Service Learning in Unequal Contexts: Toward Transforming Learning Practices in South African Schools

• In Event: Service-Learning and Experiential Education Across Diverse Contexts

Abstract

This paper examines how service learning in South Africa contributed to school improvement in disadvantaged contexts. The study is located within a university school partnership at the University of Cape Town and focuses on homework as a learning practice in black African schools. The absence of homework, rooted in apartheid’s Bantu Education, compromises the quality of teaching and learning. In response, university students initiated an after school peer-led homework programme for Grade 6 primary school learners in a semi-urban township school. Using a qualitative, interpretive approach, data was generated through student service learning reports, interviews with teachers, the programme coordinator and academic staff members. The study informs ways in which to address prevailing discourses and embedded practices through service learning.

Authors

• Roshan Galvaan, University of Cape Town

• Patti Silbert, University of Cape Town