Copyright, Fair Use and Online Safety

Copyright and fair use are subjects that educators have to deal with almost every day. While copyright laws exist to protect the intellectual property of people, educators need access to this material in order to do their jobs. “US copyright law was not created to make individuals or companies rich: it was conceived by the framers of the United States Constitution as a way to promote and protect innovation for a short, fixed amount of time” (http://www.wtvi.com/TEKS/02_03_articles/copyright.html). Copyright laws exist to help keep creativity and innovation alive. If these laws did not there would be no incentive for people to publish or display their work. Educators use printouts and books to teach their students and now they use the Internet and computer software to help them in their endeavor to educate the young people of the world. In order for them to be able use the information that is so readily available the fair use rule was put in place. Teachers are not trying to take advantage of any one, they are simply trying to keep current and provide the best education they can to their students. As an educator it is my/our responsibility to educate the students of these laws and how they apply. The lesson would be covered at the same time you would discuss citing some one else’s work. You would want to make sure that the students under that they need to get permission to use some one’s work and that they need to give credit to the person that created it. This would make a great language arts lesson involving citations and plagiarism.

Online safety and cyber bullying are different yet they are the same. Online safety involves protecting your identity from others while cyber bullying is an attack on you as a person through the use of cyber technology. As educators it is our responsibility to teach and protect the students while they are under our watch. We must teach them the proper and safe way to use technology; what to share and what not to share, which websites are acceptable and which ones are not. Schools generally have filtering and blocks in place to prevent students from accessing sites that are deemed unsuitable or questionable. We know though that this are not in place at home and that most of the time students are using the net unsupervised. We need to educate the students so that they will use the same skills at home that they use at school. Again they need to know not to share any personal information with anyone online and if they suspect something or are being bullied that they need to tell someone that they trusts what is happening. As much as we want to provide protection for our students all the time we must rely upon the parents being the most influential people in our students’ lives.

This week’s activities was very educational. I thought I knew enough about copyright laws that I was not infringing upon anyone’s rights, but now I have to question some of the things I have done I the past. The copyright quiz that I took was a lot tougher than I anticipated. I scored a lowly 47 on the quiz, I could not believe it. I will definitely be more careful in the future and keep close at hand the Copyright and Fair Use Guidelines for Teachers (http://www.techlearning.com/techlearning/pdf/db area/archives/TL/2002/10/copyright chart.pdf). This is a very useful tool and I think all educators should have this on their desk.

References.

Fryer, Wesley A., (2002). Copyright 101 for Educators: Winter 2003. Retrieved from http://www.wtvi.com/TEKS/02_03_articles/copyright.html

Techlearning.com., (2002). Copyright and Fair Use Guidelines for Teachers. Retrieved from http://www.techlearning.com/techlearning/pdf/db area/archives/TL/2002/10/copyright chart.pdf