USING PHOTOS  

• Photos can make your webpage alive!!
• Students often love to see themselves on web pages and are proud that you want to have a photo of them.
• You need to be in the photos with your students.
• Photo essays can tell a story in a succinct way that is invaluable.
• It may well be worth the effort to use a permission request to get the photos you will use in a more private version of your portfolio or a public version.

QUESTIONS TO ANSWER BEFORE ADDING A PHOTO

1. Does this image increase the comprehension or demonstration.

2. How will others be accessing the image, through a modem or via broadband (Remember everything uploaded must get downloaded. The larger the picture, the larger the file size. Larger files take longer to upload and download and may not be worth the time to load.  (when using photos RESIZE BEFORE uploading to a webpage.)

3. Is the image quality of the photo good?

4. Do you have permission to use the images?  Clip art is less formal and can detract from quality of pages and if taken from a resource on the internet may not show up on your webpages.  Photographs of students MUST HAVE PHOTO RELEASE forms. A way to use photos without releases may be to use photographs that do not reveal faces.

5. Is the image file a more effective or efficient means to communicate the information or is it just replacing a more effective method? 

6. Photos can be worth a thousand words; however most photos need texts to explain the context or situation as well as name the people.  Also in teaching portfolio a paragraph of text by a photo can reveal teaching in action and can show teacher reflection.

7. Consider using small photos that can be selected if a viewer wishes to see larger photos.

8. Consider photo essays to tell stories.