Episode 2: Service Learning Is Key

In this episode of Pete 101, the importance of service learning for physical education teacher education students is discussed. Service learning provides benefits such as improved academic and social outcomes for students. Implementing service learning can be challenging, but it helps develop necessary skills like communication and organization. There are areas where service learning can improve, such as increasing the length and number of sessions. Taking advantage of service learning opportunities helps prepare Pete students for the real world. It allows them to reflect, learn, and grow from their experiences. Stay tuned for the next episode on inclusion of students with disabilities in physical education. Hey everybody, Maddie Cooley here from the good old Platteville, Wisconsin. Welcome back to the series of Pete 101. Today is December 8th, 2022 and on today's episode, we will be talking about the importance of service learning. As we talked about in episode one about changing the culture in the physical education world, we are now going to look at the information and apply it to the importance of preparing physical education, teacher education, also known as Pete students for the real world. When it comes to service learning, not all take advantage of this awesome opportunity. According to the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, service learning is defined as an essential strategy in providing a rigorous and relevant curriculum, which will prepare students to succeed in the 21st century. This being said, what are the benefits of these hours? How are serving learning programs implemented and how will these experiences help prepare physical education, teacher education students for the real world along with improvements that can be made in service learning? So let's get to it, shall we? Starting off with the benefits of service learning, while there are many important benefits that should be noted, here are a few. Service learning not only can improve academic outcomes, but also social outcomes for students. This is so as students can then apply their academic knowledge that is taught in the classroom into the real world experiences early. As the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction service also states, there are many other positives to service learning opportunities, such as attendance dropout rates, academic and civic engagement, reducing youth risk behaviors, reducing discipline problems, and lastly school and classroom climate. Doing these service hours helps develop future teachers by giving them the quality experiences needed and deserved. Next, when we look at how to implement service learning, we see that this can be challenging at times, as we are looking for characteristics that make these opportunities great and unique and so on. Looking at a systemic review by Raquel Perez Ordaz, we gain a few things from this. In this study, it looks at the quality of the program using mixed methods and extending intervention implantation periods. Throughout, it talks about three main objectives for universities and physical education, teacher education students. Those are teaching, research, and service provision. At the end of this article, it states that resulting in implementing service learning for PEET students, like myself, most of the time relate to three main of these three main objectives. This being said, it was found that with this implantation of students, they are able then to provide a wide variety of necessary skills, like communication, planning, and organization skills. And this list goes on and on. From these experiences, this is what is gained, not only for them, but for everyone benefits from this. This being said, also, this also relates to three main elements, not only to the ones of the characteristics that they gain or the objectives that they are, but also the elements of the students themselves, the community, and also the program itself. While service learning provides many great things, there are also areas where it may need to grow, specifically looking at the length of the program, a number of sessions. Increasing this number would then help give physical education, teacher education students even greater opportunities. Lastly, to ensure great quality, this not only helps the PEET students out, but also the community, the school, the staff members, other teachers, and of course, last but not least, the students. Overall, if PEET students want to be successful, they need to take advantage of what service learning has to offer. If PEET students have greater dedication, as discussed in this study that we already talked about earlier, then they will demonstrate greater teacher competence and more. This will help students prepare for the real world by developing these critical skills early. This gives PEET students the opportunity to reflect on their own experiences, learn, grow, and develop from them. But without these experiences, where would they be, and what would they gain? That's something for you to think about. Thank you all for tuning in on today's episode. Stay tuned for episode three about factors that can positively influence the inclusion of students with disabilities in a physical education class. And this is according to a teacher's representation. And next time, we even might have a special guest, so see you then!