Having integrity as a teacher is closely tied to our ‘fitness to teach’, we must have the public’s trust in order to maintain our ‘fitness to teach’ however this can be undermined by inappropriate use on social media. Integrity can be described as honesty but I think it is better described as ‘good character’ in the sense that we must uphold our ‘good character’ that should be perceived by the public. As teachers we must be seen as honest, well presented and sensible. However some things which we post on social media may seem harmless to us but to others who have a different view point can seem entirely different. When posting on social media we must take care to not perish our integrity and this can become detrimental to our careers. For a teacher when building their professional status this simply means pausing before posting and thinking whether or not what they have written can be construed in a different manner from which it was intended. If so then don’t post it. It’s rather simple.

Many people believe that marrying personal social media with professional social media is a good tool within the classroom. There are severe dangers with this. Even though it is a merge of personal and professional you still have to be aware of what you are posting. There are certain aspects of your personal life which would not be appropriate to share with your pupils. It can be easy to forget that you have a ‘merged’ social network site and to then post something which would compromise your professional integrity.

However this idea does have some benefits. Allowing your pupils to get to know the kind of person you are out with the classroom can help build a better relationship within. Seeing aspects of your personal life may allow them to relate to you in a way they hadn’t before, it could allow prompting of discussions to occur which otherwise would not have taken place.

I think the use of social media as a way of keeping the children engaged in lessons but also engaging with the children is a vital part of the modern classroom. However I think the use has to be controlled and used wisely. I think that using social media in a professional manner whilst incorporating some personal aspects is a good idea. But I would not use my current personal social media profile and then begin adding pupils to it then using it in a professional and personal manner as there are some ‘personal’ things which should not be shared with pupils. I think it is important to keep a distinct profile where personal but monitored posts are shared.