Guideline 10: Address issues of copyright and fair use
Issues of ownership, copyright, permission, and educational fair use invariably come up in any
discussion involving the use of digital content created by someone else. The use of copyrighted
material is indeed a serious concern and one that many educators and policy makers study and
discuss. Unfortunately, there is not yet a definitive answer to the question of what materials may
or may not be freely used in educational projects. Some educators feel that if a picture or a video
clip may be easily found and downloaded from the web, then it is permissible to use this material
in an educational digital story. But other educators have a different opinion and do not want their
students to use any materials that were created by someone else. As mentioned, we encourage
our students to use digital cameras and camcorders to shoot their own pictures and video, create
their own charts and graphs with software such as Microsoft Excel, search for copy-right-free music