Up the ante...

I ran across an interesting article in Campus Technology, "MP3 Players, Cell Phones, I.M. Join Campus Cheating Arsenal" which discusses the "clever" ways students are finding to incorporate new technologies into their academic misconduct. Students are definitely upping the ante when it comes to cheating... (ex: photographing test questions with their cell phones, sending them to a friend outside the classroom who text the answers back to the student). See full article in the New York Times.

Now i'm certainly not an advocate of academic misconduct, but I am definitely a big fan of new technology so a little part of me has to grin about the ingenuity of these students. This only proves in my mind that it is essential for teacher (at all levels) to understand and use technology. Students are going to continually be ahead of the curve when it comes to new uses for technology. Many kids are introduced to very powerful forms of communication and technology at a very young age. Teachers not only have the opportunity to teach the kids how to use these new technologies, but they also have the opportunity to teach them how to use technology responsibly.