March 23

#PurposefulPedagogy

Academic dishonesty is not a new phenomenon. A little over a half-century ago, Bowers (1964) published the first of its kind large-scale study on academic dishonesty.  In that research, Bowers discovered that approximately 75% of college students participated in some form of academic dishonesty.  Thirty years later, McCabe and Treviño (1997) replicated the research.  Although the researchers only observed a modest increase in overall cheating since Bowers’ study, McCabe and Treviño discovered significant increases in the most explicit forms of academic dishonesty.  Research since McCabe and Treviño further establishes that there is a recognized problem regarding academic dishonesty, starting as early as the primary grades, that influences academic integrity throughout an individual’s post-secondary education and career.

A recent event occurred that disrupted my understanding of my own pedagogical practices in regards to academic dishonesty.  I call it the ‘Kimberly Effect’ in acknowledgment to my wife Kim, a computer programmer who works in the public sector.  She recently encountered a situation at her work that reinforced the words of Armstrong (2014), “Technology . . . is changing the way many students learn” (p. 40).  She was attempting to answer several questions that she considered difficult or questioned her own answer.  During this process, she used her phone to contact me via text to discuss the questions.  Between the two of us, using our own understanding and the power of the internet, she was able to answer the required questions.  It was at the end of this event that I realized, as an educator, if I had viewed this taking place in my classroom, I may very well have considered it cheating.  However, I knew it to be using technology in collaboration to aid learning.  This ‘Kimberly Effect’ experience reminded me that students often “[point] to the ‘real world’ where accessing all available resources to solve a problem was the norm, suggesting that instructors should recognize that and adapt their expectations of what is and is not acceptable behavior in the courses they teach” (Cole, Swartz, & Shelley, 2014, p. 35).

Events like this reinforce what many of today’s teachers and students are calling for – a reasonable and balanced perspective on the 21st-century classroom. As Christensen, Horn, and Johnson (2011) noted, “Educators, like the rest of us, tend to resist major change.  But this shift in the learning platform, if managed correctly – which means disruptively – is not a threat.  It is an opportunity” (p. 112).  This shift, the changing of the dynamics of the classroom in the digital age, further highlights the importance of understanding academic dishonesty in the digital age from the perspective of the classroom teacher.

Using this as the impetus for my own research, I turned to rural educators in southwest Ohio to describe their experiences with academic dishonesty in their high school classrooms. Five common and interconnected themes emerged: (a) Purposeful Pedagogy, (b) Culturally Conditioned, (c) Blurred Lines, (d) Knowing Their Voice, and (e) Clarity and Consequences (see figure below).

The first and most dominant theme to emerge from listening to the voices of these experienced teachers was purposeful pedagogy.  In addressing academic dishonesty in the digital age, every educator pointed to the importance of being proactive and purposeful in structuring their classroom and instructional practices.  Terms such as accountability, creativity, diligence, personalization, proactive, and purposeful were used by the teachers as they recounted how their pedagogy had evolved due to 21st-century technologies.  Such a shift to meet the changing dynamic in their classroom, according to the educators, takes time and can be demanding.  However, as they described, the accountability measures of a purposeful pedagogy are found in the relationships that are formed to counter a disinterested and disengaged 21st-century learner.

With access to such a broad swath of data and information with 21st-century technologies, the understanding of what is considered academic dishonesty is of absolute necessity.  With technology now considered a legitimate learning tool in the 21st-century classroom, there is a need for a definition and context of academic dishonesty within the digital age.  As at least one participant of my research attested to the struggles teachers and students face in defining academic dishonesty within such a cultural environment, stating, “I feel like the digital age has kind of changed that definition a little bit” (Payton, interview, May 1, 2017).  Furthermore, as this study and previous others demonstrate, students entering today’s classrooms were born into a digital age where technology is part of their daily lives – radically changing their thinking and learning.  As such, there is a disconnect between such learners and the traditional classrooms they are in – paving the way for academic dishonesty.

The practical implications for the classroom teacher are the need to be proactive and purposeful in structuring their classroom and instructional practices. Lectures and worksheets, often found in the 20th-century classroom teacher’s repertoire, will just not do. The 21st-century educator will need to establish learning that is relevant and engaging – where, instead of finding fault with them, communicate with students in order to develop positive, meaningful relationships.  A 21st-century education incorporates #PurposefulPedagogy. This requires an adoption of 21st-century teaching/learning models that meet the learning schema of the radically changing student demographics.

REFERENCES

Armstrong, A. (2014). Technology in the classroom: It’s not a matter of ‘if,’ but ‘when’ and ‘how’. The Education Digest, 79(5), 39-46.

Bowers, W. J. (1964). Student dishonesty and its control in college. New York: Bureau of Applied Social Research, Columbia University.

Christensen, C. M., Horn, M. B., & Johnson, C. W. (2011). Disrupting class: How disruptive innovation will change the way the world learns (2nd ed.). New York City, NY: McGraw Hill.

Cole, M. T., Swartz, L. B., & Shelley, D. J. (2014). Students’ use of technology in learning course material: Is it cheating? International Journal of Information and Communication Technology Education, 10(1), 35-48.

McCabe, D. L., & Treviño, L. K. (1997). Individual and contextual influences on academic dishonesty: A multicampus investigation. Research in Higher Education, 38, 379–396.