Study On American Service-learning In A Perspective Of Citizenship Education

With the development of multi-dimensional citizenship, the notion of participatorycitizen has been gradually identified all over the world. To cultivate the participatory citizenhas become the new trend of the international citizenship education. Service-learning inAmerica is one of the citizenship education models which come into being within the trend. The background review of service learning in US is the basis of the thesis. The thesisanalyzes the relationship between service learning and citizenship education in Chapter 1through the background review of service-learning. The thesis reveals that sinceservice-learning emerged at the end of 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s, and hasdeveloped as an important model of citizenship education since then in America. As for thebackground of service learning, the thesis also points out that the interpersonal alienation,citizens' indifference to politics and adolescents' lacking in responsibility sense, are the mainsocial factors and communitarianism and John Dewey's experiential education theory are themain theoretical background, of which the former is the main philosophical root of servicelearning and the later provides methodological support for service learning. Based on the examination of Chapter 1, Chapter 2 examines the relationship betweenservice learning and citizenship education, reveals the central position of the aim atcitizenship education in the aims of service-learning, and finally concretely analyzes theobjective of service learning in citizenship education, which is to cultivate participatorycitizens. Chapter 3 reveals the feature of service learning as citizenship education----citizen'sparticipation by comparing various models and methods of citizenship education in US, andilluminates the concrete procedures and steps of citizen's participation as a method ofcitizenship education in service learning activities by presenting a case illumination. InChapter 4, the effects of service-learning as citizenship education are examined according tostudents' feedback, teachers' responses, communities' evaluation and scholars' viewpoints.From the point of view of the theory and policy, service-learning is a kind of good citizenshipeducation model. A lot of practices has also manifested its vital role in fostering participatorycitizens. However, there still exist many problems in the practical aspects of service-learning.Three problems have been pointed out in Chapter 5 to be considered and discussed, of whichthe first is the relationship between service and citizenship, the second is the relationshipbetween civic participation and political participation and the last one is the differencebetween service-learning as "practice" and service-learning as "space".