Why is intellectual property and creative rights an important topic for students?
One of the things that we have talked about in my classes is the hidden curriculum in our classrooms. If we do a lot of competitive activities, we are sending the message that winning is good. If we do a lot of collaborative or team supportive work, we send the message that teamwork is good. Other activities like dividing teams up as "girls vs boys" also sends hidden messages. One of the most important pieces of hidden curriculum in our classroom is social etiquette. We have classroom rules for reasons like safety and fairness, but one of our jobs is also to teach our students to have behavior that is socially acceptable. This includes that they should not swear in public, or wear clothing that is revealing. We are in a sense conditioning them or grooming them for the workforce. While everyone has a different comfort level with this practice, we all do it to some extent. We also teach our students not to steal, and to respect others. In my opinion, intellectual property and creative rights are just the next extension of teaching respect and honesty. We are applying the same concepts to a new arena: the digital world.
Online, there is this anonymity that often gets people into trouble. People can be whoever they want to be because the internet is anonymous, no one can see you. In mild cases students post things online they would not say in real life. Most of our students will not steal and do not mean to be dishonest. However online, they may not apply the same moral code. It is our job to teach them to do that. They need to understand that just because they can "right click, save as..." doesn't mean that they don't need to say who really created that picture/video. "Give credit where credit is due," is something that we have long taught and should continue to teach. While we teach the students that once something is on the internet it can never be taken back, we need to also teach them that just because it is on the internet doesn't mean that no one owns it.
As you were discussing this week with making a cd of a song, students need to understand that just because they can, doesn't mean they should.
Nice post! A lot of good points and you pretty much covered all that needs to be said about creative rights. I also liked the "hidden messages" you talked about. I never thought of it that way but students do look deeper into thinkgs than we do as adults. We need to be careful about how we group our students or even how we go about individual work.
ReplyDeleteI too like the hidden messages. I never really have thought of it that way before! I think as teachers before we do any digital work, we should make sure to mention the "rules". I do not think the students often think of what they do as wrong, and not that we are there to make them feel guilty, but to just remind and guide them to make better decisions.
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