Copyright and Plagiarism on the Web
Anyone writing a blog (or posting any materials on the web) should be aware of how copyright law applies to them. This is particularly important in an age when mashups and remixes of existing materials are not only commonplace but are accepted forms of expression.
Students (and their teachers) need to be keenly aware of the copyright laws as they apply to the work that their students produce. The following sources are particularly helpful in that regard and should be required reading for all educators.
10 Big Myths About Copyright Explained
An excellent resource for students, as the myths are explained in the form of responses to comments that students might make–e.g., “If I don’t charge for it, it’s not a violation,” or “If I make up my own stories, but base them on another work, my new work belongs to me.”
Copyright Explained: I May Copy It, Right?
A very thorough treatment of copyright laws and rights. Topics include what is prohibited, what is NOT prohibited, what to do about plagiarism, and others. The article concludes with an excellent set of links to related articles and resources.
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Free Online Videos
There is a lot of research that shows that having readily available, content-based video increases student performance in just about all academic subjects. Having said that, it’s not always a good idea to turn students loose on YouTube in search of a video about biology or some other topic.
There are some subscription services that provide content-based video for schools. Best known among these are United Streaming Media, Cosmeo, and SchoolVideos. These services provide well-produced media mapped to student standards. Many school districts subscribe to such services, so you may already have access to some of their materials. Some sites offer samples of their videos for free viewing.
On the free side, check out:
SciTalks: Smart People on Cool Topics
SciTalk offers lectures from well-known scientists, futurists, and technologists on a wide range of science and technology topics. Best suited for high school and post secondary students.
The Futures Channel
The Futures Channel divides their movie offerings into two main categories–“Real World Movies” (animals, art & music, environment, science & tech, etc.) and “Teaching and Learning” (algebra in the real world, hands-on match, problem solving, etc.). Most are short (2 – 5 minutes) and targeted toward a very specific topic. Most come with classroom activities.
ScienceHack Science Videos Search Engine
ScienceHack provides a search engine that focuses on on-line science videos. You can also search by topic or browse a list of the latest videos that have been linked.
Google Video
Performing a Google search for educational videos (on google.video.com, type “genre:educational” in the search box) returns a huge variety of educational videos. Expanding your search (e.g., genre:educational astronomy) will narrow your topic down considerably. Make sure Safe Search in enabled in your browser for elementary students.
Research TV
Research TV produces research news stories for universities and other research organizations. They also make their productions available to watch online. Topics include Health, Science and Nature, Technology, Society, Business, Creative and Cultural, and others.
TeacherTube
TeacherTube offers a huge variety of educational videos on every imaginable topic. Many of these are school-produced, and you are encouraged to add your own educational videos to the offerings.
Video Encyclopedia of the 20th Century
The Video Encyclopedia of the 20th Century from Humboldt State University contains 2338 digitized film and video clips covering the social, cultural, and political history of
the 20th Century from 1893 to 1989, searchable by keyword or date.
Free Science Videos and Lectures
An excellent resource for high school and post secondary teachers (or as professional development for any science teacher). This site includes both science videos and science lectures and offers an excellent search engine for both types of videos.
Professional Development
Annenberg Media’s Learner.Org
Annenberg Media provides a wide variety of professional development courses and resources, including some scheduled live webcasts.
The Oklahoma Technical Assistance Center has a nice collection of professional development videos for K-12 teachers in a variety of areas including History, Science, Math, and English.
Google’s Infinite Thinking Machine is a blog with links to regularly-produced “shows” (short videos) that deal with issues related to teaching in the 21st century. Subscribe to this one…
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Thought Bubble: Tools and Ideas
Today’s post highlight’s a diverse set of articles on Web 2.0 technologies and their application to teaching and learning.
Digital Life vs Life Digital: Our Inevitable Digital Future
This article by Alex Iskold makes some very interesting points about “digital life” (as expressed by virtual worlds such as Second Life) and “life digital,” the idea that digital technologies such as Google Maps are overlaying our “real” lives with additional information and visualizations. This quote intrigued me:
“Information is being unleashed and re-shuffled. We are beginning to look at information from literally a 1000 foot view. And everything is becoming increasingly more connected. This is both very exciting and a bit unnerving. We are accelerating into our digital future from all directions – pushing digital towards life and pushing life towards digital.”
Pedagogical affordances of syndication, aggregation, and mash-up of content on the Web
Barbara Dieu and Vance Stevens provide a thorough review of Web 2.0 technologies (social networks, image sharing, blogs, mapping, podcasting, video, and other related technologies and processes) with the idea of applying these technologies to teaching and learning. The first sentence should catch the interest of any educator:
“As Internet and online learning become more and more incorporated into our courses, syllabi, and teaching materials, it becomes increasingly important that the impact the Web is having on changing perceptions of literacy carries over to the way we practice teaching and learning.”
The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning
An extensive, excellent collection of studies, book reviews, and lectures on “m-learning” (mobile learning). Past issues of the IRRODL are available from the menu, and the entire site is searchable.
WikiVersity
Even regular WikiPedia users may be unaware of WikiVersity. Here is WikiVersity’s own statement of purpose and goals:
“Wikiversity is a community for the creation and use of free learning materials and activities. Wikiversity is a multidimensional social organization dedicated to learning, teaching, research and service. Its primary goals are to:
- Create and host free content, multimedia learning materials, resources, and curricula for all age groups in all languages
- Develop collaborative learning projects and communities around these materials”
WikiVeristy is actively seeking educators to create materials for the site, and there is already a lot of useful content available for use.
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