Thing 10: Copyright, Fair Use, and Creative Commons

Part 1

I've encountered much of the information regarding copyright, fair use, and Creative Commons previously. A few things stood out though. We often remember to have students give credit for work they use, but we don't spend enough time on the specifics of fair use. Students will cite a source but then use way more than what would be considered allowable. In fact students and teachers alike will use long segments or entire songs and videos.  In our efforts to celebrate student work we post PowerPoint presentations and projects on the internet not really thinking about fair use of the content. An in-school audience is different than a potentially worldwide one. I think it important to plan accordingly by establishing clear guidelines and modeling expectations. Focusing on creating original content and using sites with more public domain resources would help alleviate some of the issues. 

Part 2

The teacher in the video engaged her students with mashups and parody which really blurred some of the lines of fair use. She was able to have students look closely at the criteria and help determine whether or not it fell within guidelines.  She required students to support their answers to be sure that they can demonstrate real understanding.   In the end students had deeper understanding and made connections to the lesson. Working with the campus Library Information Specialist we could model appropriate copyright and fair use during research projects. Partnering with teachers would be important to create rubrics and to communicate expectations. The LIS can also show students many if the tools within the research databases that make citing sources much easier.