Expanding Elementary Teacher Education through Service-Learning

Book excerpt: Teacher education programs and colleges of education face a multilayered task of preparing teachers to teach in increasingly divergent environments where children of color encompass a significant number of urban school populations. Yet the teaching force remains predominantly white, middle-income, monolingual, and female. Compounding this complex issue, the racial and the socio-economic makeup of many teacher education faculty mirrors the teacher candidate population. The goal of this handbook is to offer teacher educators a blue print for strengthening and extending traditional literacy field experiences to include service-learning components. As literacy teacher educators, Sulentic Dowell and Meidl demonstrate how teacher education can be transformed to include more authentic, meaningful, and preparatory field experiences. Adding service-learning components expands teacher education to more adequately prepare elementary education candidates to meet children’s needs in 21st century, urban elementary classrooms. This handbook considers the need to redefine and reconfigure teacher education in regards to literacy teaching and learning.