Kristen's Service Learning Reflection

For our service learning project we volunteered at Tendercrop Farm in Newbury, Massachusetts. This farm is open all year long and offers a variety of foods. They sell their own meats, fresh produce, prepared meals, flowers and much more. They are known for their great dedication to being organic and providing the community with fresh, healthy foods. Kaitlyn and I went in the early morning and we helped out for about three and half or four hours. We assisted with whatever they need us to do that day. We started with a tour of most parts of the farm. During this tour we were provided with a lot of information on the farm’s goals, how they function and what it takes to keep up a farm. Then we planted many, many seedlings to grow crops or to be sold this spring.

It felt awesome to help out at Tendercrop Farm. I have never done anything like that before and it was actually really fun. It felt good to get dirty and really put my hard work into a cause that I believe in, and a place that was truly thankful for our help. I would definitely recommend this to others to simply see where their food comes from and actually take part in growing what they eat. Also, I never really thought about how much hard work it is to run a farm. After just a half day of work I was exhausted. I can only imagine running a successful farm for many years.

I definitely think service learning projects are a useful teaching strategy because they are a first-hand experience with a cause and get students really involved. If it weren’t for this project there is no way that I would be volunteering at a farm that early in the morning, so it really pushes students to take action on something they wouldn’t normally. It can also show that even something as small as a few volunteer hours can go a long way and really make a difference.

 I would definitely do something like this with my future students. I probably wouldn’t do it my first year but I would hope to work up to it within the first three years. It can be really effective and I would hope to get into it as soon as I was settled in my new teaching position. Elementary students would be really excited about taking part in a cause they believed in.

I thought this was nicely integrated into our methods course. I enjoyed it much more than I thought I was going to at the beginning of the semester. I would maybe give students more time to choose their topic at the beginning of the semester. I remember being in sort of a whirlwind at the beginning and kind of picking any topic I saw, not realizing it was going to be a semester long project. It worked out in the end because I loved my topic and learned a lot!