[MUSIC] Welcome back to week one, the importance of relationships and this is lecture four, code of conduct for teachers. We have talked about the code of conduct in previous courses but today our focus is mainly on the relationships we need to build within a code of conduct. We have seen that a code of conduct begins by setting out our ethical for teaching profession. We are going to look at the four core values that are encapsulated in our codes, the respect, care, integrity and trust. When we look at respect, teachers should uphold the human dignity and promote equality and emotional as well as cognitive development. This applies to when dealing with our students, when dealing with our colleagues, as well as when dealing with parents. In our professional practice, we have to demonstrate respect for spiritual, cultural values, diversity, social justice, freedom, democracy and the environment. In the Maldives, we are very homogenous country. We have one religion, one culture, however, we have students from different socioeconomic backgrounds. So, when again, as a teacher in our profession, our code of conduct should be treating all students equal. The same applies to parents from different socioeconomic backgrounds. And, the diversity lies, in our case, the diversity lies in where you come from, in terms of which island, which atoll, which region you come from. There are discrete changes, not major, however there are some diversities within our school system as well. We have to make sure that we respect the diversities, we address these as well. As teachers we also need to be caring for our pupils, our students. Because the students spend most of their time in schools and a lot of their life in schools, so they are under our care, so we have to be caring for them. Teachers show this through positive influence and professional judgement. The third is integrity. Honesty, reliability and moral action are embodied in integrity. We teachers are role models for our students and in a lot of cases, especially in the developing countries, teachers are role models for the community as well. We have to exercise our integrity through our professional commitments, responsibilities, and actions. Even though there has been some negative cases about teachers' integrity, It has been mainly positive in our parts of the world. One example I can state here is recently we carried out research on the justice sector through our research center. Where we were looking for enumerators and the best people that we could hire was teachers because they are very respected in the community. They are believed to have integrity. They believed to have commitment. So, we were actually able to use them as enumerators. This was a strategy that was previously not accepted by the stakeholders because the data collected was not authentic. But this time round when we used teachers, we were able to make use of the data because the community as well as the stakeholders believed on the integrity of the teachers. Finally, trust, teachers' relationship with pupils, students, colleagues, parents, school management are based on trust. We did talk about trust in the last lecture, so I'm not going to go into details of trust again. However, in our professional conduct, iin our code of conduct, trust is a major factor that we have to look into. Trust embodies in our fairness, in treating all equal, in our openness, in our relationships and in our honesty. Now, let's just look at the focus areas of code of conduct in our profession. We have six focus areas, I would like you to read what is on the screen and then just think about it. The first focus area is professional values and relationships. We as teachers should be caring, fair and committed to the best interests of our kids, our students. We should acknowledge and respect the uniqueness and individuality of the students. We should be committed to equality and inclusion. And we should work to establish and maintain a culture of mutual trust and respect in schools. Professional integrity, as we have been talking about. We have to be acting honestly and with integrity in all aspects of our work. Whatever we do, whatever feedback that we give to students, whatever discussions that we have with our parents, whatever suggestions that we give to our school management, we have to be honest. In addition, because we are entrusted with a lot of kids, we have to respect the privacy, we have to maintain the confidentiality of information that has been shared with us. Hence, as a teacher in our profession, we have to be honest, we have to be the role models for kids. Professional conduct, again another area that we have to focus on in our code of conduct. Once again, I would like you to read what is on the screen and just think about it. What the professional conduct of us teachers should be. [MUSIC] Professional practice, again another area that is embedded in our code of conduct. And so how do we apply our knowledge and experience in facilitating our students' holistic development? Do we actually focus on our students' development? Or do we just do it for the sake of doing a job? As teachers we have to be professional, we have to make sure that we create an environment where our students become active agents in learning. We have to make sure that we act in the best interests of their development. We have to make sure that we create mutual respect, be open and responsive and give constructive feedback. So, that's our professional practice. Professional development. We have to take our responsibility in developing ourselves, sustaining and improving the quality of our professional practice. We have to be actively engaged in developing our own self. We have to be reflecting and critically evaluating our own practices. We also can develop ourselves by giving feedback to our colleagues as well. So, professional development is one area of conduct that we have to focus on. Professional collegiality and collaboration. When working with other teaching colleagues, student teachers, we have to share their interests, we have to develop good practices, and we have to maintain the highest quality of educational experiences for our students. We have to work in a collaborative manner. We as teachers are sometimes hesitant to share what we have produced for our classrooms with other teachers. This is something that we should address ourselves. This is something that we should not be reluctant to do. We can share our experiences, we can share our materials with our colleagues. So, that's basically, what we want to address in terms of the areas of focus in code of conduct in our relationships. Now, just look at an activity. What I want you to do is just address all these questions. If you have a code of conduct in your school or your school system, look at that code, and what does it say about the values of the school system? What are the ways in which you should conduct yourself under your code of conduct? And the type of relationships that are considered appropriate in that code of conduct? If you do not have a code of conduct, in your school or in your school system, what are the values that you feel should be in the code of conduct? How do you see yourself acting, or what are the important areas of professional conduct that you should incorporate in a code of conduct? And, what are the types of relationships that are considered that you think would be appropriate under a code of conduct? I hope that this activity will give you more ideas on a code of conduct and improve your professional code of conduct. Next session, week two, we will be starting to look at developing positive teacher-student relationships and looking at the connections between what we think and how we behave. Thank you very much. [MUSIC] [NOISE]
