In these 169 tech-centric situations, you get an overview of pedagogy—the tech topics most important to your teaching—as well as practical strategies to address most classroom tech situations, how to scaffold these to learning, and where they provide the subtext to daily tech-infused education.

Today’s tip: 

Category: Keyboarding

Q: I’m updating grades at school. Students come in for help and I don’t want them to see what I’m doing. What’s the fastest way to hide the screen?

A:    Press “Alt+Tab” on your keyboard (or Command-Tab on a Mac). It’ll hide the window on your screen by bringing up the one you last visited.

        Use it as a verb as in, “I had to Alt+Tab when my student dropped by.”

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In these 169 tech-centric situations, you get an overview of pedagogy—the tech topics most important to your teaching—as well as practical strategies to address most classroom tech situations, how to scaffold these to learning, and where they provide the subtext to daily tech-infused education.

Today’s tip: 

Category: Keyboarding

Q: When I push ‘PrintScreen’ to take a screenshot, nothing happens. Why?

A: I have to teach this as a full lesson in class because it is so counter-intuitive; even adults don’t get it.

• When you push PrintScreen, it saves a copy of your screen to the clipboard. Then, you must tell the computer where to put it.
• For example, after pushing PrintScreen (and putting a screenshot onto your clipboard), open a new MS Word document. Paste (Ctrl+V or right click>paste or use the icon on the toolbar or Edit-paste) and a copy of your screen will appear as a picture.

It can be pasted into docs, emails, cards–wherever you’d like.  Just don’t forget to paste!

Buy the entire 169 Real-world Ways to Put Tech into Your Classroom.

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Every month, we’ll share five themed posters that you can share on your website (with attribution), post on your walls, or simply be inspired.

This month: Shortkeys

–for the entire collection of 65 posters, click here

Jacqui Murray has been teaching K-18 technology for 30 years. She is the editor/author of over a hundred tech ed resources including a K-12 technology curriculum, K-8 keyboard curriculum, K-8 Digital Citizenship curriculum. She is an adjunct professor in tech ed, Master Teacher, webmaster for four blogs, an Amazon Vine Voice, CSTA presentation reviewer, freelance journalist on tech ed topics, contributor to NEA Today, and author of the tech thrillers, To Hunt a Sub and Twenty-four Days. You can find her resources at Structured Learning.

I forget where I got this list but it’s well-suited to special needs students. Share these with those students but push them out to all students. You never know who’ll benefit:

STICKY KEYS

Sticky Keys allows keyboard shortcuts to be executed one key at a time. When a modifier key is pressed, Sticky Keys can enable it to make a sound to alert users of the fact. If the user presses two modifiers simultaneously, Sticky Keys is disabled. To enable it, Shift has to be pressed five times.

TOGGLE KEYS

Like Sticky Keys, Toggle Keys alerts users when a command key (e.g. CapsLock) is pressed by making a sound. However, the alert sounds can be sporadic in Windows 7 and 8. Some solutions may be the sound driver should be updated or a corrupted file should be fixed.

FILTER KEYS

Filter Keys is an accessibility feature to make keyboard usage easier. It regulates keystroke rates. For example, if the user presses too hard on keys, Filter Keys can prevent repetitive keystrokes by adjusting the number of seconds a key is pressed. It also can prevent users from inadvertently pressing unwanted keys if the user’s hand trembles or slides across the keyboard. Filter Keys can be enabled by pressing the right Shift for five seconds.

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In these 169 tech-centric situations, you get an overview of pedagogy—the tech topics most important to your teaching—as well as practical strategies to address most classroom tech situations, how to scaffold these to learning, and where they provide the subtext to daily tech-infused education.

Today’s tip: The Insert Key

Category: Keyboarding

Q: When I type, the new words cover up everything that comes after. I’m losing all my work as I edit. How do I fix that?

A: Push the insert key. It toggles between ‘insert’ and ‘typeover’. You are probably in ‘typeover’.

This is an option in MS Office and most programs deselect it as the default. If yours is active and you want to change that, go to

File>Options>Advanced

…and check the boxes shown in the inset.

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Dr. Bill Morgan is a frequent contributer to Ask a Tech Teacher. Today, he is sharing his experience and research on how keyboarding skills benefit other topics I found this every interesting:

Finger Dexterity

Transferable Keyboarding Skills

Dr. Bill Morgan, Ph.D.

“How do you play the piano as well as you do?” someone in the choir asked me last Sunday. The choir director had apologized as he handed me an arrangement that I had never seen before, saying, “I should have given this to you earlier.” I reassured him, “If you pick ‘em I’ll play ‘em.” I have learned to play not only all of the hymns in the book but most choir arrangements, as well. 

I have since reflected on how I had accompanied school choirs and solo ensemble students from both the band and the choir while I was still attending high school. As I was playing a Beethoven sonata my piano teacher praised the amount of practice that I had put in that week, but the truth was I had only warmed up for an hour before the lesson. While attending a junior college I was paid to accompany a choir while taking the class for credit.

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In these 169 tech-centric situations, you get an overview of pedagogy—the tech topics most important to your teaching—as well as practical strategies to address most classroom tech situations, how to scaffold these to learning, and where they provide the subtext to daily tech-infused education.

Today’s tip: 11 Great Typing Timesavers on iPads

Category: iPads

Q: Typing on the iPad keyboard is slow. How do I speed that up without buying (and installing) a separate QWERTY keyboard?

A: Here are eleven time-savers students will appreciate (as will colleagues) when using iPads. They make the strangeness of the native iPad keyboard a bit more tolerable:

• Double-tap the space bar to add a period.
• Double-tap the shift key to turn on CAPS LOCK.
• Double-tap the Home button to bring up all open apps.
• Place two fingers in the middle of the iPad keyboard and flick them to the side. This will split the keyboard making it easier to ‘thumb’ the keys (see inset—notice the half-keyboards on either side of the image).

• Shake the iPad to undo the last word you typed.
• Four-finger swipe in either direction to change apps.
• Five-finger pinch to return to the Home screen.
• Long-hold the period key to bring up extension options (.com, .net, and more). This doesn’t work in all applications.
• Long-hold many keys to get additional options. For example, long-hold the $ for other money symbols.
• Long-hold the Home button to bring up Siri.
• As you type, let the iPad correct your spelling and complete words.

Sign up for a new tip each week or buy the entire 169 Real-world Ways to Put Tech into Your Classroom.

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Every month, we’ll share five themed posters that you can share on your website (with attribution), post on your walls, or simply be inspired.

This month: Keyboarding

–for the entire collection of 65 posters, click here

Jacqui Murray has been teaching K-18 technology for 30 years. She is the editor/author of over a hundred tech ed resources including a K-12 technology curriculum, K-8 keyboard curriculum, K-8 Digital Citizenship curriculum. She is an adjunct professor in tech ed, Master Teacher, webmaster for four blogs, an Amazon Vine Voice, CSTA presentation reviewer, freelance journalist on tech ed topics, contributor to NEA Today, and author of the tech thrillers, To Hunt a Sub and Twenty-four Days. You can find her resources at Structured Learning.

I get a lot of questions from readers about what tech ed resources I use in my classroom so I’m going to take a few days this summer to review them with you. Some are edited and/or written by members of the Ask a Tech Teacher crew. Others, by tech teachers who work with the same publisher I do. All of them, I’ve found well-suited to the task of scaling and differentiating tech skills for age groups, scaffolding learning year-to-year, taking into account the perspectives and norms of all stakeholders, with appropriate metrics to know learning is organic and granular.

Today: K-8 Keyboard Curriculum

Overview

K-8 Keyboard Curriculum (four options plus one)–teacher handbook, student workbooks, companion videos, and help for homeschoolers

2-Volume Ultimate Guide to Keyboarding

K-5 (237 pages) and Middle School (80 pages), 100 images, 7 assessments

K-5–print/digital; Middle School–digital delivery only

Aligned with Student workbooks and student videos (free with licensed set of student workbooks)

Student workbooks and videos sold separately

__________________________________________________________________________

1-Volume Essential Guide to K-8 Keyboarding

120 pages, dozens of images, 6 assessments

Great value!

Delivered print or digital

Doesn’t include: Student workbooks or videos

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I met Dr. Bill Morgan through a shared interest in keyboarding for youngers (see this article on A Conversation About Keyboarding and this article on Preparing Young Students for Home Row Keyboarding: An Unplugged Approach). In each other, we found kindred spirits, both passionate about better ways to teach today’s learners.

When Bill offered an article on a new class he started that helps English Language Learners, I was excited. It’s an important issue with not enough solutions. His approach is innovative, original, easy to implement (with some effort), and effective. Read on and see if this would work in your district. He’s included contact information so you can reach him with questions:

***

Computer Literacy for English Language Learners

“Typing by the Numbers”

Dr. Bill Morgan, Ph.D.

Over the decades I have added both Educational Technology and TESOL (Teaching English as a Second Language) endorsements to my elementary teaching certificate. My graduate studies focused on integrating technology across the curriculum.

Along the way I began volunteering with various organizations, working with immigrants from other countries. One evening a man from another culture asked me how to spell a specific word. As I spelled the word out loud we both realized that the sound I was using to name a vowel was not the same sound that he was familiar with. It must have been Spanish, where letter A “always says ah,” letter E “always says ay,” etc. When I used the letter A in the spelling of a word, he heard the letter E. When I used the letter E he heard the letter I. It was nearly impossible for him to take dictation from me.

He then asked me to write words for him to copy in his notebook. He laughed out loud and then said, “You write like a doctor!” I took that to mean that he could read my handwriting no better than that of a doctor who had given him handwritten notes to read.

From then on I brought my laptop computer to class. When an adult English learner asked me to spell a word I would type the word then enlarge the font that could be read by all in the room. I didn’t need a projector nor a large screen TV, I only needed a laptop sized monitor.

Thinking of how I might integrate technology with instruction, I gathered a group of bilingual community members and started, “Computer Literacy for English Language Learners, NFP.” Find us on Facebook!

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