There is lots of confusion about what is and isn't legal when it comes to using images from the Internet as part of student work or classroom instruction. In general, the "fair use" exceptions under international copyright law state that it is acceptable for an individual (teacher or student) to incorporate images into their work as long as they meet the following criteria:

No more than one image from a site, unless specific permission has been granted for more

All images used are credited and cited (if the project has a bibliography)

Images are not altered, unless permitted under copyright licensing

The images are not used for commercial purposes, unless specifically authorized by the image owner

Please click here to see a complete explanation of the Fair Use Guidelines for educational multimedia and copyright.

Finding images:

The easiest way to search for images which have already been approved for fair use is to use one of the three tools below. Each site allows users to filter searches for the kinds of images they want, including file size, file type, and permission status. Of the three, flickr will provide the most results, and its results make up the bulk of searches done with Google Images and the Creative Commons search.

Flickr

Google Images

Creative Commons Search