Find images you can legally use

We all use images in our lessons whether we are putting them in our presentations or students are using them in their projects.  It is important that we are not taking images that the creator didn't give us permission to use.  It is very easy to take images from a website and to justify our use under the guise of fair use.  The fair use doctrine was create to allow copyrighted works to be used fro classroom instruction (among other things).  Many teachers believe this means that they can use anything in their classrooms and this is not true.  I'm not here to discuss the ins and outs of fair use, but if you want to learn more you can visit this site from the US Copyright Office.

While, many times I am covered under fair use when I use images for my teacher, I like to be sure that I am covered.  To do so you can filter your searches in your search engine to include ones that are licences for your to use.  While each site uses slightly different language here are some ideas as to what each term means.

• Public Domain - the creator has basically waived all copyright rights
• Free to share and use - you can use it and share (but not change it) for personal purposes only
• Free to share and use commercially - you can use it and share it for personal or commercial purposes
• Free to modify, share and use: you can use, edit and share it for personal purposes only
• Free to modify, share and use commercially - you can use, edit and share it for personally or commercial purposes 

Here are some short animated gifs that show you how to find these search filters on a few different search engines.

Google

Bing

Yahoo