Sharing Student Projects

This study examines secondary school teachers' beliefs and perspectives on data-trace ethics when integrating apps into their classroom teaching routines. The literature review revealed that the digitalisation of education has accelerated the extraction and manipulation of children's data. While educators and schools adopt new technologies, they often fail to understand EdTech's ability to extract data and related ethical implications. This knowledge gap influences their ethical adoption of technology. The research is foregrounded in the UNCRC framework, recognising the unique and universal rights of vulnerable children that teachers must protect. The research employed in-depth semi-structured interviews and a focus group with 6 secondary school teachers. The interviews focused on classroom technology use, educators' beliefs on data-trace ethics, and how these beliefs influenced their practices. The findings revealed that the educators' reasons for adopting apps aligned with established technology adoption models. Educators held mildly negative views on data extraction by firms and displayed limited awareness of the data types extracted. They showed diminished personal responsibility regarding data-trace ethics, relying on institutional accountability and showing implicit trust in institutionally imposed technologies. Feelings of futility were prominent, stemming from perceptions of the overwhelming scale of the data being extracted by commercial firms and due to perceptions of the school and children's practices regarding data privacy. The study supported conclusions from previous research concerning educators' limited awareness of data extraction's consequences.

The study's findings highlight the urgent need for educators to understand data extraction techniques and institutions' roles in supporting this. The 'iceberg' model developed in this study offers a potential scaffold for this understanding. Concerns are raised in this research regarding observed apathy to online privacy, and further research exploring this is proposed. Other recommendations include exploring school leaders' perspectives and continuing to explore educator perspectives across more diverse settings.