I have been using Microsoft Word for many years now. I first began using Word in late middle or early high school. I have only ever really used Word when writing papers. Throughout the years, I've seen my teachers use Word in many different ways. Some examples would be when I have seen teachers create tests/ worksheets via Word and when teachers use Word to format emails and letters to send home.
I do not have very much experience with copyright and fair use of materials in an educational environment. I found it very interesting that librarians can make up to three copies of a work incase the original is damaged! Thanks to the fact that I work in an elementary classroom, I was aware that you can make copies of pages or excerpts to distribute to the class if it is from the original work, but not from workbooks. I know this because a large part of my responsibility is to make copies of papers and packets for the learners. All of the pages I copy are singular, whereas learners each have their own workbooks for math, science, and writing. In my own classroom, I would stress the importance of not claiming the work of others as your own. Especially with younger learners, by teaching them from an early age about plagiarism and copyrighting, they will be better set up for success in the future. As far as developing my own materials goes, I believe that I am very creative in a lesson plan point of view and will be certain to not take others material for my own personal gain.
Cyber bullying is a huge issue today, especially in the young population. In my classroom, I will monitor all online activity as closely as possible in order to keep an eye out for cyber bullying. I also think that it would be a good idea to send a letter home to parents explaining cyber bullying and ask parents to do periodic checks to make sure their child is not being bullied or bullying someone else online. I also think that discouraging cyber bullying in the classroom as much as possible and promoting respectful behavior via some sort of token system would be beneficial. As far as decreased productivity goes, I would maybe put limits on the computers or laptops in the classroom as to what websites are available. I also think that I could find an educational game website, such as IStation, where learners can log hours. I could tell learners that there is a prize for the top 5 students with the most minutes logged. This would promote productive technology use in my classroom.
I commented on Malyce and Olivia's posts. On Malyce's post, I suggested stressing the importance of privacy when using the internet, especially with younger students. I believe that this is important because some learners think that it is acceptable to share personal information online. Olivia stated that academic dishonesty and cyber bullying are two huge problems with technology use in the classroom. I suggested having a large punishment for being caught being academically dishonest.