Legal and Ethical Implications for Classroom Management Essay

Todays classrooms atomic number 18 more dynamic than ever before. educational activityal needs of pupils atomic number 18 dynamical at breakneck speeds, along with the demands organism placed on their teachers. thither are associated legal and ethical implications that are evolving as rapidly as the technology that is driving a lot of the change. In roll to pee-pee a chance to meet the needs of students and legal/ethical obligations, educators essential receive well developed classroom management techniques. These basin uprise tricky quite often and require balancing the increasingly divers(a) needs of many different people.To be an effective teacher instantly is extremely difficult for these reasons. This essay will examine round of the authentic issues that teachers are exposed to in todays classrooms by summarizing tetrad journal obligates and responding to them. The specific issues will be easy speech and what it manner in a school setting, cell sh let on outs in classrooms, bullying (specifically of students with disabilities), and gender specific fit out codes. Freedom of Speech The issue ad robed in the first article summary is freedom of speech and how it is interpreted in a public school setting in relation to the dispersal of religious materials.This is really non a new topic of debate. veritable precedents have been set in court cases dating as remote back as1969 and the Tinker vs. Desmoines case. In that case, the court decision reads that, in order to prohibit any students expression of opinion, the school must provide certify to support the fact that the actions being suppressed would be significantly roiling (Essex, 2006). Because it is an issue of ongoing debate there are cases still being heard all over the country.This article is specifically in solvent to a case in the New York Supreme Court, where a student was prohibited from distributing religious fliers on school beseemingty. The question is, why was the student prevented from expressing her opinion in the first place. match to Essex (2006), one of the requirements placed on schools is that they remain viewpoint neutral. This means that if the literature was suppressed because it was religious in nature, the suppression violated her First Amendment rights, even in the school setting.In all court cases, the real message has been that schools are responsible for reservation sure parents and students are aware that the schools are merely sending messages willy-nilly from religious and non-secular sources and that they are not in support of any of them (Essex, 2006). authentically the essence of the article is that sound policies must be in place, well documented, and consistently followed for a school to be able to regulate what a student says or distributes and there must be no indorsement of any particular ideas from any group or student.Cell phones The contiguous topic of discussion is cell phones in classrooms. The article b eing summarized is entitle The Only Thing We Have to Fear is120 Characters. In this article, Kevin doubting Thomas and Christy McGee (2012) make arguments for the use of cellphones in classrooms in spite of the fact that 69% have banned them. This paper responds to the many reasons for disallowing their use, and then it goes on to foreground some ideas about why cell phones should be used as educational tools. Both positions of the discussion certainly make valid points.If 69% schools have taken students cell phones away, there must be some reasons. Thomas & Mcgee (2012) identified and responded to four commonly offered rationales, including misuse for cheating, transposition Standard English with textese, sexting, and cyberbulling. It seems rather obvious that these are negative side effects of the technology, however there are also positive results that can be attributed to the use of cell phones. Today, they are relatively affordable and virile miniature computers.When use d properly, the possibilities for better use of time are astonishing. According to Thomas and McGee (2012), teachers need to be modeling appropriate behavior with their movable electronic devices and taking advantage of the benefits because the technology is not the cause of the problems. The problems being associated with cell phones all existed in some form, long before modern font technology. Thomas Diamates (2010) reports that courts have supported schools in their efforts to ban cell phone use as long as the school follow launch procedures.Bullying The third topic has to do with bullying, specifically students with disabilities. These students stand out in the classroom, as they are different and so they are subjects of increase abuse from fellow students (Eckes and Gibbs, 2012). instructs and teachers have an obligation to provide students with disabilities a free appropriate public education (FAPE) in the least restrictive environment according to the Individuals with Dis abilities Education Act (2004).This paper looks at the findings in several(prenominal) court cases to establish what is required of teachers in situations where students with disabilities are being bullied. What this article shows is that there are an increasing number of suits against school where disabled children are being bullied. The interpretation of what is considered an appropriate education, and whether or not the school took proper preventative/disciplinary steps in light of the bullying are the reasons for these suits.The findings of this study provide evidence that the courts will generally side with schools that have taken and documented actions to alleviate the bedevilment. In Brown vs. Monroe County gameboard of Education (1999), the Supreme Court ruled that for a school to be liable, it must receive federal funds, it must have been aware of and acted deliberately extraneous to the harassment, and the bullying must have been severe enough to deprive educational opp ortunity (Eckes and Gibbs, 2012).Basically, schools must make an adequate effort to alleviate the harassment in order to limit their liability, and this has been upheld by the courts in cases like Werth v. Board of Directors (2007), and Biggs v. Board of Education (2002). Dress codes The last article on the controversy takes a look at how and why public schools can or cannot implement gender based dress codes. Proponents of dress codes list reasons including little distractions, less pressure to dress right, safety, and lower cost to families.Opponents say that dress codes take away students expressive rights, which are already severely hold in in school settings. In this particular case, Ceara Sturgis had her picture and name take away from her senior yearbook because she is a lesbian who was more comfortable vesture the school prescribed male outfit. The current question is whether or not this is in violation of her civil liberties. Historically the courts have upheld the rig hts of schools to implement dress codes with very few exceptions. In Blau v.Fort Thomas Public School District (2005), a father brought suit against the school for violating 1st and fourteenth amendment rights with their dress code. The court found no violation of rights since it is not link up to suppression of the content of expression, it furthers a substantial government interest, and it does not weight substantially more speech than is necessary to further that interest (Dowling-Sender, p. 34, 2005). On the other side of the coin, in United States vs. Virginia (1996), schools were required to show a legitimate and important reason for any gender based restrictions (Smith, 2012).In Cearas case, the school is going to have to show that it meets all these criteria, and the resolution has some potentially far reaching consequences. What all this means is that training in todays classrooms must be dynamic. Teachers need to be aware of their ever-changing legal and ethical obliga tions as educators. Decisions must be based on sound judgment and carefully documented observations. Teachers, students, and parents must work unitedly and communicate with each other to create the best possible attainment environment for everyone.