The Best of LLESD's
Monday's Tech Tips for Classroom Needs

• If you have any students/children with visual or auditory limitations, Microsoft has tools that easily magnify and even READ printed text.

• For example:
  On a Windows-based computer (aka "PC"), when the text is too small in a browser such as Explorer or Firefox, simply hold the CTRL button down and click the "+" sign twice-- it immediately starts magnifying the screen!! TO reduce, click the ctrl and the "-" key. On a mac, It's open-apple and the plus sign to increase font size.

• Citation Maker: with the internet being the center of most  research, citing url references is important. Students can bookmark "Citation Maker" , they have an online tool that will accurately create bibliographies/citations which can be pasted into any reports. 

• Casa Notes Tool. "Casa Notes is designed to allow teachers to quickly make, and customize, typical notes that are sent home to parents or given to the students. This is done by using templates and allowing the teachers to customize some of the content, choose a color scheme and add a graphic. The notes can then be printed on a black-and-white or color printer to be used. Teachers can select whether the notes should be in English or in Spanish. "

• Quick way to make Borders on any Word Files:

1. Go to the FORMAT menu to BORDERS & SHADING
2. Click on the tab for Page Borders
3. Select the pull-down menu for ART and choose a style
4. Increase the size above to make a thicket border

• Looking to personally buy new tech "toys", like one of those great new tvs? computer? camera? phone? Make sure you do your homework and not have the salesman convince you the model he needs to clear off his shelf is the best for you!  Check out CNET.com for the most current "consumer reports" for electronics. It's easy to compare features on products and when you are ready to shop for price it lists most the storesyou'd be heading to shop at and gives their comparitive price ON the product you want!!
• Or if you know what you want, for any product, go to Bizrate.com to see most stores or sites (even Best Buy & Amazon) that carry that product and at what they price it at. I did a test run on a 42" plasma and found 16 prices that spanned $1100 to $1600--sameeee tv!!! (and fyi, Amazon was one of the higher for that and would add shipping!)

• Keep paragraphs from splitting to separate pages in Microsoft Word documents

• Two versions saved of the same document in Word? What's the difference in them?

1. Open the first document
2. Select TOOLS>TRACK CHANGES>COMPARE DOCUMENTS
3. Open the second document. Word will mark all the inserted, deleted and changed text!!

• How to remove the greater than symbols from forwarded email messages?

1. Copy and paste the email message into a MS Word document.
2. Place your cursor on the top > (greater than) sign.
3. Hold down the Alt (Windows) or Option key (Mac) and with the mouse drag down to highlight the > greater than) symbols that you want to delete.
4. Press Delete. The "greater than" symbols are gone!

• How to draw quick lines in Word?

• At the Education World website , you can be download numerous templates, save to your hard drive, edited as necessary, and then print. Or they can be downloaded, printed, and used as is!! Check out the categories that have dozens of templates there!

• Did you know the "Links" section of our district website has hundreds of great sites on pages of topics that I've collected over the years? If you see others you'd like listed in our site, please forward them to me. Encourage students and families to visit the resources which support our curriculum for any extended learning wishes.

How Stuff Works   Hundreds of cool articles
JungleWalk   Tons of audio, video, web sites for jungle lovers
Virtual Fish Tank    Build-Your-Own-Fish online and release them into the Virtual FishTank(TM) exhibit at the Museum Of Science, Boston
Switcheroo Zoo   Switch the animals' heads, legs and tails to make new creatures at this surrealistic virtual zoo
ReviseWise Science  From the BBC - Living things, Materials, Physical Processes, Games
Playing with Time  Slow time down in several examples and watch what happens!
Devices of Wonder Interactive site. Cool stuff from the last 4 centuries!
Biology in Motion Grades 7-12 A collection of learning activities,  animations, and cartoons
exZooberance Animal pictures and facts
  Edheads Interactive science activities. Try Virtual Knee Surgery!
Peep Research  Answers to all your 'Peep' questions! Use this site to intro Scientific Method ;-)
Zoobooks  Click on Kids for interesting info on animals
QX5 Computer Microscope Every classroom needs one!  Software update for QX3
Extreme Science  Find the biggest, baddest, best in the world
Build a Solar System  Make a scale model  5th/6th
  Foss Human Body  Human skeleton assembly kit
Planets, Moons, and Their Dark Sides
  BBC School Science Clips Interactive Flash Science activities
Life Cycles of plants, frogs, humans
Learn to Be Healthy  1-6 FREE activities & lessons
NEW!  The Amazing Food Detective (gr 4-6) Interactive games, lessons, activities - a complete unit
NEW! Knowledge Bears Info about animals, dinosaurs, geography, space, weather, and more. Good place to start research.

• Unleash a child's imagination. Here's a website of popular books from school libraries where students go in to write their own "next chapter"...not only does it get their imagination and writing skills blossum, but they enjoy reading the chapters that others have written (and commenting on those). EXCEPTIONAL site for most grades...331,325 kids have added their chapters to the Harry Potter stories alone!! :) 

• Here's a Site known as "stuff for Classroom teachers"...because it indeed is!! GREAT resources for many needs indeed. One of the best I've seen actually:
  http://www.edzone.net/%7Emwestern/stuff.html
  
  If you teach ANY science, anatomy, or just want your student's or your own mind amazed at how our body realllyyyy works?  (seen Body World?...you've love this)....check out http://www.visiblebody.com/
  
  

• Here's how to speed up your email loading:
  Email speed--working within Mirapoint Inbox:
  Your Email inbox should really only have tops of 300 emails that are not stored in folders--if you have over that, you are going to experience a major slowdowns since ALLLL  emails will be loading each time the screen refreshes. 
  a fix:  The "inbox" should just be essentially a holding tank--it's where they come before you decide their fate of storing or deleting.  If you are one to insist on saving most and can't/won't sort emails you receive by topic/needs, at least make folders labeled by years (or months) to store them away. ie "07-08 emails". You'll still be able to sort by date, name, etc, and do a "search" to find anything within the folder.
  how?  In "Options>Settings>Emails", elect to show 100 (or more) emails per page, not the default of 20. Apply/close. In your "My Folders" add a new folder to the name/topic you want. In email inbox click the top left box in the top title bar--that clicks the boxes all ALL emails on that page...then elect to "Move to" the folder you made. It cleans them up and OUT!!!   
  result: Your emails inbox works as it should...fast. You're more organized!
  Important reminder side note?: Email is for academic and LLESD work related needs only, for student/parent/teacher/staff/ professional communications. Per the signed acceptable use agreements, the systems and servers are managed by the district, for district needs. Personal emails, online purchases and non-LLESD email (done on personal time) through our computers should be routed only through to a personal email account, like Yahoo, gmail, etc, and STILL require compliance to the Acceptable Use Agreement since they route through our systems.

• System Restore Option  (on XP Windows / PC machines):  This weekend I became a victim of some nastyyy spyware that loaded when I literally misclicked a location (on the Bart site--long-term parking info) and I caught the ad, that leaped into downloads of spyware. Within minutes I had boxes telling me I could fix it with Spyware fixer A or B. Boxes popping up everywhere. YES, it happens to everyone :)
  
  After I took a deep breath and shunned off some panic attacks, I remembered the "System Restore Option".  I had to go to the HELP menu to remember how to do it, but with 5 new clicks, it restored my computer to where it last did the "restore point"--I have it set to everynight 9pm. Yes, I'd emailed off the Word/Excel files I'd done that day (to myself). But I was soon "back" to Friday night's clean machine. and breathing again. So for your home sanity (and double-check your work machine), I suggest you make sure your machine has System Restore turned "on"!!!
  
  Use this option if you ever overwrite anything absolutely critical too--a thesis or sorts (but hopefully you have backups on flash drives, etc...and emailed them to yourself also). It RESTORES your machine to a specific day/time.
  
  So MAKE sure System Restore is turned on! Right click on your "My computer" icon.  Click on the bottom option of "Properties". Click on the tab of "System Restore". You should check that the checkbox of  "Turn off system restore" is UNchecked.
  
  To access the System Restore Wizard, click Start, and then click Help and Support. Click Performance and Maintenance, click Using System Restore to undo changes, and then click Run the System Restore Wizard.

• A website that allows you to generate your own bogus newspaper clippings that look amazingly authentic: http://www.fodey.com/generators/newspaper/snippet.asp !!!

Icebreakers : For use with icebreakers and other classroom lessons and activities.

• Apple and Worm
  Apple Activity assesses students' ability to follow directions. (K-2)
• Apple Note Pad
  Send home notes on Apple Note Pads for Parents. (all ages)
• Bingo Card
  Play Getting to Know You Math or Bingo Scavenger Hunt. (3-8)
• Cupcake
  Make a Happy Birthday Graph. (K-5)
• Fish
  Learn about their favorite things with Fish Go to School Too. (2-8)
• License Plate
  Discover who they are with Personalized License Plates. (6-12)
• Trading Card
  You don't have to hit the pros to get your face on a Trading Card.
• Shapebook Lined
  
• Shapebook Unlined
  Kids write about what they know and explore the shape of the future. (K-5)
• Wanted Poster
  Wanted Posters display what makes students special. (3-12)

• Do you ever receive an Email from a company about your account???...and think it's a fraud? Here's a site to report these or what to do it you become a victim. Remember, only ONE phone call to the company mentioned will confirm if they've sent it to you---call the number YOU have in your records or find online from their corporate site, not the one in their email :)

• Casa Notes Tool
• "Casa Notes is designed to allow teachers to quickly make, and customize, typical notes that are sent home to parents or given to the students. This is done by using templates and allowing the teachers to customize some of the content, choose a color scheme and add a graphic. The notes can then be printed on a black-and-white or color printer to be used. Teachers can select whether the notes should be in English or in Spanish. "

• Your cell phone camera is far more useful than just for family Kodak moments... How about pulling it out when you are in any of those massive parking lots (i.e. Disneyland) to take a cell-camera photo of your parking lot sign--you'll never wonder if it was in Pluto or Goofy you parked at THIS time!!
  Or. for non-SmartBoard teachers, you put the perfect "unsolvable" math problem on the board, take the quick photo!
  Or. Police say that if more people remembered to pull out their cell to take the photo of the scenes of their accidents (probably caused by talking on them), there would be less debates and court time!

• Puzzlemaker online tools version is free--(they always have a box where they list the tools and that one side is free, or you can buy a cd that runs it all--I suggest using that very complete phenomenal FREE side!)
  

Create puzzles online for math & vocabulary use in classroom or home use--you can even let the KIDS make them and swap them in class!!

Hidden Message

1. Open the webpage itself
2. Go to the Bookmark>Bookmark this page dialog box
3. In the "Create in" line, use the pulldown menu to elect to put this on the Bookmarks Toolbar, and not simply in a Bookmarks.
4. done :) Your shortcut now rests on your browser window interface and accessible anytime with one click