Ethics?

Yes, ethics.  A tough topic to deploy as mini-lessons in your classes.  So many aspects to ethical behavior, major areas of study, ethical codes to decipher, self-reflection to do.  How do you tackle it?

I'm going to try it this way, using a variety of resources:  first, define ethics.  Morals. Values. What are these words?  What do they refer to or mean?  Has the meaning changed over time?

Using two wikis - Right Stuff and Wrong Stuff - students will do a bit of research on ethics, start a few discussions about right and wrong just to get the juices flowing!

Where do we go from there?  Hm, perhaps we'll take a look at who influences us.  Because, really, by mid-teens ethical behavior is pretty much learned.  Can it be changed?  Sure.  But understanding who and how you were influenced will help determine your future course of actions when faced with ethical dilemmas.

Then we'll apply an ethical model to situations to determine legality or illegality, ethical or unethical, thumbs-up or thumbs-down.

Going to be an interesting year...