The copyrights topic was interesting and the game in class was fun. The most interesting topic within copyrights was the lawsuits over fair use and how arbitrary the decisions seemed to be. A couple of them had outcomes that were difficult to predict!
The only copyright violations I have witnessed were in the music department the year I subbed for an instrumental teacher long term. There was a lot of photocopying being done for ensemble groups. I actually made my own arrangements for smaller group ensembles to avoid buying music and to avoid copyright issues. Other than that, I have seen the occasional copy of a music cd floating around. But, there is a question whether that was a violation or not, since it could have been a single use copy of a cd they own.
Outside of school, I haven't seen much in the way of copyright infringement, since we have discussed the issue in our home and are particular about the question. It was part of the training of the children in morality--just because you CAN do something wrong and get away with it, does that mean you SHOULD? And now that my youngest son is in music school as a composer, I'm sure he pays attention to the issue! Not to mention, he will be impacted by others decisions in that regard should he be blessed with success in his field.
Other than in our home and substitute teaching, and being a student , I don't have occasion to come across copyright issues. I don't know other people's standards or how they behave in their own homes. I've heard about being able to buy bootleg movies, but haven't seen that for myself.
I do think it is important to teach students to respect copyrights. It goes along with teaching about computers and their use, so can be naturally incorporated into lessons. I would teach about the issue when it comes up in the lessons, and talk about the reasons behind the laws. Most students do have empathy for others, and if they understand how bootlegging affects people, they may choose to do the right thing. In school, though, I would enforce the copyright laws and also model them for the students by being careful myself to abide by the laws. The issue of ignorance of the law not being an excuse for breaking the law is another one that is a valuable lesson, since that goes for all laws.
Specifically, I would, in music class, model giving original copies to students. We would discuss the issue in a lesson where students compose their own piece. We woud talk about how they can copyright their songs and how they would feel if someone just took their music and used it without permission.
These lessons go along with the first ISTE standard letter b: create original works as a means of personal or group expression. Also, the second Standard, Communication and Collaboration, would go along with that. The third Standard letter b mentions ethically using information. Standard five talks about practicing legal and ethical behavior. It turns out that the ISTE Standards are in tune with the copyright issue!
As far as the text about technology use is concerned, I thought the conclusions made perfect sense and were predictable. Even down to the difference in the sexes and how men and women view and use technology, it all made sense. Men are more about playing games, and women are the communicators. Just like in the old and oldest days, that tends to be how men and women are different from each other. The fact that it is taking more time than many people thought to really incorporate technology in the learning process is interesting. So far, when this was written, technology was used in higher education more for communication and administrative duties and less for actual learning in the classroom. In fact, students do not prefer online courses by a long shot! It would be interesting to see whether there has been any progress in the past 6 years; one would hope it doesn't take hundreds of years!
In fact, if I were going to give a survey now, I would ask some of the same questions to see the progression. I would also ask if students do more with mobile devices than they did even six years ago. I would also want to know how many students feel a compulsion to keep up with the latest gadgets, out of adademic necessity.
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