Introduction: New Culture, "i-Person" and Education
Several years ago we entered a New Age, the Internet Age, with a New Culture that clearly deviates from the contemporary culture of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and since then we are living "the greatest social change in human history" (Partal, 2001)
Understanding culture as the "set of representations, rules of conduct, ideas, values, forms of communication and behavior learned patterns (not innate) that characterize a social group" (Quintanilla, 1992), economic globalization and constant cultural and scientific advances, especially the construction of Cyberspace, have conducted profound changes in our cultural substrate forming a "new technological paradigm organized around Information Technology" (Castells, 2000:60).
So today among the instruments that most of us have ALWAYS available when we are building learning or carrying out a task, besides the traditional pencil and paper we also have Internet access (via mobile phones, digital tablets, computers...). The Internet helps us to locate any type of information we may need and multiplies our possibilities to communicate and work in Cyberspace, this parallel world where we can do more and more things each day and where we consequently spend more and more time.
The Internet has become so important that in some of its reports the UN has considered “free Internet access” as a human right and is promoting governmental actions against the “digital gap” (El Mundo, 2011).
The changes in our vital context are substantive and force us to face new challenges but also provide us with new resources and new possibilities. The (almost) permanent access to the Internet gives us access to an alternative parallel world where we have the chance to make most of our activities. It is like our brains had been expanded with a new lobe (the Internet lobe) that can ALWAYS access any information we are interested in. This is not the result of a mutation and does not give us onmiscience, but it is certainly a first-rate evolutionary leap in human evolution. Now some people (specially those who can be identified with what has been called the "i-Person", that is to say, people who have integrated i-devices, such as the i-Phone, i-Pad, etc. in their daily life) are potentially much more powerful than other "Homo Sapiens" because they are adapting better to our new cultural scene (Marquès, 2011 b).
In this framework, Education, today as always, aims at helping students develop their full potential (intellectually, emotionally, morally, physically, etc.) and transmitting them the culture of our society, so that they can become functioning members of society, help others and live a satisfactory life themselves.
This function of culture transmission, however, requires a thorough review of the curriculum that we develop in schools. If today we have a "New Culture", new tools and new forms of communication we cannot continue teaching and assessing students with the goals, instruments and procedures of the past.
And just in the same manner that until today Education was meant to help us to take advantage of the wonderful potential of our brain (to communicate, read, calculate, create, live...), now it must also help us to do the same with the omnipresent Internet, to which we always have access to and which frees us from memorizing many things (and here we must say many, not all), but also requires us to develop new skills if we are to avoid some risks like dependency, misinformation, shallow thinking, etc. (Carr, 2010; Marquès, 2011)
Because although it is said that new generations, the "digital natives" as Marc Prensky calls them (2010), are very skilled using IT, the truth is that this ability is manifested only in what interests them (playing, searching for music and movies, interacting on social networks ...) Although many times we can see in them some of the characteristics that Prensky points out (like predisposition for multithreading, interaction in screens, sharing, nonlinear accessing to information with preference for the textual versus multimedia...), most of them are not familiar with many of the risks of Cyberspace and don’t know how to select the most efficient tools and methodologies for their homework. This is because the development of the good judgment needed for the selection of information and tools requires training and plenty of practice time, and these are not promoted in schools where little attention is paid to Cyberspace, even though when Cyberspace has become today a parallel world where students (and more and more citizens of all ages) spend many hours a week. Should we start thinking of complementing the classic subjects of "science" and "social sciences" with a new subject, the "Science of Cyberspace"?
What is the bimodal curriculum? (or bimodal approach of the curriculum)
The changing cultural scenario of the Internet Age is forcing us to evolve into the i-Person, always connected to the Internet. Now, whenever we have to carry out a task, we can (almost) always go on the net and find the information we need in a more and more stable and faster and faster Internet.
We can do this provided that we know how to search, that is to say, how to do it efficiently and in a limited time, not spending hours clarifying concepts in reference sources (like Wikipedia and others). So in addition to knowing how to search, we need to have a good vocabulary, which will free us from having to be constantly looking up words in encyclopedias and other reference sources on the Internet. Here, remembering having made similar previous experiences will be of great help.
In this scenario, once the basic skills of reading, writing and arithmetic have been learned, adopting the bimodal curriculum means accepting that almost all the learning activities of our students are of two types: “memorizing” activities or “practicing, doing, applying” activities, and here “doing” means always doing with the support of their “auxiliary memory”, like their class notes, books or the Internet. Now let us see in detail these two types of activities of the bimodal curriculum:
1. - Memorizing activities. They are activities that focus mainly on vocabulary and data acquisition (concepts, events, people, multiplication tables, spelling...) that even in our Internet Age remain essential to people: to think (we think using "our vocabulary”), to understand what we read or what we are told, to communicate with others, to search on the Internet and understand others contributions ...
In this context, for each subject and grade, the teacher will decide at the start of course the 50 or 100 concepts (processes, events, characters...) that students should memorize and integrate into their mental frameworks (to know, to understand, to use, to able to explain) by the end of the course. These concepts will make up the essential vocabulary and data list. Optionally, the teacher will also prepare a second list of words and data that he considers not essential but desirable for students to know by the end of the course, this will be the desirable vocabulary and data list. Students will receive these lists at the start of course and will know from the beginning what they are expected to know by the end of the course.
In each class session a part of this lists will be systematically worked, with multiple learning activities (individual, group and collaborative) oriented to memorize these contents, like for example exercises with the glossary, interest centers, project work... Probably teachers will continue doing many of the exercises that have been “traditionally” done at school, but we can use all kinds of methods (traditional or innovative, with or without IT), taking into account that the aim is that students understand, memorize and integrate into their mental maps this information... so that they are able to recognize these words (in documents and oral discourses), to use this words (in thinking, speaking and performing other activities) and to explain (define each of the words of this vocabulary, accordingly to their age and grade).
We know that people remember easily the information that they use often. Therefore we must provide students chances to use this vocabulary and data, so that they can learn it by carrying out new activities (alternative definitions, relationships, creative writing...) requiring its use (functionality and transfer of learning) and being presented with questions that trigger their relating and reflecting skills.
Many of the learning activities focused on memorizing vocabulary and data will be done without IT support, however the review and study of media content and the practice with self-corrected exercises of digital textbooks and other educational Internet platforms will be a great help for teachers and students.
2. – Practical activities for applying knowledge. They are activities involving the execution of a task (to solve problems, analyze sentences and processes, assess situations or materials, plan and develop projects, synthesize, create...). The approach of the bimodal curriculum requires that students are ALWAYS able to make these practical activities with the support of their "auxiliary memory", reviewing their notes, books, the Internet ... The teacher will decide in each case which information sources can be used.
The goal is that students get used to work with the supports that are always present in the Internet Age (notes, books, the Internet and other IT tools). Of course, all tasks will be assigned a specific time that must be respected, so that students who do not possess the essential vocabulary and who have no experience in similar tasks most likely will not be able to finish the assignment in time, since searching and finding information on the Internet takes time.
These “practical activities” include also some activities, like psychomotor development, mental agility or development of cognitive functions, in which the consultation of external sources does not bring anything or, like exercises where an immediate answer is required, will simply not be possible. These are not memorizing activities in themselves but must be however executed with the resources that each student has available in their memories, like for example mental arithmetic or identification of elements in a photograph.
Practical activities with documentary support will sometimes be done individually, to strengthen the students’ autonomy and self-confidence, and sometimes will be done in groups, to promote mutual support and collaborative work. In any case, in these activities students should not memorize data (since they have the data already on the net) but should acquire new experiences that will leave a mark on their memories, so that when they remember them in the future, their self-confidence will be strengthened and they will find performing similar tasks easier.
Performing the same activity in different contexts over time will allow them to accumulate experiences that will enrich their "know how" (knowing what they have just learned or read in a manual) and will provide them "criteria" to adjust better and better their "know how" to the context in which they must work in.
Furthermore, the execution of these activities requires students to apply various cognitive skills (analysis, synthesis, hypothetical-deductive reasoning, assessment, exploration, selection, creation, planning...) and with that they will develop their intellectual abilities and basic skills in general.
In this context, for each subject and grade, the teacher will decided at the start of course the practical activities that students should know how to perform by the end of the course (basic list of practical activities). Optionally he will also prepare a second list of advanced practical activities. Students will receive these lists at the start of course and will know from the beginning what they are expected to know by the end of the course.
In their classes teachers may apply all kinds of methods (traditional or innovative, with or without IT) but here the use of IT resources will enlarge greatly (in quantity, educational potential and relevance of learning) the range of possible learning activities that we can offer students.
The bimodal curriculum approach fits into the framework of George Siemens’ connectivism theory of learning that focus on today’s need of knowing and connecting the changing sources of information. The data we memorize may become obsolete tomorrow, however the right sources of information will always provide us up-to-date information. "Learning (defined as applicable knowledge) can be outside us" (Siemens, 2004). Knowledge is not only inside humans but is also spread across multiple sources of information that students must learn to use according to their interests and needs.
On the same line, Professor Manuel Area points out: "With so much information available, it is more useful to know at all times the best procedure to get the right information than to store data in case it may be useful in the future" (Area, 2008).
How are exams like in a bimodal curriculum?
According to the dual type of learning activities of the bimodal curriculum, we consider two types of exams:
1. – Exams with memorizing exercises to verify that students have learned the basic vocabulary and data of the subject and that they are able to explain it: essential and desirable lists of vocabulary and data (the knowledge of the desirable list will allow to obtain a higher score).
As until now, in order to pass the exam, students should study before the exam day to strengthen their knowledge of memorized concepts. During the exam they should provide basic information of people and events, define concepts and processes...
2. – Exams with practical exercises with support from the "auxiliary memory" (students may have access to their notes, books, the Internet…). These exams will include activities such as problem solving, analysis, grammar, text commentaries, summaries of documents, relating historical facts and circumstances... They will refer to lists of basic and advanced practical activities. The advanced activities will allow them to obtain a higher score.
Teachers will specify a limited time for each exam. It is recommended that exams include some practical activities (compulsory for all) and other complementary activities with advanced exercises (for those who wish to obtain a higher score).
In these exams, students that usually do all class exercises and homework using their documentary support (“auxiliary memory”) will not need to study to prepare the exam. The exam will be similar to a class exercise and students will be able to use their “auxiliary memory”: notes, books and (if the teacher allows it) the Internet.Our starting proposal for compulsory education, and that each teacher can adjust to subject, grade and circumstances, is that memorizing exams (vocabulary and data) be between 33% and 50% of the total score of the subject.
What do we mean by "auxiliary memory"?
Having a permanent Internet connection, the "i-Person" can always access the vast sources of information in Cyberspace to search and find the data needed at any time. When, for example, we are watching a historical film and we want to place a character in its historical context and the historical references that we remember, we can quickly access this information on our Smartphone or tablet. If we are good searching on the Internet (one of the key activities that should be learned at school today), in a few seconds we will get the answer. As Dolors Reig says, "the Internet becomes our external hard drive, the place where we store a lot of things that before we could only learn" (Reig, 2012). In this sense, today Google has already become our external memory always available.
In this way, we can change the way we learn: we may retain the information directly in our brains or recall that it is on the Internet (sometimes even remember where on the Internet it is). According to research by Betsy Sparrow, assistant professor of Columbia University (New York), published in the journal Science, as the Internet provides a kind of collective memory, people stop remembering the information they know they can access from their computer but take good care to remember where to find it (Sparrow et al., 2011). That is, we tend to store less information in our brain memory bank and use the Internet as personal data bank, such as an "external auxiliary memory." Moreover, the brain still remembers the specifics of the issues that interest us.
As George Siemens says: "Technology is altering (rewiring) our brains. The tools we use define and shape our thinking. Many of the processes previously handled by learning theories can now be made, or supported by technology”. “Knowing how and knowing why are being supplemented with knowing where (the understanding of where to find the required knowledge)" (Siemens, 2004). The pipe is more important than its contents.
According to Siemens, it is a challenge to activate the previously acquired knowledge in situations where it is required. However when the required knowledge is unknown, our ability to connect with sources that can provide this knowledge becomes essential. As knowledge grows and evolves, our ability to learn what we may need tomorrow is more important than what we know today, the access to what is needed is more important than what is already known. Therefore, "nourishing and maintaining connections is needed for continuous learning" and "the ability to see connections between fields, ideas and concepts is a key skill." (Siemens, 2004).
In this context we must consider that searching information on the Internet always takes time. Therefore, despite the continuous availability of Internet content, to make our access to information (documents, links, videos...), contacts (people, networks...) and Internet tools related to our regular activities easier and faster, a good option is to build an environment (web, blog, wiki...) where we can store and order all these resources as we find them, so that when we need them, we can find them much faster.
We call this environment our "auxiliary memory" or "enhanced memory". It is like a library-book-workshop that can be filled (as we do with our memory) with data and tools for information processing, and when we need it, we can go there to search information or work with our tools. For the author of this article, his auxiliary memory is this website: <http://peremarques.net/>
When we don’t find what we need in our “auxiliary memory”, we still are able to search information on the Internet using search engines and also asking our colleagues in our social networks.
The “auxiliary memory” is a personal environment that students should start building at school, little by little. Young students may start with a notebook, folder or portfolio where they can collect notes and clippings of interest. Later students can begin creating their first personal digital environment on the Internet. When applying the bimodal curriculum approach, the “auxiliary memory” will immediately be useful, as it can be used as a support for practical activities and also as a "vademecum" where students can synthesize the vocabulary and data they have to memorize.
Ultimately the matter is that students build their memory (its representation of reality, of the world) as always from the information they receive, from their learning, their actions and experiences, etc. but now they distribute this information between the usual space of "brain memory" and the new, always accessible space that we call "auxiliary memory".The concept of "auxiliary memory" is close to the so-called "Personal Learning Environments" (PLE): "a set of tools, information sources, links and activities that a person frequently uses to learn" (Adell and Castañeda, 2010). The “auxiliary memory”, however, is an environment that can be useful in many different circumstances throughout life (not only during learning activities): studies, work, leisure, etc.
The bimodal curriculum and the PISA test
"PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) is a comparative, international study that evaluates the performance of pupils aged 15 at the end of compulsory school, by means of assessing certain key competencies, such as reading, math and science. This project evaluates the ability of students to apply concepts and work in various situations within each area ... " (OCDE, 2009)
Andreas Schleicher, head of the OECD PISA program, summarizes the new role of education in today's world where information sources are always within our reach, "educational success does no longer mean to retrieve content knowledge but to extrapolate what we know and apply it to new situations. Education, therefore, has to do much more with ways of thinking, creativity, critical thinking, problem solving and decision-making; with ways of working, including communication and collaboration; with tools, including the ability to recognize and exploit the potential of new technologies, and the ability to live in a multifaceted world as active, responsible citizens" (Scheleicher, 2011).
In this context, PISA tests are part of the assessment of competency-based learning. They assess the students' ability to extract and process information in a task-solving situation.Although so far authorizing students to use their "auxiliary memory", or any other source of external information, has not been considered in these tests, the tests overall provide the basic information needed to perform the required tasks, mostly practical activities. (To see some of the activities for reading comprehension and math, please refer to <http://docentes.leer.es/wp-content/pisa/index2.html> <http://evalua.educa.aragon.es/admin/admin_1 / file / Math% 20PISA.pdf>). These activities do not intend to measure the memory of young students but are meant to proof that students can do them. Moreover, the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) claims that in the near future some tests will be able to be answered on a computer (LA VANGUARDIA, 2012).
Will there be less school failure with the bimodal curriculum?
Currently there are many students who fail "test problems" because they do not remember the formulas. Well, with the bimodal curriculum approach this will not happen again. The students will only fail if, even with the help of their notes or the Internet, they don’t know how to solve the problems in the given time.
By freeing students from the pressure of memorizing so much content, since in the bimodal curriculum approach many of the exercises and exams (practical activities) will be made with the "auxiliary memory" support, we will prevent that students with memorizing difficulties become unmotivated (due to their inability to remember) and manage to do their exercises and pass their tests thanks to the support of their notes and other information sources. By anticipating their eventual success ("If I can refer to my information sources, I can do it") some students will be motivated to work more and therefore learn more.
This is the result from research conducted at UAB DIM about "new techniques against school failure" <http://peremarques.pangea.org/casio/> during the school year 2010-11and that will continue on 2011-12 .
It is particularly sad that much of this 30% of students who fail in their secondary-school studies fail due to memorizing tests, without having been able to proof that, beyond this limitation (often they simply do not want to spend hours memorizing things meaningless to them), they have a capacity (sometimes brilliant) to develop the skills necessary for social integration. And I say that it is especially sad because they are forced to memorize many things that no longer needed to know by heart… because they are available in their i-Phones.
And how is the full development of students like?
As mentioned in the introduction, Education as well as ensuring cultural transmission must provide each person with the maximum development of their faculties and for that, today as always, we must perform many different activities next to memorizing tasks and practical exercises with documentary support.
In this sense, "we may make the mistake of overrating the areas of language and mathematics at the expense of other areas such as Physical Education, Art, Music and Technology. In fact it is in these areas where we can apply the most innovative methodologies and where students can learn how to do things and above all learn to develop their creativity and complete their full development... " (Rey, 2011)
It is also essential to encourage reflection and dialogue on ethics and values, to help students discover their talents, knowledge (Robinson, 2009) and multiple intelligences (Gardner, 2003), as well as channel their emotions (emotional education) and self-esteem and cultivate their willpower and self-confidence. Multiple intelligences "can only be understood if one admits that students can be intelligent too by, for example, controlling their bodies, drawing a picture or building an invention, instead of reducing their intelligence to writing well or solving equations... " (Rey, 2011)
The tutoring activity of teachers in this regard, and especially the work of the tutor-teacher of each student, is the substrate on which to build the bimodal approach of the curriculum.In this context, we agree with Mark Prensky that all these regards should be integrated in a curriculum that considers "5 metaskills that all curricula should incorporate: discovering what to do (behaving ethically, thinking critically, setting goals...); getting it done (planning, problem solving, self-evaluation...); doing it with others (taking the lead, communicating, interacting...); doing it creatively (adapting, researching, designing...) and improving continuously (thinking, being proactive and taking risks)" (Prensky, 2011)
So... are you in?
The bimodal curriculum approach can be applied at any time, regardless of the official curriculum, because it does not interfere with it. It involves working in a different educational paradigm whose principles are:
- Accepting that we are in an "i-Person" world, always connected to the Internet.
- Considering, as part of a careful tutoring action, that there are two types of learning activities: memorizing activities and practical activities.
- Allowing always students to do practical activities with documentary support (“auxiliary memory”).
- Providing students at the start of course with the vocabulary and data that they will have to memorize and with the practical activities they will have to learn by the end of the course.
While waiting for education authorities to conduct a thorough review of the official curriculum and upgrade it to the demands of modern society, considering the concept of the "i-Person" and beginning to implement the bimodal curriculum can help providing a better education to students and can contribute reducing school failure.
Currently this bimodal approach to the curriculum is implemented in 24 schools in Spain and 5 schools in Latin America, in the context of a research carried out by the research group DIM-UAB <http://peremarques.net/telefonica/> and sponsored by the Telefónica Foundation.And so far that's all. I will appreciate your comments and suggestions on the main FORUM of the DIM social network <http://dimglobal.ning.com/>
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Translation: Diana & Hèctor Marquès


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Paul Lawrence Dunbar, James Weldon Johnson, Langston Hughes, and Maya Angelou are black writers who have produced some of the best black writing over the years, ranging from the serious to the light. Their thoughts, emotions, and accomplishments transcend the color line. Their works, like those of other black writers, combine entertainment, historical interest, and literary value. They share a common subject and set of feelings: the black experience. Margaret Butcher says in an article from The Negro in American Culture that every Negro writer has “something to say.” He cannot escape having important things to say. His mere body, for that matter, is eloquence. His quiet walk down the street is a speech to the people.
Dunbar, Johnson, Hughes, and Angelou represent the varieties of the black experience. Through their magical words and musical phrases, it is easy to comprehend their roots, joys, sorrows, dreams, and anger. The mention of their names can bring instant excitement. Two of these major writers, James Weldon Johnson and Langston Hughes, come out of the Harlem Renaissance. Paul Lawrence Dunbar dates back before the Renaissance period, and Maya Angelou is considered a remarkable contemporary writer of the present. The ties that bind these artists are not only color but also tradition, form, and language.
Dunbar, Johnson, Hughes, and Angelou use the spoken language of black people, often dialect or something close to it. Frequently, Paul Lawrence Dunbar captured the language of his people in a colorful and exaggerated way. He loved to write about the lives of average blacks during the post-Civil War period. Dunbar wrote about people involved in the simple pursuits of life, showing them as they sang, conversed, hunted, fished, or napped by the fireplace. He wrote most freely when he used dialect. He described and evaluated pretty girls, handsome young men, and selfish old men. What young woman wouldn’t want to be praised like the songbird in Dunbar’s poem “When Malindy Sings”?
In 1895, W. D. Howells, for want of a closer phrase, suggested that such pieces be called “dialect pieces,” but they are really not dialect so much as delightful ways of glorifying the spoken language.
- G’way an’ quit dat noise, Miss Lucy—
- Put dat music book away;
- What’s de use to keep on trying?
- Ef you practise twell you’re grey,
- You cain’t sta’t no notes a-flyin’
- Lak de ones dat rants and rings
- F’om de kitchen to de big woods
- When Malindy sings.
Whatever the consensus may be, the language of the common black man, whether past or present, is unique and interesting in itself. Often dialect was looked upon as a weakness in black speech, but today it is considered chic. “Right On, Bro!” Whites imitate blacks in picking up and popularizing the latest in “street language.” Each of the four writers shows skill in using colorful, vivid black language. Sometimes James Weldon Johnson hesitated to use dialect in his compositions because he felt that dialect had its place in fun and jest, and used it in the poem “Sence You Went Away.”
The language of that verse is uniquely black, as is the language of the following epitaph taken from Dunbar’s “A Death Song”:
- Seems lak to me de stars don’ shine so
- Seems lak to me de sun done loss his
- Seems lak to me der’s nothing goin’
- Sence you went away.
In his poem “Po Boy Blues” Langston Hughes shows his skill at a language very close to dialect:
- Lay me down beneaf de willers in de grass,
- Where de Branch’ll go a-singin’ as it pass,
- An’ w’en I’s a-layin’ low
- I kin heah it as I go,
- Sayin’, sleep, Ma Honey, tek yo’ res’
- at las’.
Maya Angelou steps outside of poetry to prose in her autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings as she describes a conversation with her mother that took place in Stamps, Arkansas:.
- I was a good boy
- Never done no wrong
- Yes, I was a good boy
- Never done no wrong,
- But this world is weary,
- An’ de road is hard an’ long.
Langston Hughes once said, “The passing of dialect as a medium for Negro poetry will be an actual loss for in it many beautiful things can be done, and done best.” If W.D. Howells had lived during Hughes’ time, he would have agreed. Howells had written, “There is a precious difference of temperament between the races which would be a great pity to ever lose. This is best preserved and most charmingly suggested by Mr. Dunbar in those pieces of his where he studies the moods and traits of his race in its own accent.”
- He said, “Annie, I done tole you,
- I ain’t gonna mess around in no
- niggah’s mouth.” I said, “Some-
- body’s got to do it then.” And he
- said, “Take her to Texarkana to
- the colored dentist.”
Margaret Larkin in Opportunity pointed out that Robert Burns had caught the dialect, speech cadences, and character of the Scottish people in his poems, and that Langston Hughes had done for the Negro race what Burns did for the Scotch—squeezed out the beauty and rich warmth of a noble people into enduring poetry.
Dunbar, Johnson, Hughes, and Angelou also reflect in their works a respect for the power of the folk preacher in providing an imaginative view of the world and coherence to his community. Dunbar did not advocate organized religion and dogma, but he believed in the Christian faith. At the end of The Uncalled, Fred says to Eliphalet: “I can do all the good I can, Uncle Liph, but I shall do it in the name of poor humanity until I come nearer to Him.” When Eliphalet suggests that he has lost his religion, Fred replied, “Lost it all? I’ve just come to know what religion is. It’s to be bigger and broader and kinder, so that people around you will be happy.”
Biblical references are found in the works of all four of the writers selected here. Vivid pictures of the Shepherd and his sheep abound. From the printed page, the roar of the black preacher delivering a rousing sermon peals. From the tradition of slavery emerged the strong respect for the Church that blacks have treasured. The ability of writers to capture the sense of deliverance from the trials and tribulations of everyday life is indeed a talent. The spirituals, an extradinary rich example of black folk art, have taken a significant place in black folklore.
Dunbar joyfully put words to rhyme as he told of the Christmas story in his poem “Christmas Carol.”
Many religious messages come from sermons or sermonettes in black literature or from well-known Biblical allusions, such as this verse from “The Prodigal Son” by Johnson.
- Ring out, ye bells!
- All Nature swells
- With gladness of the wondrous story.
- The world was lorn,
- But Christ is born
- To change our sadness into glory.
Johnson said in reference to the poems in God’s Trombones that the power of the old-time preacher was still a vital force; in fact, it was still the greatest influence among the colored people of the United States. Not only did Johnson write sermons, he told his readers how he wanted them read. “This intoning is always a matter of crescendo and diminuendo in the intensity—arising and falling between plain speaking and chanting . . . A startling effect is gained by breaking off suddenly at the highest point of intensity and dropping into the monotone of ordinary speech.” Langston Hughes allows the high-spirited Laura to preach her first sermon in the novel Tambourines to Glory in just this way. She stands on a street corner in Harlem:
- Oh-O-oh, sinner,
- When you’re mingling with the crowd in
- Drinking the wine of Babylon-
- Running with the women of Babylon-
- You forget about God, and you laugh
- at Death . . .
Laura drew in enough sympathizers from that one sermon to collect money to feed Essie and herself for a whole week.
- “I were drowning once, friends, but
- now I’m saved. I were down there in
- sin’s gutter lower than a snake’s belly—
- now look at me. Look at me up here on
- the curbstone of life reaching out with
- my voice to you to come and be saved, too.
- Our Church is this corner, our roof is
- God’s sky, and there’s no doors, no place
- in our church that is not open to you
- because there are no doors. So come in
- and be one with us, one with God, and
- be Saved.”
Angelou, too, has pictured the mighty preacher at the altar giving out the “do’s” and the “don’ts” to the congregation in I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings.
James Weldon Johnson would have been pleased by the depth of that sermon and by sisters and brothers of the church giving out loud Amens.
- First Corinthians tells me, “Even if I have the tongue of men and of angels and have not charity, I am as nothing. Even if I give all my clothes to the poor and have not charity, I am as nothing . . . Wooooo, Charity . . . it don’t want nothing for itself. I’m talking about Charity. Oh Lord . . . help me tonight. Charity is poor. Charity is simple.
Dunbar, Johnson, Hughes, and Angelou also shared the belief that beauty can be extracted from the ability of blacks to transcend bondage and oppression, that the black experience could be transformed into a literary equivalent of music. Arna Bontemps has said, “Negro experience in America has found a vastly satisfying medium of expression in music. If occasionally this has been felt as a mood of the times, in the broad sense, perhaps that is true. The lyrics . . . are certainly as valid as the music.” Just as Louis Armstrong composed beautiful notes on the horn and intimately touched the black ear, some black writers have touched the black mind. James Weldon Johnson paid tribute to the unknown composers of the spirituals in his poem “0 Black and Unknown Bards”:
The title of Maya Angelou’s I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings is a sort of parody of Paul Lawrence Dunbar’s poem, “Sympathy”:
- O black and unknown bards of long ago,
- How came your lips to touch the sacred fire?
- How, in your darkness, did you come to know
- The power and beauty of the minstrel’s lyre?
Human bondage becomes melodious in Dunbar’s poems, loudly enough to impress Maya Angelou when she wrote a novel about bondage—bondage of the mind which is the hardest to escape. Through the isolation and depression of being black rose part of the essence of the black experience—soul. Although soul is not the whole black experience, it is the most romanticized. In the poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” Langston Hughes used the word “soul” in the refrain, and was perhaps one of the first to give it the same meaning it would come to have fifty years later for all young blacks. (His reference probably goes back to The Souls of Black Folk by Du Bois.)
- I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,
- When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,
- When he beats his bars and would be free;
- It is not a carol of joy or glee,
- But a prayer that he sends from his
- heart’s deep core,
- But a plea, that upward to Heaven he flings-
- I know why the caged bird sings.
Hughes talked about another type of soul in The Best of Simple, one with which many Black Americans can identify:
- I’ve known rivers:
- I’ve known rivers ancient as the world
- and older than the flow of human blood
- in human veins.
- My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
Only those that have lived what Simple lived can appreciated what he was saying. Curly, who is Rita’s lover in Gather Together in My Name by Angelou, brings soul closer to home:
- “I have been laid off, fired and not
- rehired, jim crowed, segregated, insulted, eliminated, locked in, locked
- out, locked up, left holding the bag,
- and denied relief. I have been caught
- in the rain, caught in jails, caught
- short with my rent, and caught with the
- wrong woman, but I am still here.”
Dunbar makes readers feel that “something extra” that the colored band emits as it struts proudly in “The Colored Band”:
- He drove his 1941 Pontiac without seeming
- to think about it. I sat in the corner
- pushed against the door trying desperately
- not to watch him.
- “Where’s the baby’s Daddy?”
- “I don’t know.”
- “He wouldn’t marry you, huh?” His voice
- hardened in the question.
- “I didn’t want to marry him.” Partly
- “Well, he’s a low-down bastard in my
- book and needs his ass kicked.” I began to
- love him at that moment.
No one has yet rivaled James Weldon Johnson’s soulful version of the “Creation”:
- You kin hyeah a fine perfo’mance w’en de
- white ban’s serenade,
- An’ dey play dey high-toned music mighty sweet,
- But hit’s Sousa played in ragtime, an’
- hit’a Rastus on Parade,
- W’en de colo’ed ban’ comes ma’chin’ down de street.
Dunbar, Johnson, Hughes, and Angelou present the phenomenon of the black folk-preacher. Collectively, they describe a belief in beauty that transcends bondage. Frequently they use a language that retains certain qualities of dialect. And they enrich the immense volume of black literature with their labors. These same qualities appear and will continue to reappear in new forms in the black writing of today and tomorrow.
- And there the great God Almighty
- Who lit the sun and fixed it in the sky,
- Who flung the stars to the most far corner
- of the night,
- Who rounded the earth in the middle of
- His hand;
- This Great God,
- Like a mammy bending over her baby,
- Kneeled down in the dust
- Toiling over a lump of clay
- Till He shaped it in His own image;
- Then into it He blew the breath of life,
- And man became a living soul.
- Amen. Amen.
STRUCTURE: Each lesson contains a biographical sketch of the author, a motivational activity, a reading selection and an evaluation.
PREPARATION: These two steps are recommended in helping the instructor prepare for teaching this unit.
INSTRUCTION: These three steps will help your students get as much as possible from the reading selections.
1. PREVIEW—Read as much background information as possible on the selected writers. Familiarize yourself with some of the major works of these writers. Pay attention to pictures, captions, sub-headings, topic sentences, summaries, so that you can point them out to your students as they come across them in their reading. Listen to all cassettes or tapes beforehand as well as previewing all video materials. 2. RELATE—as you preview materials you will recognize facts and ideas that may relate to other writers or other periods. Tie in the selections of these authors with those of other American writers.
MOTIVATION: The presentation of this unit cannot be done in a passive manner. Black literature is not passive, but rigorous, exciting, and unique. In order to get and keep the attention of your students, you must make the effort to keep the lessons as interesting as possible. In order to persuade middle-school youngsters to appreciate black literature, the introduction to such must be as satisfying as the drama and trauma of its most prevalent challenger—the TV set.
1. READ—Students must have ample time to read quietly and undisturbed under your supervision. Some reading can be assigned outside of the classroom, but in order to guarantee that the reading is actually done, time must be allotted by the teacher. It is imperative that the teacher provide a suitable atmosphere for silent reading in his classroom. 2. REVIEW—Have students re-read for main ideas and chief aims of selections. Have them skim over parts which they understand, and concentrate on sections that are difficult or unfamiliar. 3. RECALL—Have students collect information, facts, ideas, that will be useful to them. Have them criticize dogmatic selections, have them list facts, outline sections, etc.
OBJECTIVES: After teaching this unit students should be able to—
—Appreciate some of the contributions of blacks to American Literature.
—Critically place these contributions in the spectrum of literature as a whole.
—Form opinions on the aims and goals of the four writers.
—Analyze, criticize, and evaluate literature more meaningfully.
—Become more selective in their choices of reading materials.
EVALUATING: A pretest is valuable to the teacher in preparing for this unit. Teachers should not spend valuable time in teaching information that has already been taught by a previous teacher. In order to find out where students rank in their present knowledge of the subject matter covered by this unit, a pre-test is helpful. After all lessons have been taught, a post-test is usually administered. Often it is an interesting practice if the instructor keeps the pre-test results to compare with later post-test results. It is to be hoped that a show of growth will be recorded. Both pre-test and post-test are good tools for measurement and can be easily developed by the instructor.
1. PRETEST—Usually composed of true-false questions of a general nature concerning authors and their works. 2. POST-TEST—detailed test consisting of essay questions, multiple-choice, and completions, centering on actual works of the authors.
In much of his writing, Dunbar portrayed the lives, customs, and speech of Negro Americans. His best novel, The Sport of the Gods (1902), describes the hardships of Southern Blacks transplanted to a Northern city, but also their dignity and humor. Dunbar wrote many poems in the dialect of the former slaves. They include “When Malindy Sings,” and “When De Co’n Pone’s Hot.” He died in 1906.
A. Paul L. Dunbar was an American novelist and poet. He was born in 1872. His father escaped from slavery in Kentucky before the Civil War. Dunbar was born in Dayton, Ohio. He was one of the first authors to picture black life with honesty and realism. For this reason, his works are historically important, though most critics do not consider him a major writer.
(World Book 1976)
B. Was Paul L. Dunbar a slave? What is meant by “dialect” of the former slaves? Give an
C. Listen to the cassette recording of several selected poems of P.L. Dunbar performed by thirteen-and fourteen-year-old students. D. Reading Assignment: “When Malindy Sings,” and “We Wear the Mask,” from the Complete Poems of P.L. Dunbar. E. Would “When Malindy Sings” be considered a serious or light poem? Why? Who was “Malindy?” Why was she so popular? Who is the wearer of the mask in the poem, “We Wear the Mask?” Do you feel Black Americans still wear the “masks”? Which of these poems do you prefer? Why. Which poem could easily convert into a song? Why?
In addition to his writing, he had a varied public career. He was U.S. consul in Venezuela and Nicaragua and served as secretary of the NAACP. He died in 1938.
A. Early in his writing career, James W. Johnson wrote songs for vaudeville, minstrel shows, and light opera. He was born in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1871. His experience as a vaudeville writer influenced the dramatic and musical qualities of his later poetry. Johnson’s best known book is God’s Trombones (1927). It consists of seven sermons in verse, expressed in the manner of a black preacher speaking on a southern plantation. The poems combine biblical materials with black folklore. At least two of them—“The Creation” and “Go Down Death”—are still performed on the stage.
(World Book 1976)
B. Which of Johnson’s poems is still performed today? What other occupations did Johnson hold besides writing? C. Ask students to write (one page or more) their own ideas of how the world was made. Ask them to draw one sketch (on poster paper provided) illustrating their ideas. Collect pictures and papers for a bulletin board titled “In the Beginning . . .” D. Reading Assignment: From God’s Trombones read the poem “The Creation.” E. Why do you suppose Johnson compared darkness with a hundred midnights in the poem “The Creation”? How did God use his arms, eyes, and hands in creating the world? Why does Johnson compare the Great God Almighty with a “mammy” bending over a baby? Describe what you think God looked like as Johnson portrays him. What is the rhyming pattern in this poem? Explain. Would you consider performing this poem on stage? Why?
Hughes’ later volumes, from The Dream Keeper (1932) to The Panther and the Lash (1967), reflect the rapidly changing times. His work told of the black man’s growing demands for social justice, and warned the white: “you’re the one/Yes, you’re the one/ Will have the blues.” In spite of his increasing anger, Hughes avoided the violence that marked the work of later black writers.
A. Langston Hughes was born in 1902 and died in 1967. He was an American poet and short-story writer. In his first collection of poetry, The Weary Blues (1926), he expressed the despair of blacks over social and economic conditions under which they lived. This despair was relieved by what he then felt was the black man’s only defense— sharp humor and self-control.
He also wrote plays and autobiographical works. Many of his humorous sketches of black life were collected in The Best of Simple (1961).
Hughes was born in Joplin, Missouri. He attended Columbia University for a year in 1921 and then held a variety of jobs before the publication of his first book. He received the Spingarn Medal in 1960.
(World Book 1976)
B. What did the poems of The Weary Blues protest? Why was Langston Hughes angry with America? For what and why is the Spingarn Medal given? What was the title of his first book? C. Pass around the class the 8 x 10 snapshots of storefront churches in Harlem and New Haven. D. 1. Reading Assignment: Read chapters 1Ð6 of Tambourines To Glory orally, with your class following you silently. 2. Have students listen to cassette recording of a female Baptist minister preaching an actual sermon. 3. Assign reading of chapters 7-12 of Tambourines to Glory. 4. Discuss the plot of the book so far. 5. Assign chapters 13-20 of Tambourines to Glory. 6. Discuss development of plot thus far. Take a look at character development. Ask students for descriptions (physical) of the various characters. 7. Assign chapters 21-29 of Tambourines to Glory. 8. Play recordings of Gospel music featuring female artists. Have the class decide which recording best fits the music of the “Reed Sisters’ Tambourine Temple.” 9. Read chapters 30Ð36 of Tambourines to Glory orally with the class. 10. Tie all of the reading together. Discuss highlights of the book. Review the character development. Try to get students to moralize about the way the book ends. E. How did Laura and Essie decide upon the name “The Reed Sisters”? Describe Essie’s appearance and personality. Describe Laura’s appearance and personality. Which character represented the “good” in people? Which character reflects the “bad” in people? Why did Laura feel threatened by Sister Birdie Lee and Marietta? How did Buddy treat Laura? Why? How many illegal games was the “Temple” involved in? Why was Buddy killed? Who witnessed Buddy’s death? Why was Essie accused of Buddy’s death? How did Essie manage to show mercy and forgiveness in spite of all that had gone on in the “Temple”? Who is the heroine of the book? What incident would be considered the climax of the story? How did you feel about Laura after reading the entire book?
A. Maya Angelou, author of the best-sellers I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and Gather Together In My Name, and an original poetry collection Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water ‘fore I Diiie, has studied dance in San Francisco and has toured Europe and Africa for the State Department in Porgy and Bess. She taught dance in Rome and Tel Aviv. In collaboration with Godfrey Cambridge, she produced, directed, and starred in Cabaret for Freedom. She also starred in Genet’s The Blacks at the St. Mark’s Playhouse. At the request of the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Miss Angelou became the northern coordinator for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. From this she went to Africa, where she wrote for newspapers in Cairo and taught at the University of Ghana. She has written and produced a ten-part TV series on African tradition in American life and she wrote the musical score and original screenplay for the film Georgia, Geogia. At this writing, Miss Angelou is working on another sequel to her autobiography. (Random House 1974) B. What makes Miss Angelou different from the other writers in this unit? At what time was Maya Angelou involved in civil rights? C. Present a slide show to the class depicting scenes from the rural South that are comparable to the atmosphere of Stamps, Arkansas. D. Reading Assignment: Read aloud pp. 3-8 of Gather Together in My Name to the class. Have them read silently. Have class continue to read chps. 1Ð6 at this sitting. Discuss Rita and the Baby through chapter 10. Discuss the hardship of being a single parent from Rita’s standpoint. Assign chapters 11Ð14 for silent reading during another class sessions. Answer questions that students may have. Discuss character development. Read chapters 15Ð16 orally with class. Review chapters 1-16 to make sure students are following the plot successfully. The remaining half of the book should be assigned now. Only one day a week should be given to silent reading; the bulk of the remaining reading should be done outside of the classroom. At this time, divide class into five or six groups. Assign each group several chapters to report on orally. The group reporting for that day should sit before the class as a panel of experts. The group should take turns giving the plot development of the assigned chapters and should be able to respond to any questions that might arise. Tie everything together. Review character and plot development. Try to localize the changing settings. Discuss “hero” and “heroine” of book. Get students to discuss why the author wrote the book and the social significance of the book. E. How did Rita feel about people saying her baby could pass for white? Describe Rita’s relationship with Curly. Why didn’t Rita join the army? Where did Rita work as a nightclub dancer? Why did Rita return to Stamps, Arkansas? What happens to Rita’s baby? How did Bailey help Rita? Why was Rita worried about him? What did you think about Troub? After leaving Guy with her mother, where did Rita go at the end of the book?
- Angelou, Maya. Gather Together in My Name. Westminster: Random, 1974.
- _____. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Westminster: Random, 1971.
- _____. Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water ’fore I Diiie. Westminster: Random, 1974.
- Brawley, Benjamin. Paul Lawrence Dunbar: Poet of His People. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1936.
- Bronz, Stephen. Roots of Negro Racial Consciousness. New York: Libra, 1964.
- Cunningham, Virginia. Paul Laurence Dunbar and His Song. Chicago: Bibliography Press, 1969.
- Dunbar, Paul Lawrence. The Complete Poems. New York: Dodd, 1913.
- _____. The Sport of the Gods. New York: Macmillan, 1970.
- Emmanuel, James. Langston Hughes. New Haven: College and Univ. Press, 1967.
- Franklin, John. James Weldon Johnson: Black Leader, Black Voice. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976.
- Hughes, Langston. Best of Simple. New York: Hill & Wang, New York, 1961.
- _____. Not Without Laughter. New York: Macmillan, 1969.
- _____. Tambourines to Glory. New York: Hill & Wand, 1958.
- Johnson, James Weldon. The Book of American Negro Poetry. New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1958.
- _____. Fifty Years and Other Poems. New York: AMS Press, 1975.
- _____. God’s Trombones. New York: Viking, 1927.
- Martin, Jay. A Singer In the Dawn. New York: Dodd, 1975.
- Meltzer, Milton. Langston Hughes: A Biography. New York: Crowell, 1968.
- Robinson, William. Early Black American Poets. Dubuque: William C. Brown, 1969.
Contents of 1978 Volume II | Directory of Volumes | Index | Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute


Volunteering is generally considered an altruistic activity and is intended to promote goodness or improve human quality of life. In return, this activity can produce a feeling of self-worth and respect. There is no financial gain involved for the individual. Volunteering is also renowned for skill development, socialization, and fun. Volunteering may have positive benefits for the volunteer as well as for the person or community served. It is also intended to make contacts for possible employment. It is helping, assisting, or serving another person or persons without pay. Many volunteers are specifically trained in the areas they work, such as medicine, education, or emergency rescue. Others serve on an as-needed basis, such as in response to a natural disaster.
- 1 Etymology and history
- 2 Types
- 2.1 Volunteering as Utilized by Service Learning Programs
- 2.2 Skills-based volunteering
- 2.3 Volunteering in developing countries
- 2.4 Virtual volunteering
- 2.5 Micro-volunteering
- 2.6 Environmental volunteering
- 2.7 Volunteering in an emergency
- 2.8 Volunteering in schools
- 2.9 Corporate volunteering
- 2.10 Community voluntary work
- 2.11 International work-camps
- 3 Political view
- 4 Moral resources, political capital and civil society
- 5 Criticisms
- 6 See also
- 7 References
- 8 Further reading
- 9 External links
Etymology and history
The verb was first recorded in 1755. It was derived from the noun volunteer, in C.1600, "one who offers himself for military service," from the Middle French voluntaire. In the non-military sense, the word was first recorded during the 1630s. The word volunteering has more recent usage—still predominantly military—coinciding with the phrase community service. In a military context, a volunteer army is a military body whose soldiers chose to enter service, as opposed to having been conscripted. Such volunteers do not work "for free" and are given regular pay.
If a student is engaged in some sort of volunteer work, taking a gap year after high school or during college is also a form of volunteering. Career break is also considered to be a form of volunteering, until involved in a voluntary work.
During this time, America experienced the Great Awakening. People became aware of the disadvantaged and realized the cause for movement against slavery. Younger people started helping the needy in their communities. In 1851, the first YMCA in the United States was started, followed seven years later by the first YWCA. During the American Civil War, women volunteered their time to sew supplies for the soldiers and the “Angel of the Battlefield” Clara Barton and a team of volunteers began providing aid to servicemen. Barton founded the American Red Cross in 1881 and began mobilizing volunteers for disaster relief operations,including relief for victims of the Johnstown Flood in 1889.
20th & 21st centuries
The Salvation Army is one of the oldest and largest organization working for disadvantaged people. Though it is a charity organization, it has organized a number of volunteering programs since its inception. Prior to the 19th century, few formal charitable organizations existed to assist people in need.
In the first few decades of the 20th century, several volunteer organizations were founded, including the Rotary International, Kiwanis International, Association of Junior Leagues International, and Lions Clubs International.
The Great Depression saw one of the first large-scale, nation-wide efforts to coordinate volunteering for a specific need. During World War II, thousands of volunteer offices supervised the volunteers who helped with the many needs of the military and the home front, including collecting supplies, entertaining soldiers on leave, and caring for the injured.
After World War II, people shifted the focus of their altruistic passions to other areas, including helping the poor and volunteering overseas. A major development was the Peace Corps in the United States in 1960. When President Lyndon B. Johnson declared a War on Poverty in 1964, volunteer opportunities started to expand and continued into the next few decades. The process for finding volunteer work became more formalized, with more volunteer centers forming and new ways to find work appearing on the World Wide Web.
According to the Corporation for National and Community Service (in 2012), about 64.5 million Americans, or 26.5 percent of the adult population, gave 7.9 billion hours of volunteer service worth $175 billion. This calculates at about 125–150 hours per year or 3 hours per week at a rate of $22 per hour. Volunteer hours in the UK are similar; the data for other countries is unavailable.
Volunteering as Utilized by Service Learning Programs
Many schools on all education levels offer service-learning, which allow the student to serve a group through volunteering while earning educational credit. According to Alexander Astin in the forward to Where's the Learning in ServiceLearning? by Janet Eyler and Dwight E. Giles, Jr.,"...we promote more wide-spread adoption of service-learning in higher education because we see it as a powerful means of preparing students to become more caring and responsible parents and citizens and of helping colleges and universities to make good on their pledge to 'serve society.'" When describing service learning, the Medical Education at Harvard says, "Service learning unites academic study and volunteer community service in mutually reinforcing ways. ...service learning is characterized by a relationship of partnership: the student learns from the service agency and from the community and, in return,gives energy, intelligence, commitment, time and skills to address human and community needs." Volunteering in service learning seems to have the result of engaging both mind and heart, thus providing a more powerful learning experience; according to Janet Eyler and Dwight E. Giles,it succeeds by the fact that it "...fosters student development by capturing student interest...":1–2,8 While not recognized by everyone as a legitimate approach, research on the efficacy of service learning has grown.:xv-xvii Janet Eyler and Dwight E. Giles conducted a national study of American college students to ascertain the significance of service learning programs,:xvi According to Eyler and Giles,"These surveys, conducted before and after a semester of community service, examine the impact of service-learning on students.":xvi They describe their experience with students involved in service-learning in this way: "Students like service-learning. When we sit down with a group of students to discuss service-learning experiences, their enthusiasm is unmistakable. ...it is clear that [the students]believe that what they gain from service-learning differs qualitatively from what they often derive from more traditional instruction.":1–2
Skills-based volunteering is leveraging the specialized skills and the talents of individuals to strengthen the infrastructure of nonprofits, helping them build and sustain their capacity to successfully achieve their missions. This is in contrast to traditional volunteering, where specific training is not required. The average hour of traditional volunteering is valued by the Independent Sector at between $18–20 an hour. Skills-based volunteering is valued at $40–500 an hour, depending on the market value of the time.[not in citation given] Skill based volunteering include medical internship, dental elective, teaching English etc.
Volunteering in developing countries
An increasingly popular form of volunteering among young people, particularly gap year students, is to travel to communities in the developing world to work on projects. Activities include teaching English, working in orphanages, conservation, and so on. International volunteering is said to give participants valuable skills, knowledge, and the experience of a lifetime. However, "voluntourism" has been criticized by some as being paternalistic and reinforcing historic power imbalances. Some critics argue that in many cases, voluntourism does more harm to communities than good.
Also called e-volunteering or online volunteering, virtual volunteering is a term that describes a volunteer who completes tasks, in whole or in part, offsite from the organization being assisted. They use the Internet and a home, school, telecenter or work computer, or other Internet-connected device, such as a PDA or smartphone. Virtual volunteering is also known as cyber service, telementoring, and teletutoring, as well as various other names. Virtual volunteering is similar to telecommuting, except that instead of online employees who are paid, these are online volunteers who are not paid.
Micro-volunteering is an unpaid task that is operated via an internet-connected device and completed in small increments of time. It is distinct from virtual volunteering in that it typically does not require an application process or a training period.
Environmental volunteering refers to the volunteers who contribute towards environmental management or conservation. Volunteers conduct a range of activities including environmental monitoring, ecological restoration such as re-vegetation and weed removal, protecting endangered animals, and educating others about the natural environment.
The Giant Panda Conservation program in Xi'an and Sichuan, China, is a famous endangered animals protection program. Sichuan Giant Panda Sanctuaries conservation program attracts huge foreign support and volunteers.
Volunteering in an emergency
Volunteering often plays a pivotal role in the recovery effort following natural disasters, such as tsunamis, floods, droughts, hurricanes, and earthquakes. For example, the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami attracted a large number of volunteers worldwide, deployed by non-governmental organizations, government agencies, and the United Nations.
During the 2012 hurricane Sandy emergeny, Occupy Sandy volunteers, formed a laterally organized rapid-response team that provided much needed help during and after the storm, from food to shelter to reconstruction. It is an example of mutualism at work, pooling resources and assistance and leveraging social media.
Volunteering in schools
Resource poor schools around the world rely on government support or on efforts from volunteers and private donations, in order to run effectively. In some countries, whenever the economy is down, the need for volunteers and resources increases greatly. There are many opportunities available in school systems for volunteers. Yet, there are not many requirements in order to volunteer in a school system. Whether one is a high school or TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language graduate or college student, most schools require just voluntary and selfless effort.
Much like the benefits of any type of volunteering there are great rewards for the volunteer, student, and school. In addition to intangible rewards, volunteers can add relevant experience to their resumes. Volunteers who travel to assist may learn foreign culture and language.
Volunteering in schools can be an additional teaching guide for the students and help to fill the gap of local teachers. Cultural and language exchange during teaching and other school activities can be the most essential learning experience for both students and volunteers.
A majority of the companies at the Fortune 500 allow their employees to volunteer during work hours. These formalized Employee Volunteering Programs (EVPs), also called Employer Supported Volunteering (ESV), are regarded as a part of the companies' sustainability efforts and their social responsibility activities. About 40% of Fortune 500 companies provide monetary donations, also known as volunteer grants, to nonprofits as a way to recognize employees who dedicate significant amounts of time to volunteering in the community.
According to the information from VolunteerMatch, a service that provides Employee Volunteering Program solutions, the key drivers for companies that produce and manage EVPs are building brand awareness and affinity, strengthening trust and loyalty among consumers, enhancing corporate image and reputation, improving employee retention, increasing employee productivity and loyalty, and providing an effective vehicle to reach strategic goals.
Community voluntary work
||This section is written like a personal reflection or opinion essay that states the Wikipedia editor's particular feelings about a topic, rather than the opinions of experts. (May 2014)|
Community volunteering refers to the volunteers who work to improve their surrounding community. Neighborhood, religious, and civic groups may promote community volunteering in furtherance of shared goals. Community volunteer work can also be defined as volunteerism that requires a certain number of people, however they are organized, to bring about the desired results.
An international work-camp is an international voluntary project in which participants from different countries can meet, live, work, learn, and exchange with local people concerning issues about environmental conservation, cultural heritage, social justice, rural and human development, etc. Groups including CCIVS, NVDA, Group Work Foundation, and Service Civil International (SCI) are a few providing International work camps.
International work-camp volunteering can be divided into the short term voluntary projects (STV) and long- or middle-term voluntary projects (LMTV). STV projects are international workcamps for less than two months, while LMTV projects are those lasting two months or more. The most common international workcamp lasts for two weeks with a group of 10-20 overseas and local work-camp participants.
Modern societies share a common value of people helping each other; not only do volunteer acts assist others, but they also benefit the volunteering individual on a personal level. Despite having similar objectives, tension can arise between volunteers and state-provided services. In order to curtail this tension, most countries develop policies and enact legislation to clarify the roles and relationships among governmental stakeholders and their voluntary counterparts; this regulation identifies and allocates the necessary legal, social, administrative, and financial support of each party. This is particularly necessary when some voluntary activities are seen as a challenge to the authority of the state(e.g., on January 29, 2001, President Bush cautioned that volunteer groups should supplement—not replace—government agencies’ work).
Volunteering that benefits the state but challenges paid counterparts angers labor unions that represent those who are paid for their volunteer work; this is particularly seen in combination departments, such as volunteer fire departments.
Difficulties in cross-national aid
Difficulties in the cross-national aid model of volunteering can arise when it is applied across national borders. The presence of volunteers who are sent from one state to another can be viewed as a breach of sovereignty and showing a lack of respect towards the national government of the proposed recipients. Thus, motivations are important when states negotiate offers to send aid and when these proposals are accepted, particularly if donors may postpone assistance or stop it altogether. Three types of conditionality have evolved:
- Financial accountability: Transparency in funding management to ensure that what is done by the volunteers is properly targeted
- Policy reform: Governmental request that developing countries adopt certain social, economic, or environmental policies; often, the most controversial relate to the privatization of services traditionally offered by the state
- Development objectives: Asking developing countries to adjust specific time-bound economic objectives
Some international volunteer organizations define their primary mission as being altruistic: to fight poverty and improve the living standards of people in the developing world, (e.g. Voluntary Services Overseas has almost 2,000 skilled professionals working as volunteers to pass on their expertise to local people so that the volunteers' skills remain long after they return home). When these organizations work in partnership with governments, the results can be impressive. However, when other organizations or individual First World governments support the work of volunteer groups, there can be questions as to whether the organizations' or governments' real motives are poverty alleviation. Instead, a focus on creating wealth for some of the poor or developing policies intended to benefit the donor states is sometimes reported. Many low-income countries’ economies suffer from industrialization without prosperity and investment without growth. One reason for this is that development assistance guides many Third World governments to pursue development policies that have been wasteful, ill-conceived, or unproductive; some of these policies have been so destructive that the economies could not have been sustained without outside support.
Indeed, some offers of aid have distorted the general spirit of volunteering, treating local voluntary action as contributions in kind, i.e., existing conditions requiring the modification of local people’s behavior in order for them to earn the right to donors’ charity. This can be seen as patronizing and offensive to the recipients because the aid expressly serves the policy aims of the donors rather than the needs of the recipients.
Moral resources, political capital and civil society
Based on a case study in China, Xu and Ngai (2011) revealed that the developing grassroots volunteerism can be an enclave among various organizations and may be able to work toward the development of civil society in the developing countries. The researchers developed a “Moral Resources and Political Capital” approach to examine the contributions of volunteerism in promoting the civil society. Moral resource means the available morals could be chosen by NGOs. Political capital means the capital that will improve or enhance the NGOs’ status, possession or access in the existing political system.
Moreover Xu and Ngai (2011) distinguished two types of Moral Resources: Moral Resource-I and Moral Resource-II (ibid).
- Moral Resource I: Inspired by Immanuel Kant’s (1998 ) argument of “What ought I to do,” Moral Resource-I will encourage the NGOs’ confidence and then have the courage to act and conquer difficulties by way of answering and confirming the question of “What ought I to do.”
- Moral Resource II: given that Adorno (2000) recognizes that moral or immoral tropes are socially determined, Moral Resource-II refers to the morals that are well accepted by the given society.
Thanks to the intellectual heritage of Blau and Duncan (1967), two types of political capital were identified:
- Political Capital-I refers to the political capital mainly ascribed to the status that the NGO inherited throughout history (e.g., the CYL).
- Political Capital-II refers to the Political Capital that the NGOs earned through their hard efforts.
Obviously, “Moral resource-I itself contains the self-determination that gives participants confidence in the ethical beliefs they have chosen”, almost any organizations may have Moral Resource-I, while not all of them have the societal recognized Moral Resource-II. However, the voluntary service organizations predominantly occupy Moral Resource-II because a sense of moral superiority makes it possible that for parties with different values, goals and cultures to work together in promoting the promotion of volunteering. Thus the voluntary service organizations are likely to win the trust and support of the masses as well as the government more easily than will the organizations whose morals are not accepted by mainstream society. In other words, Moral Resource II helps the grassroots organizations with little Political Capital I to win Political Capital-II, which is a crucial factor for their survival and growth in developing countries such as China. Therefore, the voluntary service realm could be an enclave of the development of civil society in the developing nations.
In the 1960s, Ivan Illich offered an analysis of the role of American volunteers in Mexico in his speech entitled "To Hell With Good Intentions". His concerns, along with those of critics such as Paulo Freire and Edward Said, revolve around the notion of altruism as an extension of Christian missionary ideology. In addition, he mentions the sense of responsibility/obligation as a factor, which drives the concept of noblesse oblige—first developed by the French aristocracy as a moral duty derived from their wealth. Simply stated, these apprehensions propose the extension of power and authority over indigenous cultures around the world. Recent critiques of volunteering come from Westmier and Kahn (1996) and bell hooks (née Gloria Watkins) (2004). Also, Georgeou (2012) has critiqued the impact of neoliberalism on international aid volunteering.
The field of the medical tourism (referring to volunteers who travel overseas to deliver medical care) has recently attracted negative criticism when compared to the alternative notion of sustainable capacities, i.e., work done in the context of long-term, locally-run, and foreign-supported infrastructures. A preponderance of this criticism appears largely in scientific and peer-reviewed literature. Recently, media outlets with more general readerships have published such criticisms as well.
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