Copyright Free Resources

This website has thousands of free images that are able to downloaded for free. Many of the images you will find on this site are high quality and well done. You can find an image for a variety of subjects. This website would be best used by students middle school or high school looking for images for a project or PowerPoint presentation. The difficulties a student might run into is the search engine used for this site. It can be very broad when looking for specific pictures. The best use of this website could be for a history class or science class. For example finding pictures for a WWII project can be done very easy for a student at the secondary level. A student would be able to find maps of where the war took place, famous images from the war, types of weapons used, types of planes, etc.

This website is designed or educators and students of all levels. The videos are all under five minutes so a teacher can find a video related to the discussion of the lesson and the video will not drain the attention of the students. The benefit of this website is the variety of videos, there is something for everybody and every subject with it all being free. There is also a search bar with topics that makes it more convenient. What I found that made it difficult is the search bar on top blends in to the background so it will not stand out right away when you look to search for a topic.

This is a website designed for free downloads of a variety of types of sound. You can click on the sound tab and browse and find what you would like to download and it is free. This website can be used in an educational resource for middle school or high school age students doing a video project or PowerPoint project that will require background sound. Some difficulties I have found is the sound quality can vary between some of the sound clips. In order to download the sounds you must register an account you'll be able to begin. This could also be a difficulty for some students in a school setting depending on the school's firewall and if the student has an email. The tool I have found most useful with this site is the search bar and assisting you with finding the sound clips you want to hear or download.

Free Photos and Free Images for personal, educational and non-commercial usage. This website is so neat - it has a huge library of copyright free photos. You don't have to have an account to look through the photos or download them, so that's another plus to this website. All of the photos you find on this website are free to use for personal or non-commercial use. I loved seeing the different types of photos - I just searched a random topic to see what came up and the variety was great. This resource would be great for Middle or High School students to use in any subject area.

www.videezy.com is a site with 20 to 90 second video clips that are free for download.  The categories include water, culture, sports, and animals along with many other areas that could be beneficial in a video based project.  The video clips do not have sound and they will integrate into narrated projects very easily.   Teachers can use the video footage in their flipcharts to engage students into the content.  A video clip of the Hindenburg disaster lasts about a minute, but gives students a visual of what actually occurred.  These video clips can also serve as backgrounds for text pages as students create videos.   Even with the great free choices, the site will pull up clips that are not free.  Working with video is always more challenging than photos and so this will be better for older students to work with.  High school and maybe upper level middle school students would benefit from this site the most.

Sound Jay has an assortment of great sound clips to use in flip charts, presentations, or videos.  The sound clips are extremely realistic and so practical.  Students and teachers can really enhance their products with these well-placed sound bites. Did you know that fire had a sound?  Need a certain sound for a website button?  Students and teachers could use these very realistic sounds to accompany their video clips that do not have sound.  A literature class could have an audio assignment where the students create a scene from the book and these sounds would be the perfect addition to the podcast. The downloads are available in wav and mp3 format and they download very quickly.  The clips are typically very short and students might struggle with extending the sound in a loop.  The downloads are free, but there are a lot of advertisements and other "pay" options that might confuse younger users.  I would recommend this site for middle or high school students.

Motion Elements provides some nice background stock footage, some computer generated background footage and some title imagery. Examining the site in closer detail, I would describe the target audience for this site to be fairly universal. While scanning through the vast offerings I did not see any content that I would deem "inappropriate". I would suggest, however, that older students have an easier time with the general concept of video production that younger students, so this site may benefit them more. The free videos are of very good quality, but there are only about 5 pages of them. If you want to diversify your options, then videos can cost from $20 to $50, so I would stay with the free ones. One the plus side, the free clips do contain high definition (HD) content. If they have something you can use, you will be highly pleased with the quality. From a technical standpoint, the video clips that I downloaded to try were all in .mov format. .mov is an extension associated with Apple and its QuickTime platform, so use of these clip on Apple products, Macs for example, is certainly possible. However, I was able to easily add downloaded clips into Windows Movie Maker for editing as well with absolutely no hiccups, whatsoever. This means that not only will teachers and students benefit from easily downloaded clips covering a vast variety of subjects, they should have no difficulty using the clips on any computer platform they may be limited to in their educational setting.

Pixabay is a photo repository. This website is free to join, even though you have the option to donate towards the cause. It is a search engine for Shutterstock, which does cost money so be careful when you select a photo. Scroll past the first line of results. Some images are drawings or cartoons while some are photos. Pixabay has 179 photographers and their photos are free. You still have the option to donate to an individual photographer or promote their picture as well as download in several different sizes. The home screen is clean with a search bar and one large picture. I searched several times to see what quality of pictures would come up: Mozart, 21 results; Bassoon, 2 results; Baroque, 115 results. To test the system, I searched for an inappropriate word (boobie- which is really a bird). I didn't get any nudity or anything explicit, but I would still be cautious. Kids can still get around safety protocols and sometimes by accident. I would use this resource for middle school students to find images representing different time periods in music. For example, I would ask them to search for an image to describe each of the following ages: Ancient Greek, Middle Ages, Renaissance, Classical (search Mozart or Rococo), Baroque and Romantic (search Beethoven). If I have given them the search items, I can also search these items to make sure they are clean.

This site offers thousands of free pictures that are categorized so you can easily find the image you are looking for. Here are some of the examples of categories you will find on this site: home living, nature, cooking, business, animals, backgrounds, and textures. Within each main category group, the site breaks the groups into more specific categories.
Since the majority of the students I work with as a SLP range in age from 4 to 7 I often find myself needing pictures of common objects to include in my lessons when increasing vocabulary and teaching the concept of categories. This is especially important when working with students who do not only exhibit a language impairment but are also learning English as second language. This site is incredibly useful to me because I have numerous pictures available at my fingertips.

One possible problem with this site is that the pictures are very basic. While this is best for the students I work with, these pictures may not be useful for all students. Also, there is no way to filter what images may appear in each group. While I presume there are no inappropriate pictures, there is no way to ensure this. I feel comfortable using this site however because my students will not be using the site directly be themselves. Anything I retrieve from the site will be done prior to the lesson to reduce the risk of inappropriate pictures popping up.

This site offers royalty free background music for just $0.99 for each track. In addition, the site has over 1,000 free music teaks available for download. The site offers numerous music genres to pick from and will let you hear a sample of the track before you download. I have used this site in the past for videos and have been very pleased with the selection of music this site offers and how easy the site is to use. This site may be best suited for older students, but could be used with elementary aged students with teacher assistance. This site is great source to use when helping students create video projects. For example, last semester I created a documentary video focusing on the Cherokee Native Americas. Jewel Beat had several tracks of Native American background music to choose from. Add this music to my video made my work more authentic. I think student will enjoy being able to pick out their own music to add to their video without worrying about infringing on copyright holders. One possible problem I see with this site is that most of the music tracks cost $0.99. While this is not very much, this could lead to problems when helping a room full of students create videos especially since it would involve the use of billing a credit card. It may be best to just mention this source to your students as a possible choice.

pdsounds.org offers a free sound library with a variety of interesting sound effects from a German bar to writing with an ink pen. The sound volunteers utilize recording equipment to capture hundreds of sounds for copyright free, public use and tag them with a set of tags that help in the search process. You do not need a membership to access the free sound files, and you are able to submit sounds to be added to the catalog. These sound effects are perfect for incorporation into presentations and videos. In my high school business education classroom, these sound effects will enhance our projects. For instance, if a student created a marketing video with still images of tea products, the tea pouring sound effect would be helpful. In commercials, the effects can be used to make the situation more lifelike...birds in the background of a kitchen scene, or cars in the background of a busy sidewalk. Students will enjoy searching the clip options and finding just the right combination. I give this site a 4 on a 1-5 scale, because of the variety of clips, the ability to post clips, and the ease of searching via tags and simple downloading. To improve, I would like to see thousands of sounds available for download.

This website was originally created as a resource of 5,000 images concerning the American Civil War, but has since grown to include many more subject areas concerning U.S. History. The site is very easy to navigate and provides teachers and students with clear headings to find pictures from whatever specific area of U.S. History they are looking for. Here are just a few of the main headings used for categorizing the photos: Native Americans, Native American Culture, The Age of Exploration, Settlements and Colonies, Slavery in America, etc. I could easily see this resource being used by a high school U.S. History teacher, as well as by their students. A teacher could use this resource to add more visual meaning and interest to their own presentations or guided notes. Students, like-wise, could easily add relevant photos to their reports, presentations, or research projects. Students may require help with downloading the photos and embedding into their presentations, but this could be corrected with a simple modeling exercise where the teacher demonstrates how to navigate the site and download any desired photos. I really liked this site and have never seen it before. I plan on taking advantage of this year as I plan to create some new U.S. History assignments for my students.

This website offers a collection of out of copyright recordings, which would greatly serve to enhance a podcast. The site is easy to navigate and allows the user to download the audio file (MP3) to his/her desired location. After this file has been downloaded to the computer, students could then import the file into Audacity in order to edit the audio file to better fit their podcast. Student created podcasts would be a great way for middle school and high school students to convey their ideas or topics to a class. These can be done as individual or group projects. I especially see this type of activity being well suited for a Social Studies context, especially as a way to present research information. The correct application of music, to serve as an intro in a podcast, could greatly assist in the development of a polished final product. However, I would recommend sticking with the instrumental music for most uses within the educational context. But, the creation of a podcast within a history course could be enhanced with the accurate incorporation of time appropriate music. I believe for these music files to be incorporated into a podcast, to benefit the listener, the creator must have a working knowledge of Audacity. However, with the ability to pair Open Music Archive with Audacity can give the individual the tools necessary to create a product that would benefit learners through the multimedia platform.

8 Helpful Assistive Technology Tools for you classroom

MERLOT which stands for "Multimedia Educational Resources for Learning and Online Teaching" is repository site that contains images, video, as well as audio. The site contains information suitable for all grade levels k-12, however the resources being looked at or 9-12 Science resources. MERLOT is an established community of resources that offers a variety of resources to its members. User can browse for material across many different subject matters. They can also create a collection of resources to use with learning exercises to practice or teach concepts. MERLOT also provides its user with the opportunity to meet and collaborate with expert's virtually form all over.

This site is more functional than the other two I posted. One of the unique features is its large collection. There are not only objects (photos or illustrations) but also materials/textures available. Another feature is that they have some pull-down menus to narrow down the search. We can select the images by the topic (animal, architectures, etc), dominant colors of the image we want, the number of items we want to see at once, etc. These functions meet the users' needs. The site also asks for donations of the images. The challenge might be the filter set by the districts. Almost all the time this is the case some teachers are discouraged. It is strongly recommended teachers check this site on a school computer before the intended use. If blocked, requesting unblocking may be the next thing to do. Furthermore, as a school or department it may be a good idea to secure several online repositories that are not blocked; therefore, any teachers can use at any time safely for educational purposes. Lesson Example: 3rd grade and above in Visual Arts Direction: In our life there are many signs. Common features of those signs are simplicity (restricted numbers of colors, shapes, lines, etc.) and clearness of a message (directly represented by an object). Suppose you are a professional illustrator and the city has asked you to create a symbol/sign useful to the community. Make sure to provide good reasons to back up your creation. (Ex. how your creation will promote the welfare of the city, reduce the crimes, or promote business, etc.) Search the needs of the city so that your creation is timely and meets the needs of the city. Save the resources. Image citation: Dario sign no baby carriages warning lift. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.imageafter.com/image.php?image=b17dario103.jpg

This website is amazing. Once you sign up for a free account, you are able to download and use thousands of high quality images. Teachers can incorporate these pictures into their personal PowerPoints, Prezis, etc. or they can have their students use the pictures in projects. There are many beautiful landscape photos. This would be a great opportunity for 5th graders to gather pictures of different landforms and make a presentation using them.

This site offers a variety of different video clips. Some clips are free and some have to be purchased before downloading. Many of the highlighted clips included animals, family life, transportation, and other Kindergarten Social Studies content. There is material that would work with all grade levels and subject areas, but Social Studies was the first idea that popped into my head. There are a lot of news clips and weather clips as well. There are a lot of cool clips that show tornadoes in actions. BBC Motion Gallery is connected to BBC news, so you are able to access clips and news from around the world.