E-mail

[sippo]

Not a technical question just an opinion one really.

 

We have exchange in place with every student having an e-mail address and access. Does anyone else find that they really abuse the privelige? They are using the e-mail system like an MSN chat service. If it were my way I'd remove outlook from them altogether. Does the government still want students to have a school e-mail address?

 

How do you 'police' yours?

[FN-GM]

They used to here. We had a crack down that involved 40 students. Every one was lined out outside the deputy heads office. Since then it doesn't happen.

 

Do you log every message sent? We keep a copy of every message in a special inbox.

[sippo]

We keep a record of messages that contain offensive language, attachments etc. But I know for a fact that they just use it to 'chat' to each other.

[webman]

During lessons when students use an IT suite, our staff have the ability to turn email on and off at the click of a button which goes some way to prevent that sort of misuse. Individual accounts can also be disabled by us when requested.

[sippo]

Thats a good idea webman. How do you do that? Can it be done in exchange 03?

[webman]

We use Zimbra web client for our mail, and I developed a custom "launcher" program to provide integrated authentication and to check an INI file that says whether the room is enabled or disabled. The INI file is updated with a teacher program.

 

You could probably do the same if you have programming experience and a copy of AutoIt.

[deanc]

another option to stop students using it as a chat program is to get hold of some software like NetOp.

 

this really is a classroom management thing and is something that the teacher has control over (in theory!), obviously misuse of e-mail should result in either removal of e-mail or if it really serious removal of the account.

 

having said that the school i currently work at has e-mail for all students and it is a useful resource for teaching and learning, also with courses like OCR Nationals being big at the moment students HAVE to use e-mail including some of the more advanced features to gain the higher grades

[CyberNerd]

They are using the e-mail system like an MSN chat service.

 

We installed a chat service (actually part of moodle) so that the students didn't use the email system like a chat service. Moodle generates really good logs so it's easy to spot someone abusing the system.

Teachers also use moodle to email their classes (the messages are sent as email if the student isn;t online chatting). Quite good for collaboration, but maybe easier to just uninstall and say NO if you want a quiet life, or get a job in a library maybe.

[User3204]

At least your lot are using the email system.

 

Most of ours use Hotmail/Yahoo/Etc, which has become a problem for them as the new LA filtering is blocking URLs which use IPs. Suddenly they have to learn how to use it, and remember what the password they set with it 5 years ago (I really should setup AD integration).

[sippo]

another option to stop students using it as a chat program is to get hold of some software like NetOp.

 

this really is a classroom management thing and is something that the teacher has control over (in theory!), obviously misuse of e-mail should result in either removal of e-mail or if it really serious removal of the account.

 

having said that the school i currently work at has e-mail for all students and it is a useful resource for teaching and learning, also with courses like OCR Nationals being big at the moment students HAVE to use e-mail including some of the more advanced features to gain the higher grades

 

We use LANSchool which is basically the same. Some students spend a whole lesson sending messages every minute to their mates. Surely this is down to lack of classroom management??

 

When you tell them that, the staff say 'we can't keep an eye on all of them...'

[deanc]

We use LANSchool which is basically the same. Some students spend a whole lesson sending messages every minute to their mates. Surely this is down to lack of classroom management??

 

When you tell them that, the staff say 'we can't keep an eye on all of them...'

 

do teaching staff have access to this,and do they have any idea how to use it. It is very difficult to keep and eye on up to 30 computers at a time, particularly with how badly some rooms are designed.

 

remember back to when you were at school, as soon as the teacher turns thier back students will immediately do whatever they are not supposed to be doing.

 

some of us still do:)