Critique and address issues of law, regulations and policy in practice using a reflective model.
This week I am examining an ethical dilemma that occurred in my workplace. I will use Rolfe et al.’s (2001) reflective model to unpack the issues surrounding this event.
What.
A colleague was doing a monthly clean out of the junior school iPad photos and came across an inappropriate picture taken by a 5 or 6 year old boy of himself.
Looking at the date of the photo, they determined that the photo was taken about 3 weeks earlier.
As a staff we had come across this issue in a different context and therefore had done some research into age and stage behaviour, in itself the behaviour exhibited here was appropriate for the age and stage of the child and not necessarily and indicator of anything else more concerning (Information retrieved from stop.org.nz).
The ethical dilemma came in the form of use of our devices, access of other children to this photo and the potential that had it been seen by another child they could have reported this to a parent. It also challenged my colleague as there was no way of telling who took the photo, who else was present and if anyone else had seen the photo as no-one had reported it.
According to our eLearning agreement and our school values, we expect appropriate use of the device.
So What.
Using the model from Ehrich et al. (2011), I went through an unpacked what actions we should take in this situation.
According to our professional ethics we should protect learners from harm and promote their wellbeing. In this case other learners may have viewed this image. How can we protect them from being exposed to this again? In the global context, our students use these devices daily and so we have an obligation to teach them how to use them appropriately.
According to the DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY | Safe and responsible use in schools
document (2015), prevention is the best policy, so how do we prevent this from occurring? How do we discuss this with our learners in an age appropriate way around their use of our devices and how can we provide an environment where device use can be monitored safely but without needing to constantly supervise the students?
What happens if this occurs again and parents are the ones that inform us?
All these questions need to be discussed with our leadership team and our policies, I believe, need to include more about appropriate use by all ages of students including making documents that are in kid speak for our junior children as our current user agreement is more appropriate for Year 4-8 learners.
Within our organisational culture it is also our responsibility to regularly remind and refer to our user agreements and policies with our learners, including regular targeted teaching, not just at the beginning of the year - as a new school we are constantly getting new students and therefore our digital use needs to be regularly taught.
Legal issues: In this case it was difficult to notify parents of this incident as we had no way of telling which children were involved. In the previous case we encountered, we contacted a principal mentor for advice and then contacted STOP who advised us on the steps to take to ensure safety of the child involved and our other learners.
Now what
As mentioned above, we need to revamp our user agreements for younger children, introduce regular targeted teaching, and have an ongoing discussion with our teaching team as to how we can manage the monitoring of device use. This incident provides the impetus to review our learner agreements and our digital use policies, alongside reviewing our teaching programmes for digital safety and citizenship.
References:
Ehrich, L. C. , Kimber M., Millwater, J. & Cranston, N. (2011). Ethical dilemmas: a model to understand teacher practice, Teachers and Teaching: theory and practice, 17:2, 173-185, DOI: 10.1080/13540602.2011.539794
Education Council. (2017). Our Code Our Standards. Retrieved from: https://educationcouncil.org.nz/sites/default/files/Our%20Code%20Our%20Standards%20web%20booklet%20FINAL.pdf
Ministry of Education. (2015). DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY Safe and responsible use in schools. Wellington: New Zealand: Author. Retrieved from https://www.education.govt.nz/assets/Documents/School/Managing-and-supporting-students/DigitalTechnologySafeAndResponsibleUseInSchs.pdf
Rolfe, G., Freshwater, D., Jasper, M. (2001) Critical reflection in nursing and the helping professions: a user’s guide. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
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