Developing a Service‐Learning Curriculum for Linguistics

Abstract Service‐learning integrates community service into a credit‐earning course to enrich the learning experience and pair practice with theory in some content area. Linguistics courses offer tremendous potential for service‐learning because there are a variety of ways in which language‐related theory can be put into practice. This paper outlines the development of a service‐learning curriculum for linguistics courses. While examples come from a project where students tutored adult second language learners of English, the activities in this paper extend well to other linguistics courses. Reflection is essential to service‐learning, so necessary background and examples of it as a structured learning tool appear here. A second assessment tool, an anonymous online survey taken before and after tutoring, was used to explore any impact on language and diversity attitudes. More generally, service‐learning has the potential to positively affect career development, to generate a sense of civic engagement, to facilitate greater understanding of other cultures and races and to make a difference in local communities.