With our goal to create a more technology inclusive classroom for the 21st century, there are many questions and discussions we need to have in utilizing ethical implementation of tech.
We can create a lot in education using technology, the biggest example would be the creation of Microsoft Office and its now ubiquitous usage in creating documents and information. For most of my educational life,starting around middle school, MS word has been what I have used for many assignments and papers if I was not told it was suppose to be paper. The interface was something I got accustomed to as just a part of my life as a student and will probably be for the rest of my school and career life. My teachers used MS word to create my assignments and documents to give to my parents to sign or show. The program has expedited our ability to create and share documents and should be used in the educational setting always to get students use to the program.
However, a layer that we have discuss with this constant content creation helped with programs like Word is that we have to be careful of knowing who's intellectual property is who's. The debate about copyright was only intensified with the creation of computers, the Internet, and now social media. Ethical and social questions relating to the spread of information and giving proper credit to the original creator is something we have to face in the 21st century. In the educational setting there is an abundance of resource that teachers can use to help their class and curriculum, however if we, the teachers, do not follow the regulations of copyright then how can we teach our students the same lesson? We need to cite properly and teach citation etiquette to our students to start developing healthy habits. As well, we need to self-regulate when it comes to deciding if we should use something that is breaking fair use but is beneficial for our students. A good compromise out of this discussion is the creation of the system of the creative commons, which allows people to tell others how they can use their property that dose not infringe their property rights.Some technology issues that we face are very important to this discussion, they include;
Digital Divide: Though we may think that each new generation are "Digital Natives", many factors can lead to a divide between groups of students, the biggest being socio-economic inequities in the world. The government and educational departments need to find ways to help lessen this divide. Maybe giving grants to school to buy tech to be used in the school like laptop carts or Ipad carts.
Academic Honesty: A subject I touched on before but should be talked about more than just copyright. The explosion of the ways we get information that tech gives us is a double edge sword as it also allows more opportunity to cheat. Teachers need to develop plans to teach the habits of citing sources that you find on the Internet and intellectual property, maybe through courses in school or projects.
Cyber-bullying: This is a concept and topic that needs more conversations about. I see that people like to diminish cyber-bullying as a problem because there is no "physically bullying" or the very common but problematic phrase "they can just turn the computer off". These ideas ignore that just because the bullying is done differently the results are the same. Schools, teachers,and even bigger institutions need to find a way to incorporate resources and strategies to help people fight this act. It should be utilize just as strong as our resources for physical bullying.
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