating and Assessing the Community Service Day
Chapter 13 Planning for Next Year
Service learning is a critical component of any successful character education program... Our youth need to appreciate that democratic and caring communities are places where individuals can share the mutual benefits of trust. Oftentimes educators are held back by the lack of time to put a community service action plan together. Building Character Through Community Service is the how-to, nuts-and-bolts reference classroom teachers and character education coordinators need to put a class or schoolwide community service day project into action without any further delay. Marge Rizzo's and Joyce Brown's volume should find itself onto the reference desk of every educator who wants to develop youth of good character who not only know what good choices are, but 'love the good' and who actually will 'walk the talk' and make a positive difference in the adult world.
— John Walko, Ph.D., director of the Academy for Character Education, The Sage Colleges, Troy, New York
This guide really provides the step-by-step process for reaching out into the community with a large-scale project. While the focus is on a single-day experience, the shear magnitude of having hundreds of students from the same school, on the same day, participating in a community service experience provides infinite possibilities for developing character along with applied academic skills!
— Merle J. Schwartz, Ed.D., director of education and research, Character Education Partnership, Washington, DC
Building Character through Community Service is a must-read for any teacher contemplating a service learning project. This book is a complete guide to the planning and preparation needed to conduct a successful service learning project. Sample letters, project timelines, and suggestions to make the process as easy as possible are organized into a step-by-step outline by teachers who have conducted successful programs for years.
— Ron Coleman, director of student programs, New York State Council on Leadership and Student Activities/Magellan