E-safety Tips
1) Don’t allow possible problems with internet use stop you from making the most of technology.
2) Be aware of guidelines and policies set by your employer.
3) Develop school internet use policies that are specifically for your staff, students, and families.
4) Teach your students about internet safety regularly and authentically. This is not a one-off lesson.
5) Teach your students basic internet tips and be a role model.
Along with internet safety, students also need to be taught about things like plagiarism, copyright, Creative Commons search engines, and effective search engine tecniques. These are important areas for teachers and students to know about if they want to use the internet effectively and legally.
Teachers have a key role to play as a digital citizenship role model for their class. For example, avoid using images from Google Images in your own work and model to students how you found and created you image or video
6) If students or parents approach you with issues regarding cyberbullying or safe internet use, it’s important to deal with them.
You don’t have to go it alone. Get advice and support from your school and possibly your education department.
Encourage your students to talk to you about any concerns they might be having with their internet use. All teachers know it can be easier to sort out small problems rather than let them escalate!
7) Carefully consider whether you want to connect with students or parents on social media.
If your account is purely professional it might be fine to connect with members of your school community, but it generally wouldn’t be a good idea for personal accounts.
Whatever your decision, consult with your school policies and do not add children who are under 13 on social networks with age restrictions (most social media platforms require users to be 13+ or older).
COPYRIGHT TIPS
Tip 1: Don’t use photos or video clips you find on Google or other search engines.
In general, the photos or videos you would find through a typical Google search can not be legally reproduced. Instead, we recommend using the following strategies for collecting photo and video assets.
Strategy 1: Create your own!
The easiest way to stay stress-free about copyright law is to use your own photos and videos, and we strongly encourage you to go this route since it will make for a more authentic story. Most exemplary capstones are made up of photos and video clips taken by the educator personally. Consider including:
- Photos or screenshots of learning materials you have created
- Photos or video of yourself
- Photos or video of student work, without including the students' first and last names
- Photos or video of students' feet, hands, or the backs of their heads
Strategy 2: Advanced and Optional
Use photos that have a creative common licence and include proper attribution.
Here is one method to find images that are under a creative commons license:
- Go to google.com.
- Click images.
- Type in a search term.
- Click settings > advanced search.
- By usage rights, click free to use, share or modify, even commerically.
- Click advanced search again.
- Click on an image you are interested in. You may need to click on the image twice or even three times to get to the original file. (For example, if clicking on the image takes you to a wikipedia page, find the same image on the wikipedia page and click on it again. That will take you to the orginal file.)
- Find the licensing information. In the below example, the license is is CC BY-SA 3.0. Click on that link to read what constitutes proper attribution. In most cases, you are just required to include the username of the person who uploaded the image and the type of license.
Tip 2: Don’t use music from your iTunes library, Spotify, YouTube, etc.
Unless it is specifically listed as a free resource or as sample tracks in your video production software, we recommend not using music which is not owned by you. In general, music cannot be legally reproduced without paying royalties. It is not required that you have background music for your capstone video—and in many cases, background music can be distracting. If you are very interested in using background music, you can use a music track that has a creative common license and include proper attribution.
Here is one method to find music that is under a creative commons license:
- Go to https://search.creativecommons.org/.
- Select one of the buttons that says "Music" such as Jamendo, ccMixter, or SoundCloud.
- Type in a style of music or, if you'd like to browse all music, type "music" and click search.
- Once you find a track you like, find the licensing information. In the below example, it is just listed as "Creative Commons License". Click on that link to read what constitutes proper attribution. In most cases, you are just required to include the username of the person who uploaded the image and the type of license.
Tip 3: Be purposeful when showing copyrighted resources.
Tip 4: Be discerning when showing people besides yourself in your video.