Week 1 Reading - Copyright

Copyright Symbols by Mike Seyfang

Copyright is the legal process of protecting the creation of intellectual products in a final form. Meaning that your published (in final form) works (such as book videos, etc) cannot be used by others without your (the copyright owner) permission.

Creative Commons by Jayel Aheram

With the stringent limitations of copyright and the very narrow access of fair use Creative Commons is a wonderful resource. I came across this a while back and have found it invaluable. Rather than wondering if the way I'm using the resources are essential enough to my lessons that they couldn't be taught without them, I just have to follow the copyright directions of the creator.


I was surprised to find how narrow fair use restrictions are. I had been taught teachers had fair use access for any resources they used as long as it was used in teaching their content. It was never mentioned that the resource had to be essential to the learning. I've seen so many teachers using background music, videos, etc just to make the lesson more interesting or engaging but it wasn't essential to learning the content. Again, this makes me very grateful for Creative Commons and similar websites.