Lecture for April 13, 2009

Legal and Ethics Issues

Academic dishonesty happens all the time, however, that does not mean it is right. I think that most students understand what they are doing is wrong when they copy and paste paragraphs from the interent and put it in their paper. I liked learning about the Google advanced site that allows teachers, or anyone, put in an entire paragraph to see if it is ripped off a webpage. This will be helpful if I think one of my furture students wrote a little too good for his or her level. As a teacher, I think it is important to make sure the students and the parents know what I would consider cheating and what the consequences are for my class. Instead of sending a small paper home with the basics and having both the parents and students sign, I would want to hold a meeting to discuss the rules of my classroom. If that could not be arranged then I would mention it during a the parent-teacher conferences. If you want academic honesty to be important to your students you have to show that it is important to you as well.

We discussed the issue of personal lifes of teachers and the different social networkings avaiable to teachers on the web. Of course teachers are going to have their own life outside of school but posting everything they do onto Facebook or the equivelent will not help with professionalism or get ahead in their career. As a teacher, there is a certian line that should not be crossed. A teacher over twenty one have every right to drink but that drinking should not be on display for everyone to see. I feel like certian pictures should not be put out either. If a teacher is drunk and posts obviously drunk picures on Facebook where the students can see the respect level will go down. There will be less control over the classroom.