Take a Fresh Look at Google

It’s probably the site we visit most often, probably several times a day! So we all know what to expect at Google.co.uk right? Well, here are some tricks that might have passed you by…

Let’s do a search for, let’s say, dogs. We enter “dogs” into the search box, hit enter and get a list of sites. If you look at the top of the list there’s a Show Options button. Ever clicked it? Go on, be brave! The list that then unfolds contains a few hidden gems. You can narrow the search results by type (video, news etc) or time, but it’s the views that interest me.

Under Standard view you have the option to show Related Searches, show a Wonder Wheel or a Timeline. Related searches just gives us the information we usually see at the bottom of a Google search page, but the Wonder Wheel is an interesting feature. It presents connections between related searches and your search term as an interactive diagram. Click the different nodes in the diagram to see how searches can branch out.

The Timeline

is handy view if you’re researching information about a historical person or event.

You can click any section in the timeline to zoom in on that time period. Want to change the time range? Click Search other dates above the timeline to enter new start and end dates. Alternatively, click the date links below the timeline to see results that mention that particular year, month, or day.

I’ll post a few other hidden features of Google in the near future, but I’ll finish this post with a great free resource from Google itself. If you want to learn more about how searching works and become a more efficient searcher, Google has published a set of lesson plans. These are well worth everyone looking at and would form the basis of a series of lessons for KS2 pupils (but they would need adapting to suit the age and ability of children). They can be found here.

Teaching Typing Skills

Since the publication of the Renewed Framework for Literacy and Mathematics, the issue of children learning to type has come back to the fore. Strand 12 (Presentation) of the Literacy Learning Objectives states that children should use a computer keyboard to enter text. Year 1 asks for children to use the space bar and to type their name; Year 4 objectives state that children should be increasing their typing speed and accuracy; Year 6 are expect to select from a wide range of ICT programs to present their text effectively.

There are a lot of programs that teach ‘Touch Typing’ – teaching the children the ‘Home Keys’ and then presenting a series of drill exercises usually made up of dull repetitive sentences, “sad; dad; lad” etc. While there is a place for such exercises, it is perhaps more relevant for children to initially be taught keyboard familiarity rather than touch typing. One tool for developing keyboard familiarity is Keyboard Crazy (see our discounts page).

Children do need to be shown how to place both hands on the keyboard at all times and to use all their fingers. This should be started from an early age in order to prevent bad habits that will hamper development later.

Children of course need to learn the location of the keys so that they can find them without thinking. However, true fluent typing will only happen once the children have reached a certain level of reading and spelling proficiency. It is asking rather a lot of a child to compose a sentence in their head, work out how to spell it and then to find the individual letters on the keyboard – that’s a lot of skills and knowledge!

So my advice?

• Ensure that the children have regular opportunity to practice and at the early stages, ideally daily.
• Children should be taught keyboard familiarity – i.e. where the keys are. This can be done away from the computer with paper or plastic keyboard templates and bingo or quiz style games.
• Ensure all teachers encourage children to have both hands on the keyboard at all times and are aware of good posture and typing techniques.
• Use the thumbs for the space bar.
• Children should be using the right hand for pressing keys on the right hand side of the keyboard and the left hand for keys on the left hand side. If they keep both hands on the keyboard then this comes more naturally.
• Use the shift key (not Caps Lock) and two hands for creating capital letters i.e. one finger from one hand (preferably the little finger) hold down one of the shift keys while a finger on the other hand presses the appropriate letter.  Caps Lock should only be used for sustained typing in capitals.
• Begin teaching more formal typing from the end of Year 3 upwards when reading and spelling levels are up to the challenge.
• Encourage children to watch the screen more than their fingers as their skills increase.
• Encourage support from home and try to make it as enjoyable as possible.

Take a look too at this blog post from ICT Inspirations.

Here are some relevant links to typing tutors, resources and software:

Free Keyboard familiarity sites

www.abcya.com/keyboard (Drag the keys to the correct location on the keyboard.)

www.freewebs.com (hit the letter shown on the keyboard)

Free tutors (online)

www.bbc.co.uk/schools/typing (Best with headphones!)

www.powertyping.com (The lessons are a bit dull, but the games are good!)

www.typing-lessons.org (A comprehensive site for teachers that will explain the principles of good typing. Plus there are some colourful charts that might be useful.)

www.ukspeller.com (simple interface, but effective)

Free software download

Tux Typing (An open source typing tutor for children.)

Commercial Products

Keyboard Crazy (a wildly used and researched product to teach keyboard skills. Banes Schools discount available). It is a non-computer based resource and can be used to support other curriculum areas.

2Type (A simple and attractive effective typing tutor from 2Simple with with a good range of activities. Banes Schools discount available)

Type with Tizzy (Sherston’s ever popular Tizzy character teaches typing for KS1. Click here for a demo.  Banes Schools discount available)

Easi Keysi (Sherston’s KS2 typing Tutor. Click here for a demo. Banes Schools discount available)

Screenshots from Windows Media Player

Since moving from Windows XP to Vista I have had a lots of reasons to be searching on the internet for fixes to various problems I have encountered. Here is a fix I found recently – not vista related but very useful.

Ever tried to print screen from windows media player and just got a black screen here is the answer.  Very useful for taking stills into other programs for discussion with students.Free simple way to capture Images from Windows Media Player

• Open Window Media Player
• Then go to Tools | Options
• In Options, select the Performance Tab
• Way below you click on the Advanced Button
• Uncheck “Use Overlays’
• Click Ok
• And you are ready.

Now run your movie in any size or screen resolution. Use the standard ‘Print Screen Key’ Method as described and you have captured a snapshot from your favourite movie on windows media player without using any special multimedia software

Creating Custom Image Headers in WordPress

Following on from our highly successful Subject Leaders’ Meeting last termlet, many of you asked “How do I get my school logo into my blog’s header?” – or similar. If you want to replace WordPress’s headers with one of your own like we have, then here’s what you need to do.

Firstly, using a paint program design your header. Set up the image size to be 760 x 200 pixels (look for Page Setup in the File menu, or look for Attributes in the image menu). Once you’ve created your eye-catching header save it as a .jpg file.

In WordPress, login and go to Site Admin and then select Presentation followed by Custom Image Header. Upload your newly created image using the upload tool.

You should now see your header, but you’re also likely to see your Blog’s name and tag line written over the top. This is because your header is effectively a background and WordPress still insists on putting your Blog’s header text over the top. This may or may not fit in with your image.

If you want to hide the Blog’s tag line, click on the Hide Text button below the header.

To hide the Blog’s Title, go to Color Header (next to Custom Image Header) and click the Advanced tab below the header. You then have a Toggle Text Display button. Click that to turn the text off.

You should now have a just your image showing in your header. Remember to save your changes at each stage. If you want to restore everything back to how it was, click on Restore Original Header on the Custom Image Header screen.

Finally, Freewebpageheaders.com has some…, guess what? Free web page headers! They might not be exactly the right size (800×200 instead of 760 x 200), but they more than make up for it quality. You can use them under the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial licence.