Mindlab - Influence of Law and Ethics on Professional Practice

Activity 5: Legal and ethical contexts in my digital practice

Evidence for Applied Practice in Context - MindLab

THE CODE OF ETHICS FOR CERTIFICATED TEACHERS EXISTS TO:

• promote the ethics of the profession
• inspire the quality of behaviour that reflects the honour and dignity of the profession
• encourage and emphasise those positive attributes of professional conduct that
• characterise strong and effective teaching
• enable members of the profession to appraise and reflect on their ethical decisions.

Certified educators in New Zealand are governed by  the four
 fundamental principles : The Code of Ethics

• Autonomy to treat people with rights that are to be honoured and defended
• Justice to share power and prevent the abuse of power
• Responsible care to do good and minimise harm to others
• Truth to be honest with others and self.

As an educator of children, I recognise my commitment to develop and provide the highest quality of educational services to all learners I serve.  I also recognise the responsibility for fulfilling obligations to the organisation that employs me, the profession, and the community.Furthermore, I understand that the way I conduct my professional activities has probable influence on the learners, as well as any other involved individuals, not only on their academic but also on their private lives. 




Ethical dilemmas are a fundamental part of daily life and are unavoidable. The use of social media makes us all exposed and start to feel unsafe. Therefore it is important to me to create safeguards. I must consider what the purpose is of using social networking, as mentioned in a video from the Education Council.  New Zealand Teachers Council (2012) Establishing safeguards video by Sean Lyon, acknowledges that there are challenges for teachers to use social networking in classrooms. He states that these challenges should not stop teachers from using social media.

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My Current Dilemma

My Dilemma is around social networking as an educator.   

Teacher Ethics Video - Social Media Dilemma HD

This video reflects on how educators need to be very careful about what they post, where they post and who the posts are visible to.  

I use Facebook, Twitter, Google + communities, VLN, blogger and youtube. I use all of these tools for my proffesional learning. I enjoy networking with eduactors here in New Zealand and globally. I am very concious of my privacy settings with my facebook accounts. My personal facebook account is not accessible to learners. I have had a few try and add me as a friend. I have declined and have had conversations with them about safety and privacy. They have been respectful towards my decision not to add them.  

The barrier I have at my current school is that most of these are blocked for eduactors and learner use. I find this frusturating but at the same time I need to respect and value the school's choice.

Hall (2001) explains the ethics and values around social media within a collaborative student, teacher, community built site. The relationships should have a clear understanding of the expected interactions that this should be planned for.  My community of practice I believe would benefit from creating a policy specifically around social media use in the classroom. To date I have not sighted a policy. Learners do sign a Google policy and parents give permission to the school if their children's photos can be used on media.

Hall states that the community of practice within the school would need to set guidelines that takes into consideration for values based on the culture of the school. Hall believes it would promote a universal ideal among the many members and stakeholders by being collaborative. Ethical decisions are often based on personal ideas of what would be deemed right or wrong. Different people will have different ideas and yet again I need to be respectful of this.

How we keep Safe?

In  my classroom, each group of learners attending Technology classes completes a cyber safety session with me so that the learners are very clear about expectations.
One of the videos we watch discusses the 9's of digital citizenship. 

References:

Education Council New Zealand, (2016). About the Code of Ethics.
https://educationcouncil.org.nz/content/about-code-of-ethics

Digital Citizenshio Week:6 Resources for Educators

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/digital-citizenship-resources-matt-davis

Hall, A. (2001). What ought I to do, all things considered? An approach to the exploration of ethical problems by teachers. Paper presented at the IIPE Conference, Brisbane. Retrieved from http://www.educationalleaders.govt.nz/Culture/Developing-leaders/What-Ought-I-to-Do-All-Things-Considered-An-Approach-to-the-Exploration-of-Ethical-Problems-by-Teachers

New Zealand Teachers Council.(2012). Establishing safeguards. Retrieved fromhttps://vimeo.com/49216520