Copyright

Have you ever found a video, worksheet, poem, book, or short story you would like to use in the classroom with your students but have been scared of using it because of copyright issues? I have, and it's pretty frustrating, especially when is a really good one.  Well, I have found a solution to it! Recently I read an article about copyright and how teacher can be able to use copyrighted material in their classrooms without breaking the law.

Their is something called "fair use", this is like a "Advance To Go" Monopoly game card for teachers, that is part of the 1976 Copyright Act in section 107. With this benefit allow teachers limited use of copyright material within the educational field, and only dedicated for teaching.  Did you knew about that? Well their are some guidelines you need to follow in order to not break any laws.  Here is a link to a website that has created a creative and interactive portal to learn about Copyright laws and the "Fair Use" clause:

Copyright Bay

After reading about all this, I took a quiz that to my surprise I got 75% on my first try! Today I took it again, scoring a 100% which means a lot because most of the questions were tricky. The answer to this quiz were shocking! Many things that I thought weren't breaking copyright rules were! But thankfully I know better now, which will let me incorporate great resources to my future lessons. Hopefully copyright laws are modified in the coming years to our benefit as educators.

Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants

After reading both parts of the Digital Natives,Digital Immigrants articles by Mark Prensky, I can make sense on how the Digital Immigrants (my teachers), struggle with success in their classrooms.  I remember how difficult sometimes it was to pay attention in class because how uninteresting was the way my teachers presented the materials.  After I took my education courses in my undergrad, I believe it was due to the lack of meaningfulness in their lessons.  But after reading this article I realize that was a combination of that and the lack of the "native language".

It's impressive to see how the digital natives evolve and adapt to the fast pace changes in technology. This is why I agree with Prenksy on the topic of the Digital Immigrants.  I believe that in order to have your students be interested in what your teaching and learn it, you need to understand the way they think and react.  It's important that we teachers be on the vanguard of technology and keep ourselves educated.

For me it was impressive to understand clearly how important the manufacture and design of educational games is important.  Students nowadays spend more time with their digital gadgets and devices, making it essential to have something educational they could spend their time in on them, rather than social networks and regular games.  Some examples of games that I believe posses some educational value are Words with Friends and Scramble with Friends.  Such games expand vocabulary to the players, making it essential for students.

I believe that their is many changes previous teachers need to make.  Nevertheless, we the Digital Natives need to keep in track with the ever changing pace of technology!