Despite the name, this website has nothing to do with the trading of shares (not that such a premise would not be without its education merits!).  Stock.XCHNG is a website that instead deals with the trading of digital photos.  More often than not, the process is generally one-way (you, downloading the photos of your choice), but there is the option of uploading pictures of your own or even pictures that the students have taken.  Source the easy-to-use search engine at SXC and you can have dozens of copyright-free pictures on any topic within seconds.
Some of you might be reading this overview, wondering at its relevance.  Perhaps you, like many other teachers, simply tap into Google Images to quickly scour through thousands of websites to find a suitable picture or clip art for your presentation or newsletter.  What many teachers don’t realise is that, without proper referencing, this can be illegal.  And yet, because the quick search/paste method of digital photography is so painless, many teachers (and members of society at large) have become entirely too comfortable with infringing the creative rights of photographers and individuals the world over.  Perhaps now you are starting to see the merits of a website entirely comprised of copyright-free, easy to download images.
Stock.XCHNG has a pleasing variety of images for you to search through, more so than some other “free” websites.  It could and probably should therefore be one of the first places you start your search for digital images for integration in the classroom.
Teaching students the ethics associated with utilising technology, particularly web-based material, is one of the forefront issues in recent curriculum.  It is therefore vital that as educators, we model the same expectations we have for the students.

Stock.XCHNG is teacher and student friendly and its use should be considered by time and copyright conscious classrooms everywhere.

If you would like to learn more about using Stock.XCHNG in your classroom click here for your free guide.