Gathering Internet Addresses for Later Reference
As students and staff come across sites that they would like to reference as part of their multimedia writing project, encourage them to keep track of those sites by setting a "bookmark" in Netscape or by copying and pasting the addresses from their Internet browser application into a word processing document, like Word. This is fairly straightforward and also will give them practice is using common computer skills such as switching between open applications as well as copying and pasting. 

Multimedia Fair Use at a Glance
Probably the most used resource from the Internet for multimedia-writing projects are the graphic images. More and more sites are making their image collections available for educational use. In addition, more sites are using images as part of their HTML pages to enhance their readability and these images can be used as part of projects as well. Please respect an author's copyright on these Internet resources.  In every case, it's important that students and staff cite these resources appropriately.  Taking things off of the Web and using them in classroom projects is OK, but posting them back on to the Internet is generally not. Even if there is no copyright notice on someone else's page, images, etc., ask the author (copyright owner) for written permission before you copy the text or pictures to place on other pages that are going to placed on the Internet. To find out more about "Copyright and Fair Use" talk with a librarian.

Authoring for curriculum-based projects may include materials from CDs, books, the Internet, and other sources.  The resulting projects cannot be distributed outside the "classroom community", although they can be shared with family members since students' homes are considered to be part of the learning community.

Retrieving Graphic Images

1. Have the Internet page containing the graphic image you wish to use visible in your browser application.

2. While "hovering" or "floating" the cursor on the graphic you want, click the right mouse button to see the built-in menu from the browser.

3. Choose Save Picture As...and you'll be able to save the image file into the directory (folder) that you choose.

4. Before you hit the "Save" button, you may want to rename the file with a different name so it gives an indication of what the file represents when you use it later on.

Gathering Text from the Internet
Retrieving text from the Internet can be accomplished in two ways. You can use the "highlight" method to save only portions of the text on a page or save the entire page as a text file.  Make sure to open both your browser and your word processing application before following these steps. 

1. Highlight the text on the page using the standard "click and drag" method.

2. Use the Copy command in the Edit Menu or use the buttons Control-C.

3. Use the task bar to switch from your browser application to your word processing file.

4. Use the Paste command in the Edit Menu or Control-V to place the text in your word processing file.

OR

1. Have the page with the desired text showing in your browser.

2. Use the Save As command in the File Menu.

3. Make certain you choose Text as the format.

In both cases, the text will contain some extra spaces that will take some editing to clean up and make the text truly usable in your multimedia writing project. 

Gathering Other Resources from the Internet
Other resources, such as sounds, movies, and animations can also be retrieved for local use with a similar process. 

1. Have the Internet page containing the resource you wish to retrieve visible in your browser application.

2. While "hovering" or "floating" the cursor on the file you want, click the right mouse button to see the built-in menu from the browser.

3. Choose Save Target As, and you'll be able to save the file into the directory (folder) that you choose.

4. Before you hit the "Save" button, you may want to rename the file with a different name other than the default so it gives an indication of what the file represents when you use it later on.

The techniques described above will enable students and staff to retrieve all forms of Internet resources and use them as needed in their multimedia writing projects. With all of the data available on the Internet, it will be a task not to "fill up" these projects too quickly without truly evaluating the information for appropriateness. Use these elements selectively and sparingly to keep them effective at enhancing your presentation.

Try this address for some suggested places to find graphics to use in presentations and projects:
http://k-12.pisd.edu/techs/train.htm and click on "Finding Images and Graphics on the Internet".