Mr. Kirk is excited to use Google Apps for Education with his third grade students. He jumps in with both feet and his classes are off and running. Because he started so quickly, he never thought about putting policies and procedures in place. After a few weeks, students are spending more time off task than on. They are creating and sharing Docs as a way to bully each other, adding inappropriate comments in Google Classroom, and deleting or changing other students' work. Mr. Kirk doesn't know what to do, so he suspends all technology use in his class, abandoning it completely and any of its benefits.
Mr. Kirk is dealing with the ethical issues of cyber-bullying and inappropriate digital citizenship, as well as a class of students who are not using their class time to work, but instead to goof off. To prevent this from happening, Mr. Kirk should have created a code of conduct before beginning any work with technology. This way, students would know how to work ethically with technology, and they would know that following this code of conduct was an expectation, not a suggestion. Also, Mr. Kirk should have made students aware of consequences if they didn't adhere to the code of conduct - and follow through with these consequences if necessary. The consequences should be logical, while not taking away all use of technology if at all possible.
In the case of Mr. Kirk, I would suggest he temporarily take a break from technology while he goes over a code of conduct, with appropriate consequences, with his class. After this, he should "start over"/"rewind" the class' work with technology, while implementing and adhering to the code of conduct. Finally, Mr. Kirk should remind his students that there are many people (including their parents, teachers, and administrators) who are able to view what they post in Google Classroom, as well as other places on the Internet, and that they need to be very careful about what they post and share on forums such as these.
A situation similar to this happened to a student from my homeroom last year, not in a class I was teaching, but outside of school hours. There were many mean words and comments, causing many hurt feelings. Parents, teachers and administrators got involved, accounts were suspended and had to be earned back, and valuable lessons were learned.
Scenario 4
Mrs. Janeway decided to have her middle school students create digital projects then use Snagit to create video presentations of their projects. Mrs. Janeway discovered in the computer lab while her eighth grade students were creating their accounts that Snagit required parental permission for students under 13. This didn't pose a problem for her eighth graders, but Mrs. Janeway panicked because the following period she planned to do the same activity with her sixth graders.
By not having parental permission for her sixth-grade students to use Snagit, yet letting them use it anyways, Mrs. Janeway would not have been in compliance with the Children's Online Privacy Protections Act (COPPA). Not only could this cause problems for Mrs. Janeway as a teacher, but it could also potentially cause problems for her school and the entire district. If she stopped at this point and did not continue with her original plan of having her sixth-graders use Snagit, then I don't think that anyone's safety or well-being would be in jeopardy. Mrs. Janeway would, however, have to quickly come up with an alternative class activity that she could use that didn't involve getting parental permission.
Though it can be time-consuming and a pain, it is important and necessary to check the terms of service and/or privacy policy of websites and tools that you desire to use in your classroom. If you know a few sites and tools that you anticipate using with your class during the school year, you could make up an "umbrella" parental permission form listing these sites and tools and have parents sign it at the beginning of the year before technology is used. A bit of extra time up front can save a lot of time and frustration on the tail end.
The only personal connection that I have to this incident is that, prior to this tech nerd camp, I didn't realize that there could be restrictions on some of the sites and tools that I may use during class. I also didn't know where I could find these restrictions and that there were different "tiers" of restrictions. Now I am aware of such things and the importance of checking these sites' privacy policy before using them with my class.
How can the Mounds View Resources help to implement high quality instructional practices with technology?
The Mounds View Resources give nice, clear guidelines for determining if a website or tool would be valuable for use in a classroom, as well as a procedure to check for restrictions for usage by our students while in our classrooms.
I also think it'd be valuable to have more specific training on how to safely and effectively use technology within our classrooms - perhaps a Tech coach? Prior to doing this activity, I didn't realize the restrictions that there could possibly be on some of the sites I use within my own class. I'm sure most other teachers in my building are in a similar position.
Finally, I think it'd be helpful to have some sort of template for a Code of Conduct that we could use and tweak to suit our needs for our classes. It's always easier to start from something (like a template) rather than starting from scratch. I'd love to have some sort of template letter that I could tweak to send home to parents at the beginning of the school year listing some of the most often used sites for our classes and requesting parental permission.
What is 1 procedure that you can implement in your class and what is one that you would like to implement in your whole PLC or whole building?
I am excited to try out the hand signals that Ryan talked about in his video linked on the Activity 10 page. I think that'll be a useful classroom management procedure to help me determine priority of needs. I also like the idea of have students who finish early "verify" other students' work so that students are not kept waiting to know if they're on the right track with their work.
I'm also going to be certain to talk about procedures and proper usage of technology in the classroom (forming a Code of Conduct), as well as consequences if these are not followed, before students will be allowed to use our Chromebooks. Hopefully this can eliminate issues that may otherwise occur. I will also be sure to send home some sort of letter at the beginning of the year requesting parental permission for websites and tools which we will use frequently throughout the year. These are things that I think would be very beneficial to develop as a PLC since we will all have Chromebooks, and will be using them frequently as instructional tools. I also like the idea of making a Code of Conduct poster to hang within the classroom. This would be a great visual for students, as well as for guest teachers that we may have during the year.
Good thoughts on scenario 1. Start with a code of conduct, plan consequences and be consistent with follow through. You also mentioned having a digital footprint and teaching your students that the things they post online can be seen by others which is another important lesson for students to know.
ReplyDeleteIn the second scenario, you are right that Miss Janeway needs to abandon her current lesson and come up with a backup plan. Doing so might be a pain and might create a less than ideal lesson for the day but the alternative is to violate COPPA which is something she shouldn't do.
We don't have a code of conduct template because we want teachers at each school engaging in conversations about what the code of conduct should look like as they create it. We do; however, have a template for a parent letter that was presented to principals this summer. If you need a copy of this, I can get it for you.
I think that creating a code of conduct and a parent letter with your PLC is a great idea. I also think hanging the code of conduct in the room would be a good visual reminder for students.