Many Irons in the Fire

This semester has been great with all the collaborative projects

and fun things I've been trying. Right now it seems like I have a lot of irons in the fire. (photo courtesy of iansand at flickr).

I've wrapped up the Fall Project with Tita Martinez at Haskin Elementary. I'll let her tell you all about it. My students have completed their Monster stories, drawings, and recreations for my project with Esmunda Talamantes at Hanson. I've got a voicethread project going with Sara Zaleski and another just among the students I have for English Language. I'm building a multimedia database to accompany StoryTown stories for second grade for a Star teacher project. I'm as busy as ever but really having a good time. I'll post links later.

On another note. I encourage everyone to nominate the Global Learner Blog as the Best Group Blog for the 2009 Edublog Awards. Follow the rules here and make the nomination from your personal blog. You can see my nomination here.

Who Owns Digital Content

In March Lawrence Lessig the revered Stanford Law Profesor and creator of Creative Commons delivered spellbinding TED Talk (TED stands for Technology Entertainment and Design) about the future of copyright and creativity. The talk is outstanding for three reasons: (1) He explains our modern culture so that it is easily understood, (2) he addresses issues that are relevant to us as educators and important for us to teach to our students, and (3) he is one of the best visual presenters alive (in fact, his style of presentation is called the "Lessig Method").

Phot Credit (http://flickr.com/photos/jdlasica/)

As leaders in the field of 21st Century education we can learn a lot from this talk. However, I think we can learn even more by showing this talk to our students and colleagues and absorbing their reactions. You will not regret taking 19 minutes to watch this talk.

Watch the Lessig talk and tell me what you think. What do we teach our children to respect about digital content? How do we encourage our students to experiment and participate in digital cutlrue?

Who Owns Culture in the 21st Century

I was listening to this wonderful discussion with Jeff Tweety and Lawarence Lessig around copyright law and digital media. Lawrence Lessig is a Standford Law Professor that is well known for his advocacy for reduced restrictions on copyright and for the creation of Creative Commons licensing. Jeff Tweety is the lead singer of Wilco, a band that is well-known for its effective use of the Internet to release an album in 2002 after being dropped by their record label.

The discussion at the New York Public Library focused on the legal restrictions that stunt the organic development of culture in this digital world. Today's children are clearly adept at taking music, film, or pictures and creating a "collage" that is new. An example that Lessig cited was the mixing of the Beatles White Album and Jay-Z's Black album by DJ Dangermouse into the Grey Album.

There is also this money quote from Jeff Tweety in response to whether he has a problem with people downloading his music for free: "the only people complaining are the people that are so rich I don't know why they would ever have to be paid again."

What does this all mean for public school educators? Are we required to teach children the most restrictive limits of the copyright law (sometimes called fair use) and hold them accountable for these? Or do we encourage children to be creative and engage in the creative processes that includes remixing regardless of the legal restrictions? Or do we find ways for our students to become part of the conversation with lawyers, artists, and lawmakers? What should students know about Creative Commons?

PS: I find it slightly ironic that when I went to get a photo of Wilco for this blog all the photos on their webpage are "all rights reserved".

Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bouche/194264830/

Useful Links to find Creative Commons Licensed Materials:
http://creativecommons.org/
http://www.archive.org/index.php
http://magnatune.com/
http://www.flickr.com/