The article “Cyber Ethics: The New Frontier,” by Janna J. Baum discusses the issue of students committing ‘cyber crimes’ including hacking, internet plagiarizing, and violating appropriate ‘netiquette.’ The author and the teachers interviewed express their surprise and disgust with the increasing number of students cutting and pasting pieces of internet documents into their own work and failing to cite them properly. However, the statistics do not surprise me at all. Many students have not been taught what plagiarism actually is.For instance, in my high school practicum last year, I was assisting senior-level students in writing research papers from their research online. I was shocked to see that most of the students were cutting and pasting chunks of information directly into their own work, with no citations at all. When I asked my sponsor about this, she told me that she was not teaching them about plagiarism, as she wanted the students to simply write a research paper without worrying about other details like citations. Many of these students will be going on to university next year, and they could be facing big trouble if they are not taught about plagiarism soon, as this matter is taken very seriously by university instructors.
I wonder if there is a place in the curriculum yet for teaching about ‘cyber ethics’ such as plagiarism, as it appears that some teachers may not be making students aware of this important issue. What do you think are some things that teachers can do to ensure students are fully informed ‘cyber citizens’?
Cyber ethics sites for teachers:
http://www.cybercrime.gov/rules/kidinternet.htm
http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/tech/tech055.shtml
http://archives.cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/05/09/cyber.ethic.conference.idg/
http://www.cybersmart.org/for/teachers.asp
Kathy Saretzky
3 comments:
I think that there is a place to teach students about plagiarism. If we as educators do not inform our students about citing their sources then we are not doing our jobs. In my opinion students need to learn about crediting thier sources from an early age so that it becomes a good habit rather than an oversight.
p.s. the previous comment was composed by Jennifer Beal
I agree with you that we should be starting to teach our students at an early age the basics of citing their sources. What grade do you think this could start at a basic level?
Kathy
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