Teachers Pay Teachers is an online community for educators. This website allows teachers to share their lesson plans with other teachers and sell these lesson plans to buyers. Paul Edelman is the founder Teachers Pay Teachers and is also a former New York City school teacher. I found an article online from the New York Times (link is below) which talks about Teachers Pay Teachers as well as a number of other websites which offer teachers the opportunity to make a profit by selling their original lesson plans, such as We Are Teachers, as well as online mentoring and tutoring. This article verifies that yes indeed; Teachers Pay Teachers is a legitimate website although I cannot verify the safety of making a purchase on this website.
The New York Times article also struggles with the ethics and legality of teachers selling their lesson plans online by representing both sides of the issue. The article explains that a number of the teachers which use such commercial websites have made hundreds and even thousands of dollars selling lesson plans on such topics as “Lord of the Flies”. The teachers then use the money to buy items for their students and the classroom as well as to pay off debt and mortgage payments among other things. Because the marketplace for educational tools is so new, rules and regulations have not been created to address this issue. For example, the article also talks about a former football coach from Fairfax, Virginia who was selling his playbook and instructional DVDs online for $197, but after an investigation the charges against the coach were dropped. The article also discusses how some feel that sharing lesson plans and ideas is a great idea, but that selling these lessons is “ultimately destructive to the profession.” Others in the teaching field believe that they do not get enough credit for their creative and innovative ideas and see commercial websites such as Teachers Pay Teachers as a way to earn what they deserve.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/15/education/15plans.html?_r=3&hp&
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