Denise K. Sommers
University of Illinois at Springfield


Integrating Service Learning into the Online Classroom: The Development of Collaboration, Critical Thinking, Empowerment, and Leadership

Online teaching and learning has grown exponentially in the past decade which has transformed higher education globally. Service learning is an experiential, educational activity that offers credit to student participants and a service to community-based stakeholders. It has the potential for greater depth and breadth of experience as it often involves social, cultural, and other aspects of the community and has the potential to be used over a period of time. Creating a community service learning project that allows students to critically reflect on their process, to collaborate effectively with each other, and to apply newly acquired awareness and knowledge gained in the online classroom to real-life situations in the community is a challenge at least. Addressing this challenge involves the use of multiple online teaching strategies and technologies as well as development of student awareness and knowledge of critical administrative and management competencies. The author focused on four competencies (critical thinking, collaboration, empowerment, and leadership) derived in part from Triangle of Practice Model (TPM) to teach in the context of a grant writing service learning project.

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