Many popular search engines and directories
offer an image search option. This is a great opportunity
to locate images relevant to student needs in a simple and speedy
manner.
Unfortunately not all images on the Net are suitable for general
exhibition so strategies need to be put in place to avoid students
being exposed to unwanted and unsuitable visuals.
To help students avoid misleading, unexpected or inappropriate
results it is better, particularly for younger searchers, to
use pre-selected image collections.
These image collections contain images that
are selected for inclusion in each of the image collection databases.
All are suitable for school use.
- Kids
Image Search Tools
Part of the Kid’s Click!
site, this page provides links to a number of general
image collections and special image databases.
- North
Chadderton School Global Community Gallery
A gallery of images, organised by topic such as fossils,
science, and butterflies. There are 21 albums in total,
containing almost 1,400 images which can be used freely
for non-profit, educational purposes.
- Pics4Learning
Pics4Learning is a copyright-friendly
image library for teachers and students, consisting
of thousands of images that have been donated by teachers,
students and amateur photographers.
- Picture
Australia
PictureAustralia lets you
search a range of Australian image collections, regardless
of where they are located.
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Because the Image Search option in major search
engines locates images from all over the Web, users in
schools must set the levels of filtering required to eliminate
most of the unsuitable results.
The following search engines have been listed in order
of safety.
NB: Google, the most widely used search engine, has
a safety measure that students can turn off, as does AlltheWeb.
- AltaVista/Images
AltaVista appears
to be the best-protected search engine because
of its 'Password Protection' option for its
filter preferences. It is recommended that schools
use this option so that students cannot changes
the filter settings.
The Family Filter has three preferences:
• Multimedia Only filters images,
video and audio search only.
• All filters all searches: web
pages, images, audio and video.
• None will not filter any search
If the Family Filter is in place and
adult content is detected, the searcher is alerted
to this fact and asked to choose between changing
the settings to allow adult content or seeing
results without adult content.
If a searcher chooses the unfiltered option
a message appears asking this person to certify
that they are eighteen years of age or older
and that they understand that graphic and offensive
materials may be found.
- Ditto.com
Ditto.com is a visual
search engine, enabling people to search the
Web through pictures. It claims to have taken
special measures to filter out adult sites using
proprietary technology and human intervention,
and the filter is always on.
- AlltheWeb/Pictures
AlltheWeb has an Offensive
Content Filter that can be turned on or
off.
When trialled, some images did slip through
with the Offensive Content Filter turned
on. However, if adult content is detected the
searcher is required to choose between seeing
filtered results and all the results. If ‘ALL
results’ is chosen a panic button appears
on the selected page so that it can be closed
down immediately if desired.
- Google/Images
Searchers are offered the
following options:
• Use strict filtering (Filter
both explicit text and explicit images)
• Use moderate filtering (Filter
explicit images only - default behaviour)
• Do not filter my search results.
It is recommended that each computer should
be set to the Use strict filtering option.
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| Quick links to sections
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Image Search Tools
Direct links to image collections |
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