K12 Online Conference: Steal this Preso: Copyrights, Fair Use, and Pirates in the Classroom

I chose to watch this presentation because I'm concerned about the frequent practice students have of taking images, music and video from the Internet for use in projects. They really don't seem to understand the concept of intellectual property.

In this presentation, elementary school teacher Matthew Needleman provides many useful tips on how to be respectful of intellectual property. While he does not claim to be an “expert” on this topic, he does speak from personal experience. As a teacher, he spent many hours after school creating his own Web site. Eventually, he put ads on his Web page and was able to earn about 20 cents a day, an amount essentially reimbursing him for some of what he put into the site. He talks about the frustration he felt in later finding his own Power Points on other teachers’ Web sites. As he explains, he put in his own time and money to create these “free” resources; now people can stop going to his Web page to circumvent the advertising, without which his resources would not exist. “Free to you does not mean free,” he concludes.

Needleman addresses the Fair Use Doctrine and stresses how quickly multimedia projects these days end up beyond the four walls of a teacher's classroom once they are posted on web sites. Needleman also spent some time discussing the use of copyrighted music in movie projects. Because it’s not often feasible for students or teachers to get permission from both the songwriter and the person who owns the recording for use in a project, he recommends using royalty free music. What I found most useful about Needleman’s presentation was his tips on using royalty free music and images. One resource for music is Garage Band, which I know is available on the Sharon Public School computers. Another avenue is using music in the public domain, which, unfortunately, is very limited. His other suggestion is using creative commons license music and images, which are available at this site: http://creativecommons.org/

Needleman also suggests using his own blog as a resource: Creating Lifelong Learners, http://www.needleworkspictures.com/ocr/blog/.

In the end, I agree with Needleman's assessment that we as teachers have to teach students how to be “responsible citizens in this new digital world.”