Comment for Teachers

C4T #4

Missouri Law on Sexual Misconduct of Teachers

This was a very interesting blog post from Bill Genereux. Missouri has just written a state law that is trying to be passed that will supposedly help students against teachers who could be sexual predators. This law will make it harder for a teacher who gets fired from one job because of being accused of sexual misconduct to get a job at another location until the trial is over. The two different school systems can talk about why the teacher got fired. What is disturbing is that they make a law for this but they don't try to figure out a way to speed up the trial process.

They also will put in effect that if schools don't already have a policy on teacher-student communication, then they will be making one. This includes social networking, texting, and websites. I do think that there needs to be a policy set in place about this issue but I do wonder how far will a school take it? Will they ban technology in the classroom altogether?

Then the bill goes off into some crazy things like strictly watching what websites a teacher is using in the classroom to communicate with his/her students. I do think there needs to be some restrictions but to pick and choose could hinder a child's education. They need to be learning from the internet and gaining knowledge there that they might not could get anywhere else. But to restrict all teachers of this, I think is absurd. Just goes to show you that " the good suffer with the bad" is true. It makes it seem like there is no faith in teachers anymore and I have a problem with this.

They are starting a new procedure to inform teachers on the signs of abuse and teach them on how to report it, etc. This can be a very valuable thing and I am looking forward to this being implemented (even if it is only in Missouri right now). But I will have to agree with Mr. Genereoux that this is something that needs to be taught to the students as well. Since they are the ones experiencing these terrible crimes, they need to be provided information on how to spot the warning signs. If the students were taught this early on then we might could prevent some of these cases from ever happening! I can't wait to see if this bill gets passed and how it will effect other states.

Dissertations and Technology

 This was a post about how Bill Genereux is trying to figure out what he will write his dissertation on. He calls it his KYHOI (knock you head off idea). In the beginning he was thinking about focusing on video literacy but now he is turning more to "Mediated Literacies in Education." He changed his mind after finding a blog by a guy named Paul Bogush. He is the only one in his school that uses these tools the way that he does. His students make videos, post and more. He doesn't get any encouragement or support from his administrators so he has made it into his PLN. This has helped inspire Genereux to write about the connection between what teachers are doing with their own mediated learning and what we want students to do. He has to narrow it down still and frame it into a question that can be studied.

On this post I talked about how I feel that Bogush was making a good choice by having his students involved in a blog even though he has no support on it. It made me really think about how EDM has opened my eyes to how we can use the technology in the classroom to help improve the students education. I don't care if its encouraged at the school I teach at or not, I have already made up my mind that I will be using it in my classroom. I told Genereux that I know he will narrow it down and make it into the wquestion that he is looking for. I also thanked him for his wonderful blog and helping to instill in future teachers lives!