COPYRIGHT SUGGESTIONS

FOR YOUR PRESENTATIONS:

Try to use only things youve written or
created yourself. Then you wont have to
worry about copyright at all!
Try to use copyright-free artwork and/or
music.
Fair Use means students can use
copyrighted material for school projects. But
you still have rules to follow!
You must get permission to use the
copyrighted material. Use a form at
http://www.kent.k12.wa.us/library/copyright.htm
or go to
http://www.copyrightkids.org/permissframes.htm

and read about getting permission.

FAIR USE? WHATS THAT?

Fair Use guidelines are rules (called
exemptions) that make it okay for students to
use copyrighted material for school projects.
But you must follow the very strict rules!
Your opening screen must include a message
something like this:
NOTICE: I borrowed other peoples stuff to create
my project. I followed the rules.
Please dont copy my project.
You must list the source in your
bibliography. Include author, title,
publisher, URL, place and date of
publication. Its ok to put the copyright
info and the credits together in a
separate place in your project (like
on the last slide of a PowerPoint).
You can only use certain amounts of copyrighted
material! Check inside this brochure to see how
much you can use.

PLAGIARISM VS. COPYRIGHT

Plagiarism and Copyright violations are kind of the
same idea because they both mean copying without
permission. Copyright violation is taking someone
elses work and using it without permission.
Plagiarism is taking someone elses work and using
it as your own.

TO AVOID PLAGIARISM:

Put quotation marks around words another

person has spoken or written

Take what another person has said and rewrite it,

using your own words (then cite your source)

Give credit to another persons idea, opinion, or

theory (cite your source)

Give credit for (cite) information that is not

common knowledge (facts, statistics, graphs,

drawings, etc.).

If you use information that is exactly as you

found it somewhere, be sure to highlight,

underline, or use quotation marks and cite it in
your projects bibliography.

GETTING PERMISSION
Its not hard to get permission to use someones
copyrighted stuff. Go to our website at
http://www.kent.k12.wa.us/library/copyright.htm
to download some fill-in permission forms.

Here are the steps:

Phone, email or write a letter, put the address of the
permissions department of the publisher on your mail,
or mail directly to the copyright holder. Include:
Title, author and/or editor, and edition
Exact material to be copied giving amount and page
numbers (URL, track, file, etc.)
Number of copies youll make of your project
How youll use the copied material
Whether or not the copies are to be sold
Type of reprint (will you download, digital transfer,
scan, photocopy, etc.)

KENT SCHOOL DISTRICT #415

Administrative Offices
Instructional Technology Department
12033 S.E. 256th Street ESB-D200
Kent, Washington 98030-6643

For more information or

questions, contact your
school librarian

K E N T S C H O O L D I S T R I C T #4 1 5

SOME IDEAS
FOR YOU!

COPYRIGHT INFO
FOR STUDENT
MULTI-MEDIA
PRESENTATIONS

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Public performance is:

Showing a presentation
anywhere outside your
classroom!
Buying a CD or
DVD does not
mean you own the
copyright to that
CD or DVD!

RULES AND SITUATIONS

F O R C O P Y R I G H T E D O R R OYA LT Y- F R E E M AT E R I A L

COPYRIGHT IS:
Copyrighted material: First of all, believe
everything on the internet is copyrighted (even if it
doesnt say it is!). And royalty-free stuff isnt
copyright free! It still needs to follow the Fair Use
guidelines!

Copyright is the law! It protects the rights of the

person who wrote the music, wrote the book, made
the video, created the multi-media show, made the
Web site, designed the movie poster, etc. Copyright
does not protect common facts or ideas.

The copyright owner is: The original creator of the

content owns the copyright to start with. The
copyright owner can give someone else permission
to use the content and can even sell the copyright to
someone else.

Copyright: If I buy it, I own it, right? No! Just

because you buy a CD, DVD, book, or whatever it
doesnt mean you own the copyright you dont!
There is a difference between owning a copy of a
copyrighted work and owning the copyright. If you
buy a music CD, you own that copy of the CD, but
you do not own the copyright to the songs on that
CD. You may not use the songs in your presentation
(without permission) because you are not the
copyright owner of the songs.

Copyright owners can: Only copyright owners can

copy, upload, display, distribute, publicly perform, or
sell his or her content (without permission).

Copyright begins: Believe it or not, if youre

working on a computer, the very second you hit
save, your work is copyright protected! Copyright
protection happens automatically; you dont need to
print a notice that something is yours, and you dont
need to use that little symbol!

THE MOST YOU CAN USE IS:

Film, Video or TV Up to 10% or 3
minutes total of any one program
(whichever is less).
Pretend that: Your math group is
making a presentation about M.C.
Escher and tessellations. You
found a great 10 minute video clip
from the internet about Escher. Using the Fair Use
Guidelines, you can use the smaller amount of 10% or
3 minutes. The most you can use from this video
would be 1 minute and 12 seconds (See box below).
The Math
10% of 12 minutes = # minutes you can use
.10 x 12 = 1.2 minutes
.2 minutes (from above line) is 12 seconds
(.2 minutes x 60 seconds = 12 seconds)
Now ask yourself WHICH IS LESS 1 minute
and 12 seconds, or 3 minutes? Right!
1 minute and 12 seconds is all you can use.
Text up to 10% or 1,000 words total (whichever is
less). Whole short poems (250
words or less) may be used, but
there is a limit on the amount that
may be used from an anthology.
Pretend that: You are have a
research project to do about
Washington States history. You
found a website with tons of great information about
Marcus Whitman, and you want to copy and paste
some of the text. There are about 3,000 words on the
site. The Fair Use Guidelines say you can use the
lesser of 10% or 1,000 words of text. Be sure to cite
where you got your information.
The Math
10% of 3,000 = # words
.10 x 3,000 = 300 words
Think about it WHICH IS LESS 300 or 1,000?
Right! You can use 300 words total from this site.

Music, lyrics, music video Up to 10%

but not more than 3 minutes total
from a single work (whichever is less).
Pretend that: Youre making a
PhotoStory slide show using a song
that is 3:04 minutes long that you got
from a royalty-free music site. You
didnt pay for the music, but you still need to follow
Fair Use Guidelines for how much you can use. And
cite your source! See below.
The Math
10% of 3:04 minutes
(Convert 3:04 minutes to seconds)
3 x 60 seconds = 180 seconds
add the 4 extra sec = 184 seconds
10% of 184 sec = .10 x 184 = 18.4 sec
Think about it: WHICH IS LESS?
18.4 seconds or 3 minutes? Right! You can only
use a total of 18.4 seconds of this song.
Computer databases or spreadsheets up to 10%
or 2,500 cells (whichever is less). Note: Treat
Databases and Spreadsheets the same as for Text
(see column to the left).
Illustrations, cartoons,
photographs, graphics
An individual work may be used in
its entirety, but no more than 5
images from a single artist; no more
than 15 images or 10% of the total
from a collective work.
Pretend that: Youre making a
display for science, and you are
using images you copy and pasted
from a science website that had
200 photos. How much can you
use under the Fair Use Guidelines?
The Math
10% of 200 = # photos
.10 x 200 = 20 photos
Think about it WHICH IS LESS 20 or 15? Right!
You can only use 15 photos from this site.