It’s the first day back to school after summer vacation. In an elementary school class, Mrs. Fay is teaching her students math using computers. She instructs all of her third graders to write a website on her computers in front of them.
“Now, class, we’ll cover addition using the website you should be on at Mathway.com. If so, click the ‘Basic Math’ button and you’ll go to a blank screen.” When you’re done with each one, highlight the answers one at a time, and I want you to click exactly what I’m telling you, hold down the right side of your mouse, and click “Copy.” Then I want you to go to a new blank screen, click on the left side and choose “Paste”. Then you should see the answer.” She writes out some addition problems and asks her students to solve them on the screen. Let me know if anyone had any problems. They spend the rest of the session solving addition problems.
When they have five more minutes until the bell rings for the next class, Ms. Lynn gives them a big problem to solve for homework and writes it along with the website on the board: 9950 + 8001 + 5400 + 2345 + 1980 = ?. Please “Copy” then “Paste” to my email address: “efay at aol.com”
The bell rings and most of the students are still copying it. “Now, don’t be late for your next class. Oh, I forgot! Send your answers to my email. She writes it on the board, but she writes “eBay,” not “efay.”
Jenny Smith is one of her students who was slow to write her homework. Mrs. Fay asks if she wrote it all down and the girl nods.
That afternoon, after school is over, Jenny asks her mom to lend her her laptop because she has homework to do. So, Jenny sits at a table where her mother’s computer is and follows the teacher’s instructions: add the numbers: 9950 + 8001 + 5400 + 2345 + 1980. She clicks the “add” button and gets “27,676 “. She then copies it with her mouse. Her when she clicks the delete button and types “eBay”. As soon as she gets there, she forgets her teacher’s email and goes to eBay looking for the fine jewelry up for auction on her mother’s account. She is captivated by 24 carat gold rings. She sees several that are about to end. She finds “Make Offer” buttons on five of them and pastes “27,676” into the text boxes.
As time runs out, you receive five messages saying “You have won!” Jenny is so excited that she runs and tells her mom what she just did. Her mother’s eyes widen and she asks, “What did you do?”
“I bought you five rings on eBay! Isn’t that great?”… “Mom?…Mom?”
The mother looks at the total: “$25,890.78”
“Mom???…Mom??…” The mother’s last words were…Dial 911, now!!!”