Copyright is an important issue, and one that ALL teachers must know about. You have to know the restrictions in your local area, as well as the restrictions that are placed on particular items. Do NOT ignore this issue, as you could wind yourself in a lot of hot water for copying the wrong things!

Let’s say you’ve got a class of about 25 music students and they all need a theory book or you need to photocopy a set of worksheets for a whole class. Now as music teachers, we’re probably all very aware that you can’t just go and photocopy a whole printed music theory book.

Why?

It’s illegal. And quite frankly, it should be too. Authors and Publishers deserve to be paid for the time and effort in writing books. In most countries it is illegal to copy more than 10% of any published work, so you just can’t go and make copies of whole theory workbooks for your students.

So with this in mind, lets look at some alternatives:

Get the School to pay for Theory Books
This could work in some schools, but for others, it’s far too expensive! Consider each book costs at least $10 (and least). So if the school pays for it, it costs the school at least an extra $250..and at a time where many schools are cutting music education, you’ll be lucky to work for a school that can afford to pay this extra money for each student.

Get each student to purchase their own book and use it.
If your school puts this extra cost into the students yearly book allowance this can work, but if you’re asking each family to buy an extra book, let’s face it in most schools there are some students that will and some that won’t- so you’ll be left with some who never have books! If you ask the students or parents to get to the shops to get the book – then good luck! It will take weeks before the whole class has the book – if you’re lucky!

Write your Own Book
Now here’s a solution that could free you of the copyright issue. If you write the materials yourself, you will own the rights to the book so copyright won’t be a problem and you’ll be ably to copy as much as you need. The issue with this though is TIME! Who has enough of it? To sit down after a full teaching day to write a theory book, let alone make it look professional is a huge ask of yourself.

At the Fun Music Company, we want to make it easier (and CHEAPER) for you.

As a former music teacher, I always wanted a music theory book license rather than an individual theory book, but I could never find one. What I always wanted was to be allowed to print out as many copies as I needed for my own teaching purposes. I didn’t understand why a publisher didn’t come up with reproducible materials that I could just purchase a license to print out what I needed.

So this was the whole reason why we came up with Printable Music Theory Books. It’s designed as a license rather than a book and once you get it, you can print out the materials as many times as you need for your teaching.

Recently, we’ve run a survey to find out from teachers who have purchased Printable Music Theory Books how they’re getting on with using it and what they find most useful about it.

What we found was 95% of Printable Music Theory Book users purchased it so they could be free of copyright restrictions.

Here’s what people had to say about it in the survey:

“One the many things that I like about it is that I can print the materials as many times as I want-no more purchasing theory books for my students or asking them to buy books”
“It is good because I don’t have to ask parents to buy as many books because I can just print them out”

What are your thoughts on the issue of copyright restrictions placed on music teachers? Do copyright issues affect you in your teaching? How do you get around it? I would love to hear your views on copyright and how it affects you in your music teaching!

P.S. The same survey found that 90% of all users were also “Extremely Satisfied” or “Very Satisfied” with their purchase of Printable Music Theory Books – So why don’t you give it a try? You are covered by our no-questions-asked money back guarantee, so buy it, give it a try and see if it suits your teaching. If it doesn’t, then no stress, just contact us and we’ll give you a refund.

Printable Music Theory Books