Abstract:

Founded on an Action Research paradigm in 2016, NCIC-Immersion School is quickly gaining recognition in Asia and abroad for operationalizing immersive, integrated content-language instruction. The school is lucky enough to call Shenzhen, a coastal city in south China, its home. The very essence of the city is that of design, iteration, and redesign, as Shenzhen rockets to international status as a prototyping and manufacturing hub. That spirit extends to Immersion School, and the innovative, iterative learning environment that is co-generated by educators and students alike.  

The concept-based curriculum being developed in Immersion School is driven by the work of the Common Ground Collaborative (henceforth, CGC). The intentional flexibility of the framework lends itself to contextualization, and as such, experiential programming thrives. Tied directly to the Character Education component of the CGC framework, as well as the academic, conceptual content from the Middle School program, Immersion School’s Service Learning initiative is endeavoring to connect classrooms to communities, and back again. Service Learning occurs during the self-determined Self & Society (SNS) block and is guided by a Western English-Immersion teacher, as well as a Chinese-Immersion teacher. To expand their agency, students practice the school’s Learners’ Goals (Negotiation, Collaboration, Inquiry, and Complex Thinking); these are essential competencies they leverage to facilitate initiatives in service of the environment and vulnerable populations. Embedded in this approach to Service Learning are two mutually-influential theoretical frameworks, specifically Sen’s and Nussbaum’s scholarship on Human Capabilities (1999, 2011, respectively) and the Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) approach employed by McIntyre (2000).  

This paper will explore the ways in which Immersion School, through its Service Learning program, is enhancing community well-being through the expansion and development of students' personal capabilities, and the ways in which freedom of choice fosters students’ progress toward becoming agents of meaningful change. By making the explicit link to authentic scenarios, transfer of learning not only happens effectively, the conditions are also created for each student to take ownership of their right and responsibility to learn in a way that is meaningful to them. (CGC, 2018).   

Keywords:

Language Learning Innovations,  Learning and Teaching Methodologies, Collaborative and Problem-based Learning,  Strategies, Principles and Challenges.