
I unknowingly set myself up to learn a lesson this week when I used a Pixabay image and altered it last week to be the graphic on my blog heading! I knew enough about copyright and Creative Commons before this week’s lectures to know that I needed to ensure I was allowed to use it and that attribution was not required. Clearly, I hadn’t given any thought to whether modifications of any sort were allowed, as I immediately cropped it, or the fact that I needed to cite it. I realized this pretty quickly when I watched the lectures Dr. Kimmel shared that I’d not done it correctly, but I decided that sharing my mistake this week indicated the learning that occurred between posting on my blog last Saturday and this one.

Playing with the tools in the sandbox was a lot of fun this week, and I settled on creating this magazine cover. I used Big Huge Labs once last summer for a Children’s Lit class, found it a bit frustrating, and was sure I’d avoid it this go ’round. That said, I clicked around with a bit more confidence this time and really enjoyed playing with it. I found myself really wanting to use an image of my own students playing with Makey Makeys (https://makeymakey.com/) this past winter, but, as discussed last week, I would never use their photographs on a public blog. I settled for a picture that conveyed the same sense of victory that my students displayed upon making a piano out of a circuit board and play doh and then playing actual music!!!
I can think of several ways my students could use these types of tools in a lesson. I love the idea of having my 4th and 5th graders create a magazine cover or movie poster for a book they’re reading: sharing information like title, author, genre, characters and theme. Any of the photo editing tools we were offered this week allow students the chance to try something new and different and, perhaps most importantly, a tiny bit frustrating which allows for the thrill of overcoming an obstacle. I have a feeling I’d be a big hit if I were to suggest that we play around with memes!
May 30, 2020 at 4:49 pm
I love the top image you chose and the modification on the lower image. I think the magazine cover modification would make a great lesson for middle/high schoolers that not only allows them to delve into their creative side while making an image relevant to whatever lesson or class they are in but also including a lesson about image use and citing. Image use and citing is relevant to any subject since images can be used in any subject project or assignment, as well as every day life in this digital era. I remember doing assignments making a magazine cover but we didn’t learn about image citing and permissions, of course this was before the internet was such an established part of everything we do. In this era this lesson is a necessity and needs to become part of our regular middle and high school lessons-what a great project that would be to take on as a school librarian!
May 30, 2020 at 5:06 pm
Mary,
Thank you! I agree that we absolutely need to tackle this subject with students. I think you are correct about the middle and high school students too, but I also think that it’s a natural fit to discuss with elementary students as they learn to do their first research projects.
Thanks!
Gray
May 30, 2020 at 9:46 pm
Hi Gray,
Like you, I also found myself learning a bit about this topic last week when I was trying to find an image for last week’s blog post on copyright. At that point, I knew better than to simply copy and paste an image from the internet, but I now feel much more confident about how and where to choose an image from and cite it. I am in the process now of returning to that blog post to edit it with the proper citation too 🙂