Words & Music
•
Country Music Hall of Fame® and Museum
10) Copyright and Post-Unit Reflections OBJECTIVES Students will reflect on their songwriting experience.
•
Students will be introduced to the basics of the business side of songwriting.
•
Students will apply their songwriting experience to a discussion about illegal downloading. VOCABULARY copyright, illegal downloading, publisher, royalty
PREPARATION Make copies of Copyright Laws and Royalties Worksheet. Ensure students have access to calculators.
STANDARDS CCSS.ELA-Literacy.CCRA.R.7 Integrate and evaluate content presented in diverse media and formats, including visually and quantitatively, as well as in words.
FREE WRITE (5 minutes) BRAINSTORM
(1 minute)
Prompt: In your journal, spend one minute writing down all the ways you listen to or download music.
ACTIVITY
(35-40 minutes)
1. Ask students the following questions to initiate a discussion about their songwriting experience: • Did you enjoy your songwriting experience? Why or why not? • What, if anything, was difficult about the process? • What, if anything, surprised you about the process? • How did you feel when you completed your song? Proud? A sense of accomplishment? Surprised at what you could create? 2. Explain to students that one way songwriters make their living is through earning a royalty . This is the part of the profit from music sales that is paid to writers to compensate them for their work. When music consumers download pirated songs for free that otherwise are for sale on legitimate websites, they deprive songwriters of their income. Illegal downloading is the act of obtaining files from the Internet that one does not have the right or permission to use. A copyright gives songwriters legal protection when their work is illegally downloaded. With a copyright, creators have the legal right to use and distribute their original intellectual property, thus enabling compensation. To protect profits, the music industry often files lawsuits to stop illegal downloads or collect payment from people who illegally download.
COPYRIGHT AND POST-UNIT REFLECTIONS
51
