Is It Cheating If Unmonitored Students Find Another Way of Doing Things When Their "Educators" Aren't Watching?

There is a reason why schools should not be shut down willy-nilly and why tried-and-true methods still work:

Olivia Meleta, a high school math teacher in Thornhill, Ont., said she realized something was amiss in late September when several students learning virtually submitted tests with matching solutions - using a method she and her colleagues don't teach.

 

(Sidebar: did you ever change the format of the tests or try teaching a method that still works?)

 

"It was a very convoluted way of doing things,” she said. “Their solution was about 20 steps ... The process in class would have been around five or six.”

A colleague explained what was likely going on, she said. The students had apparently downloaded an app called Photomath, ostensibly meant to be a teaching tool.

The app - one of several - scans a photo of a math problem and offers a step-by-step guide on how to solve it.

Photomath, which was founded in Croatia in 2014, claims to have more than 150 million downloads globally, at least a million of them from teachers.

The company has created a “best practices” guide in collaboration with teachers to show how it can be incorporated into the classroom, a company spokeswoman said.

“The guide focuses on three core principles: reinforcing concepts learned in the classroom, providing a way to check homework assignments, and accelerating individual learning,” Jennifer Lui said.

Mathway, a similar app, also boasts about “millions of users and billions of problems solved.” Its purpose, it says, is to “make quality on-demand math assistance accessible to all students.”

And while experts say the software can be a legitimate teaching tool for students doing homework, teachers have had to find ways to safeguard tests against it.

 

A really good way is to monitor students, you know, in a classroom.