Trickey Ethical issues: dealing with the digital divide

Thinking about the moral and ethical issues in the classroom is particularly tricky for me, pun fully intended. To talk a bit about my own morals and ethics, I am an active member of the union and a strong believer in social equity. Due to the nature of my ethics, I could not turn away from the complicated idea of the Digital divide.

The digital divide is defined by Aleph Molinari as the gap between the people who have access and do not have access to information technologies such as the internet and computers. Looking at the work of InternetNZ and the 20 20 trust I can see that in Dunedin there is indeed a digital divide. Though in general there is High access to internet infrastructure, there is a medium level of access and skill level in many areas this is coupled with low social well being in many in zone areas of our school. I am going to explore the ethical dilemma this may and has created in course planning. To do this I am going to use Rolfes model of reflection.

In our school, we have bring your own device (BYOD) policy, all students are expected to bring a device that is internet ready to assist learning inside and outside of the school. This policy could be seen alongside the Educational council's standards and the commitment to learners as in promoting inclusive practices to support the needs and abilities of all learners.

The What

So imagine I spend time setting up what I think is a collaborative and engaging task using a programme that I expect my students to download on their device. I firstly notify them all on Google classroom and say that it is expected that they download the programme ready for class. Unfortunately, one student in the class does not have a laptop and when quizzed on this is reluctant to share why this is the case. Though the school can supply laptops they are chrome books and do not support the software I am wanting to use. I feel upset at having put in the time to organise this activity only for it to not be accessed by all the students. I decide to go on with the activity and pair her up with another student. Despite running the activity I can not help being frustrated about the situation and am wondering how to take the issue further. Is the student simply not bringing her device to avoid the tasks in class, is the task seen as not relevant to her learning or is there an underlying issue, either way, she will not discuss it with me.

So What

At the end of the lesson, I ask the student to stay behind to ask her why she has not brought the necessary equipment and if there is anything I can help with. She starts crying and runs off. This tells me that the situation is obviously quite emotional for the learner and she did not like being singled out about the issue. In doing this I did not intend to upset the student I intended to get a better understanding of the issue and try and find a solution to the issue that would mean she could engage with the activity. The broader issue that arises from this is that my practice in the classroom has not been inclusive and I have failed to support the needs of all my learners in the classroom.

Now what

Well having this now turned into a bigger incident I have a number of options at my disposal as to further reflect on my practice and cater for the individual needs of the student. I could possibly contact home and ask why the student is not bringing a laptop to school either through email, text or a phone call. I could refer the incident on to the pastoral support team and have them further investigate the issue. I could email all the core teachers of the student to gather further information on the students BYOD use in their classroom. In this situation, I choose to email the core teachers to highlight the issue. One of the teachers gets back to me and explains the student had their laptop stolen over the weekend and with no insurance the family will not be able to replace this equipment. To really hype the drama here let us imagine it was a Christmas gift from a grandma who passed away (apologies for getting slightly carried away with my theoretical but we often hear tragic stories in teaching). It leaves me in an ethical pickle though how can I still provide an exciting and engaging programme to my learners in the classroom in full knowledge that there is no way of all the students accessing the learning? Do I simply give the student a different task related to the learning, do I change the whole plan? With inequity and poverty being prevalent in New Zealand this is a dilemma we will all have to tackle.

References

https://youtu.be/EatnXgkKlkg

https://www.ted.com/talks/aleph_molinari_let_s_bridge_the_digital_divide

https://educationcouncil.org.nz/sites/default/files/Our%20Code%20Our%20Standards%20web%20booklet%20FINAL.pdf

https://my.cumbria.ac.uk/media/MyCumbria/Documents/ReflectiveModelRolfe.pdf

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

Images:

https://pixabay.com/en/railway-platform-mind-gap-1758208/

https://pixabay.com/en/objects-equipment-assortment-neat-731426/

https://pixabay.com/en/mary-pickford-silent-film-sad-1963155/

https://www.bringoutthebest.nz/