Blog post outlines- the code of ethics’ principles that relate to your teaching profession. Think about how these principles govern your practice.
In your opinion are ethical codes of conduct reflective of societal norms or essential principles of humanity?
In the context of my own profession, the key applied area of applied ethics relates an academic paper in moral and ethics at the University of Auckland which students have to study for their teachers degree. During the degree programme, we studied case studies and reflected on the resources regarding our moral and ethical decision making. (teachers council) moral and ethical problems and had to make links to the current Professional Code of ethics documents by the New Zealand Teachers Council (2004).
Code of ethics for registered teachers. (NZTC, 2004)
The Code of ethics is primarily societal norms in terms of interactions of a service provider and client (students and families). However the explicit links to principles of humanity like the right have information kept in privacy or relationship which a respectful make me believe that the code of ethics is essentially a blueprint for teachers to self govern against.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of having a Code of Ethics?
The main advantages of the ethics is accountability within a profession and allow for teachers to justify their practice where needed. Some teachers require extra support to meet the requirements in the provisional registration and so having a code of conduct allows managers and tutor teachers to effectively performance manage where needed. Alternatively a disadvantage is that teachers are not able to get registered by not meeting the code when a subject judgement is made on a moral or ethical decision. An example of this is when a dichotomy exists in teaching in a semi neo-liberal government run education ministry which conflicts with lower socio-economic decile schools. In the previous post, I use the example of schools not being able to support students with special learning needs as the government wouldn't release close to 30 million dollars worth of funding. The teacher is then left to make a moral and ethical decision to request for funding from other areas of the school budget or the principal and thus the school board. The cycle becomes even more problematic if the funding is sourced from another student which again conflicts with the code to provide essential learning and tailored resources to the needs of the student.
In your own field to what degree are ethics concerned to protect individual rights and to what degree do they exist to minimize organisational risk? and How is the balance between the two distributed?
As a member of our school board of trustees, I am morally obligated to sit with the organisational risk management as required by my post. However as a assistant principal I have my own individual rights to consider. The key similarity to is that they are both concerned with the relationships between the client (students) and Parents, the ministry and staff. Therefore a code of conduct which is unified may be useful to balance them evenly. I have read a few examples of the rights of individuals exceed the rights to minimize the organisational risk, as in the case of teachers who commit criminal acts and may not disclose this to the media. Often the media and the Ministry of education will follow its procedures which are underpinned by the Code of ethics to protect the students privacy by not naming the school or the students name. However it could be argued that schools also do not wish to be tainted with the label of harboring a criminal. The best way to balance this would be to collaborate with other professions when making decisions whilst using their respective code of ethics eg Police, Ministry of education and teachers council.
Create a blog post where you highlight key points from the article on Applied and Professional Ethics by Collste (2012) and discuss what you find relevant or applicable to your profession. The first relevant point of Collste (2012) article -Applied and Professional Ethics is to describe the concept of applied ethics and Professional ethics -
Applied Ethics
Applied ethics is an academic discipline analysing moral problems
in different social arenas. Applied ethics is often worked on in collaboration
between philosophers and academics from other disciplines and with
professionals who are affected by a moral problem. (Collste, 2012)
Professional Ethics-
Professional ethics is, on the other hand, a response to moral problems facing
professionals in their work or also later described as virtue ethics. (Collste, 2012)
Collste describes the following indicators of a professionalIndicators for a professional -
1. Academic education, 2. Importance of services provided, 3. Professional degree, 4. Professional association, 5. Autonomy 6. Ethical code or code of conduct.
Some implications for Educators
As educators the implications for a morally ethical practice is based on adherence to the teachers council code of ethics and the registered teacher criteria. Even as a university students we are required to adhere to the graduating teacher criteria which is then scaffold-ed to the registered teacher criteria. I have studied the origins of modern day ethics as described by Collste, such as Immanuel Kant, J.S Mills and other enlightenment theorists. A key concept which Collste starts as being part of the professional body is "autonomy". The enlightenment theorists strongly believed in the individuals determination of what is moral and ethical for them, however Collste goes on to say that some decisions are not as autonomous in many professions. Lastly Collste (2012) describes the practice of Reflective Equilibrium which I believe resonates in the effective use of the teaching as inquiry model, which is both utilitarian in its nature to balance beneficence and non-maleficence. The model or method for this reflection can describe in its application as teachers make moral and ethical decisions on a daily basis without even realizing it but when it comes to academic interventions than Teaching as Inquiry becomes an efficient and transparent process to use along with the code of ethics.
I believe that all teachers in New Zealand should be moral and ethical, however many are allowed to continue teaching even when they do not meet the stated professional criteria. Most notably are teachers who breach the code of ethics for misconduct but are left to continue harming students. Governing bodies like Board of trustees and senior leaders are often the key people that hold teachers accountable but often lack the authority to change the governments actions when it opposes the ethics of the school such as the examples shown in the media recently of lack of use of educational funds - which evidently is maleficence which as a result of not using the funds appropriately has caused harm.
References New Zealand Teachers Council. (2004). Code of Ethics. Retrieved on 12 July 2015 from http://www.educationcouncil.org.nz/required/ethics/index.stm Collste, G. (2012). Applied and Professional Ethics. Linköping University, Linköping, Sweden in KEMANUSIAAN Vol. 19, No. 1, (2012), 17–33
Identifying your personal ethics allows you to understand what drives and motivates you to respond to situations in certain ways. Being able to reflect on your personal views will enable you to more easily set them aside while you make the ethical decisions required in your practice.
Examples of ethical Dilemmas -
I watched the 2 teacher ethical dilemma videos stated on the Mindlab portal and I have written my responses to the ethical problems raised in the videos below.
Example one - Inappropriate sharing with staff and students:
My response - Firstly the teacher who really has the ethical dilemma seems to the be the male teacher who has found the material posted in appropriate. Does he report this to the principal or approach the teacher involved. Secondly the influence of an older respected adult has a huge impact on the lives of young impressionable to students. If the teacher chooses to drink and smoke than it shouldn't be shared in the same domains or network sharing as with her students as stated in the Guide lines for social media use by the Teachers council as -
"When using a social media platform, consider setting up separate groups for specific teaching purposes. Keep your private and professional use of social media separate." (Teachers Council 2015)
If I was the male teacher, I would first discuss the matter with the teacher, as suggested in the guidelines to discuss sensitive matters directly, failing this I would approach some member of the senior leadership team and failing this I would make a formal complaint to board of trustees or the teachers council. It is completely in appropriate to teach our students that smoking (drugs or cigarettes) is appropriate behaviour and where possible than privacy blocking needs to be in place so that not all students can view photos that the staff member is tagged in. I personally do not add any current students to my facebook because of this reason, but I do know other teachers that do which I believe is playing with fire as it only takes one post of an inappropriate image that can ruin a career.
Example two - Professional Boundaries
My response to the second example video: the teacher has exercised his rights to address a truancy issue but failing to address the social issue through a social worker or similar service he is now is a ethical dilemma to provide transport for the student. This places him is a very vulnerable situation. As a male teacher myself, I was told on the first day of work to never be alone with a student due to the number of child abuse cases against male teachers. I have always found this morally wrong as I do not believe that I would harm a student, however I advise other male staff the same as in the case with the transporting the child. I would also be inclined to refer this family to the social worker in the school for help with transport as their are services available for this.
My Personally identified ethical dilemma in the practice of social media and digital/online access.
Social media "Shole" Video Incident-
Last year, member of the staff posted a video of a "shole" prank on another staff member during a school trip on their facebook page (this was sincere a kind hearted joke). However at the time, we as staff were trying to stop our students from specifically doing the "shole" prank on other students. For privacy reasons, I will not be posting the original video on this blog, but have included a publicly known example of "Shole" for this reflection activity.
The "Shole" prank was made popular recently on social media and tv shows as some major sports stars would film themselves conducting the prank on others.
Sadly the students at our school started to copy this type of behaviour too excessively and took to "shole" students in a bullying manner. The senior leadership at the time hoped that by letting staff and students know that this was unacceptable behaviour we would see a reduction in the number of incidents. Sadly a video turned up on facebook of a staff member being pranked in such a manner and although the staff member involved didn't mind it was seen by a number of students because they were both friends with students online. As stated in the first example, all teachers and staff need to consider -
"When using a social media platform, consider setting up separate groups for specific teaching purposes. Keep your private and professional use of social media separate." (Teachers Council 2015)
The staff member involved was asked to remove the video which they compiled with and sincerely apologized. They were not aware of the impact of video on our students, so some training was given, regarding what is appropriate content to post online as described in the social media guidelines set out by the teachers council.
This blog post aims to make connections between my own context of practice and general guidelines in promoting professional communication using social media sites.
I have examined social media policies within my organisation and also considered how the points raised relate to my own situation of building a professional network at Wesley Intermediate School.
The New Zealand Teachers council outlines the following guidelines and aims to provide professional standards for teachers to guide appropriate practice when communicating through social media-
Teachers have a professional obligation to develop and maintain professional relationships with learners based on the best interests of those learners. A teacher who is both aware of social media and a competent and confident user will be a role model for their learners and encourage them to become good digital citizens. Teachers Council (2015)
Some key safety and legal parameters to bear in mind when dealing with students are also covered by the Teachers Code of Conduct and the Registered Teacher Criteria. The guidelines spell out some pertinent behaviour that will protect teachers and learners in the digital context for example.
"Consider ethical risks that could arise. Act the same way when using social media, as you would in a face to face setting and consider setting up separate groups for specific teaching purposes. Keep your private and professional use of social media separate." (Teachers Council, 2015)
The guidelines also state that its best to follow the school or center’s policies on dealing with information divulged to you as a teacher and to monitor contentso that posts and discussions remain on-topic (Teachers Council, 2012). The Guidelines go on to say that the profession is a knowledge-building community and as a member of the profession you should seek and respond to opportunities to share knowledge and discuss concerns.
PB4L and ICT use at Wesley Intermediate School.
During the course of the other DCL assignments I have extensively developed and reviewed the school wide policies and procedures for implementing the social and ethical use of online content. I have created a series of PB4L lessons around putting these guidelines into practice. The main functional aspect of creating these lessons have been due the fact that when learners are taught explicitly, the expected behavior -they are more likely to exhibit the behavior during the lesson or activity (Lewis and Sugai- PBIS, 1999).
Legal obligations from Parents and students incoprated with School Policy
I have also collaborated with Gerhard Vermeulen (IT specialist) at my school to create a Kawa of Care (online contract) for students and teachers in order for online behaviour to stated clearly and agreed upon.
In Reflection of this Blog post -
We have tried to use the best approaches to teach our students and teachers about the Pb4L lessons for ICT and online behaviour. Students are shown examples of appropriate pro social behaviour and staff role model this in their day to practice. However I believe there is more room for improvement since reviewing the guidelines. I have personally come across staff using social media that goes against the guide lines and this will need to be addressed with them as stated in the professional aspect of the guidelines and the NZRTC. References:
Lewis, T. J., & Sugai, G. (1999, 6 31). Effective
behavior support: A systems approach to proactive schoolwide management. Focus
on Exceptional Children, pp. 1-24.
New Zealand Teachers Council.(2012). Establishing safeguards.[video file]. Retrieved from https://vimeo.com/49216520
New Zealand Teachers Council (2012). Commitment to Parents/Guardians and Family/Whānau. [video file] Retrieved fromhttps://vimeo.com/49804201
Create or extend professional social media networks
Provide evidence (links/pictures) of your professional involvement in social media networks. Briefly discuss one or more platforms that you feel best supports engagement with your professional development.
Use of Facebook page-
During the course of the the DCL paper we have been encouraged to use the social media channels that are available to us to connect to our colleagues. I have joined the group and this has greatly enhanced my professional development because it has given a chance to ask questions outside of lectures. The way students on the DCL course were able to share resources and articles was really helpful as some of the students hadn't studied through an online portal before. Some of my queries and questions also provided answers for other students who were wondering similar queries.
The following blogs have been developed recently and I have found them most useful to my own immediate professional learning as Sepcial Educational Needs Coordinator (SENCO) at my school and also to track what I have covered in my learning thus far as an educator in the DCL course.
RTLB SENCO's Network
The SENCO blog is a good place for all of the SENCOs in our cluster to share resources, ideas and also to update the Resource Teacher of learning and Behaviour (RTLB service) professional development forums. These are essential for learning new approaches, systems such the recent Barbara Bran PLD that I attend along with other SENCOS.
This blog has been a great tool for me to gather and share my ideas with my peers. Although I don't get as much traffic as other bloggers, I have learned a lot from this course and so am really keen to share my learning through a blog. Similarly I have taught my students to do the same through the Wesley News Blog that I have discussed in previous assignments.
Social media in learning and teaching and professional development.
My views on social media use in learning and teaching and in professional development.
What are some key features of social media that you have identified as beneficial for teaching and learning?
In regards to teaching and learning and professional development, its clear that social media/connectivity has resulted in a lot of benefit on education system (Melhuish 2013). Social media, provides an intrinsic opportunity for learners to engage with the subject matter informally outside of the classroom by collaborating with their peer group (Gouseti 2014). This enhanced learning (Silius et al. 2010) occurs without the explicit instructional focus on summative outcomes for learning as students with the study were highly motivated towards using social media. Some of the other benificial features of social media is that students experience greatly levels of gamification and gain a great deal of peer affirmation using social media (Kapp, 21012). In the text Social Media Tools and Platforms in Learning Environments (White et al. 2011), it is mentioned that social media can be harnessed to describe and implement new paradigms for communication, learning, and education.
Learners are venturing into places that formal educators may never go,
absorbing new kinds of knowledge, creating their own interactive learning
arenas, and joining 24/7 global dialogues in affinity spaces such as Wikipedia,
Facebook, Twitter, YouTube- (Sharpe, Beetham, & de Freitas, 2010)
What are potential challenges that teachers need to be aware of when integrating social networking platforms into teaching activities?
Whilst researching social media for my other assignments, an ongoing theme arises around the failure of teachers to effectively use social media to not only engage but actively build learning focused relationships through social media (Gouseti, 2012 & Gouseti 2014). The studies conducted by Gouseti (2012), involved a range of schools in Britain and Greece and were part of the larger e-twinnings study into collaborative learning. Many participants gave feedback about learning collaboratively on procedural tasks which Gouseti (2012) negates as educators not fully utilizing the opportunity for collaborative learning. Learning collaboratively online is a fairly new paradigm and educators need to move away from previous notions of procedural or rote learning with the context of collaboration. Some of the other challenges relate to the capacity of educators to provide safety for their learners whilst they are online. Its not just about protection with firewalls or filters but rather equipping learners to make appropriate and independent decisions about their online behaviour.
How do/would you use social media to enhance your professional development?
I am currently using social media in a range of formats to enhance my own professional development, by providing a way to share my learning and to collaborate with others. One of the main ways to use it in the future would is similarly stated by Gouseti (2014) - as providing a platform for myself and my learners to engage with each others, outside of the formal learning environment. During the course of the DCL assignments I have regularly found the online collaborative aspect (which I have covered in previous posts) as the single most beneficial factor to using social media. Also there are other extrinsically motivating factors like the fact that a lot of people boast about their success on social media forums which goes against the normal 'Tall poppy syndrome" that exists in education.
Reference
Gouseti, A. (2012). A comparative investigation of the use of digital technologies to facilitate school collaboration within the framework of the eTwinning programme. Institute of Education (University of London).
Gouseti, A. (2014). Digital Technologies for School Collaboration. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Melhuish, K.(2013) Online social networking and its impact on New Zealand educators’ professional learning. Master Thesis. The University of Waikato. Retrived on 05 May, 2015 from http://researchcommons.waikato.ac.nz/bitstream/han...
Sharpe, R., Beetham, H., & de Freitas, S. (2010). Rethinking
Learning for a Digital Age : How Learners are Shaping their Own Experiences.
New York: Taylor and Francis.
Silius, K., Miilumäki, T.,Huhtamäki, J.,Tebest, T., Meriläinen, J., & Pohjolainen, S.(2010) ‘Students’ motivations for social media enhanced studying and learning.’ Knowledge Management & E-Learning: An International Journal, 2, (1). Retrieved on 7th May,2015 from http://www.kmel-journal.org/ojs/index.php/online-publication/article/view/55/39 White. B.,King, I.,Tsang, P. (2011). Social Media Tools and Platforms in Learning Environments. Retrieved from http://www.eblib.com
Contemporary issues or trends in New Zealand or internationally
What are current issues or trends of global education in this 21st century?
The first issue or trend that I have seen is flawed system which doesn't offer Free, Secular and Compulsory unless you are white, middle class and come from an economically secure background:
I came across my first concern or issue that will influence and shape NZ's education whilst watching a Ken Robinson talk. Free, secular and compulsory education in its current state has many concerns and is well conceptualized by Ken Robinson in his talk regarding "changing paradigms" (The RSA, 2010) -
In New Zealand, we also have a free, secular and compulsory education system (Education act 1877), which evidently acts as a component of the post industrialization system to which Ken Robinson discusses in his talk. We as educators still are too focused on putting out an ideal student who has met the national standard. A few of my ex-students are no longer attending high school as the systems was not designed to cope with their "ADHD" as referred to by Robinson since the model of education was not engaging to the learners.
How do I respond to those issues or trends in your practice?
By making it not compulsory and in batch like factory products, often students get the chance to maturate or innovate at their speed, style or method. The same ex-students may have been evident within the 53% of total students leaving high school without any qualifications as being Maori and Pasifika in 2012 (Ministry of Education, 2015) simply because they had been labelled "ADHD" or "conduct disorder". Robinson relates the lack of the education system as its inability to cope with divergence thinking as students can't taught be academically but also need to be aesthetically engaged as well. .
My hope that we develop way of dealing with children with behavioural issues differently in the near future and specially with an inquiry based approached to learning. Recently we integrated our classes so that year 7 and 8's were mixed. Initially I was really apprehensive to this as I was still thinking in the Batch like model to education (Year 7, 2014 batch - with unit on dinosaurs, and inquiry into Future Me). Such serialization of education was evidently discussed at the senior leadership level, share with staff and Board and thus a change was made.
Are there any lessons from other countries that you find particularly inspiring or relevant?
One of the countries during the DCL that stood out to me was Finland, in a recent article regarding the success of Finland's education system - its stated that Finish teachers will find ways of addressing students learning needs, adapt to their learning and working out new methods if one doesn't work in a divergent manner.
The Second issue that I have is the leader boards at National and international level of education.
The data from the OECD research (OECD, 2014) stating that we are third highest in educational index, is actually quite uplifting as an educator. I feel proud to be part of that statistic - however there is a hidden dark secret to this accolade. We have gained this title but it is only an incentive to sell education system overseas as our future ability to continue training new students has become our third highest export. It is heavily influenced by economic factors like GDP, cost of the New Zealand dollar and the com-modification of our education system. The next set of trends isn't to quickly pass on the information to our students that we learned at university but it will be to equip them for a world that has the following changes-
Alternatives to the current methodology -
I believe that there is strong evidence that the OECD wants to perpetuate the Industrial 'Knowledge based education system, rather than the newer divergent learning pedagogy that Ken Robinson refers to. We are not teaching our students to be equipment for the world that will be present in 2030 as they will be doing that part themselves. I would reject the free, secular and compulsory system as it is detrimentally based on a model which no longer works for every New Zealand child. If we continue down this pathway we are merely teaching to a test, as shown by recent letter to the OECD by some of the top lecturers and educators of the world.
The Third issue: Neo-liberalism and the ever popular marketisation of education.
Our schools are no longer places where teachers teach children to be prepared for what challenges that they will face and to equip them for jobs that don't exist yet. As Ken Robinson stated in the RSA video that schools are still producing students to have certain qualifications and career preparedness. Generally speaking the schools ability to show other prospective clients (parents) is by the academic performance of their students. The National government stated that it would not be doing league tables, before it was voted into power, but as clearly seen by the data collated on the following website are type cast based on their academic performance.
Schooling essentially has become a free market model where parents with income and mobility can send their children to the best school they believe based on data. This data is not indicative of teacher ability within the school and has very little proven effect size shown based on John Hattie's theory. Yet the measuring stick is always going to favor higher decile schools that do not necessarily show accelerated learning (0.75 or more) in the classroom but normative learning of around 0.5.
Hattie's effect size a better indicator of success rather than cooked books-
Using a revised version of national standards data which shows effect size rather than attainment superlatively. Yes, at the end of the day I agree that it is needed for university entrance etc but not when students are only 12 years old. Parents should make informed decisions based on the accelerated progress of their students by judging schools on the difference it can make (Alton-Lee, 2004). Too often I have had discussions with lay-people outside of education profession that believe all students start at an equal playing field. However as data collect recently within our own school community shows that their are still huge socio- economic disparities.
Alton-Lee, A. (2004). Using best evidence syntheses to assist in making a bigger difference for diverse learners. Wellington: Ministry of Education.
Education Review Office (2012). The three most pressing issues for New Zealand’s education system, revealed in latest ERO report - Education Review Office. Retrieved 5 May 2015, from http://www.ero.govt.nz/About-Us/News-Media-Releases2/The-three-most-pressing-issues-for-New-Zealand-s-education-system-revealed-in-latest-ERO-report
TeAra. (2014). Establishment of a national system of education, Retreived 7 July 2015, from http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/1966/education-evolution-of-present-system/page-2
