Week+6

**__ Week 6 __ Code of Ethics and Code of Conduct April 20, 2009 **  Amber is purple  Luke is **__BLUE__** Nicole is PINK Mathew is GREEN 

This week looked at Ethics and the code of conduct. We discussed the unique position of trust we as teachers will be in, the influence we have on our students and how this shapes our relationships with them. The important ideas I got from the lecture were: To always act in the best interests of the students. To behave in ways that advance and respect the profession. To act with care and compassion. To treat students fairly and impartially. Acknowledge parents as partners in the education of their children. Be fair and just. Hold your colleagues in high esteem. Provide quality teaching. Stay up to date! A point I hadn't considered before was making sure that prep boys have seen a urinal before starting school! As teachers, we are NOT a friend, a counsellor or a psychologist - we are not there to rescue children. We are professional teachers! I think I will have trouble with that aspect. I will want to help every child I see and I may get too emotionally involved... 

Amber I think the point you made about acknowledging parents as partners in the education of their children is very important. What I have noticed from the time I spend in schools is how true this fact is. We have the kids for only 5 hours of the day. The parents have them for the rest of the time. We rely on parents to help our students with their homework if necessary. We also rely on parents to help kids read their ‘take home’ books and sign of when they have read them. Without the understanding that we need parents cooperation we will struggle a lot in the classroom. Also parent helpers can be very helpful in the classroom. It never hurts to have another set of eyes in the classroom to help the kids reading or correction. We need to invite the parents in and be thankful for their help, for we BOTH want to see their child succeed.

Another point you made Amber was “As teachers, we are NOT a friend, a counsellor or a psychologist”. I found this concept the hardest to come to terms with when I am in the classroom. Sometimes I feel the children need a friend. It is hard to find the line between being a good compassionate teacher, and a friend. There still needs to be a level of respect.

Well Amber, being the best teacher that you can be will be the best thing that you can offer to all the children you teach. Being passionate about what you do will provide a space that children are learning and enjoying as well as making them feel safe. Your students will love coming to school. This is the biggest gift you can give to the children you will teach - doing __your job__ wholeheartedly! On the rare occasion when children do have other needs that you can't meet, you will make sure that you get the right people to do the job involved. Indeed, making sure the right people are informed is also a legal requirement. But that aside, when these situations come up, you have to make life as normal as possible for the child while they are at school by engaging wholeheartedly with your job - the inspiration and education of children through teaching and learning, with a touch of compassion, warmth and care which you will shower upon your whole class...

I like the discussion that we had on ethics and creating ethical school communities ('Promoting the Ethical School' Dr Kathie Forster). We should be striving to ensure that our schools are the best places that they can be! We should expect and encourage only the most positive of behaviours in a school and furthermore, we should be teaching them! Conducting a 'values' audit within a school is a great idea as a first step to achieving this. It is important to move this onto the children and having the children involved in the process. A skilled teacher would be able to engage the children in this discussion and make the children believe that the process of creating a whole school ethos has started __from__ them, thus empowering them and hopefully helping to create a more positive school environment and future. I would like to add a link here, it is to a poster which my prveious school used as the core of it's ethics/values. I like it very much and it informs my attitude to teaching and the ethos within my own classroom. It is very much about how adults should treat children, but can also be viewed as a guide to behaviours which you could expect within your classroom. http://www.pdhu.on.ca/pdf/poster1.pdf

In terms of teaching and a code of conduct, I would expect that each school would have it's own code of conduct these days. It makes complete sense to me the the VIT would have set out a code of conduct for all teachers in Victoria, and what is contained within it is not surprising, but what I would have considered to be common sense. One thing that I would like to say about this discussion relates to the way that Greg speaks in terms of men and the fear which they ought to hold when they enter the teaching profession. I have been surprised at how much he overstates (in my view) the situation for men (as opposed to that of women) in schools and the importance of keeping safe as a professional. Overstating this point (which is what I feel is also done within the media) has the power to turn men away from teaching altogether and to breed and perpetuate the paranoia which turns men away in the first place! Rather, we should be encouraging men into the profession (if they prove to be good teachers - not soley because they are men), encouraging adherence to the teaching code of conduct for all teachers, and publically discussing the difference between the way that we allow females (as opposed to men) to act towards children often without question and what this means for our society. - Mathew

Over the school holidays I volunteered with the YMCA as part of my field work, doing their school holiday program. The program was in a low socio-economic area and so the kids were disadvantaged and had not had the greatest homelives or pasts. I found myself exhausted at the end of the day and generally becasue the stories I was hearing were devastating. I would go home and feel so helpless for these kids. It was pointed out to me that it wasn't my job to rescue these kids. I was told that I couldn't hold myself responsible for the trauma they were going through. BUT instead my job was to give these kids some sort of stability even if it was just for the day and to encourage them to make the right choices and build up their self-esteem. That was the greatest gift we were giving these kids.

Just like with school and being teachers, all we can do is try to make a difference within the limits we have. I agree with Amber that I too will have difficulty separating myself, but I suppose with experience we will learn better ways to help our students and school community without having that feeling of it being OUR JOB.

I like Mathew's comments about having students involved in creating the standards in a classroom and school as a whole. It would be interesting to hear their point of view and what is important to them. Afterall we are there for them and their needs and wants should be considered too.

I found reading some of the readings this week were extremely dry. In particular the one that I focused on in the tutorial. It seemed so daunting all these codes, but I suppose really I don't understand fully because I am not yet a teacher in the classroom. That is where I am presuming my experiences of ethics will spring from. References:

Forster, K 1998 'Promoting the Ethical School' Discussion Paper presented at the syposium on 'The Ethics of the Teaching Profession'

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