Welcome to Our New Space

 

The SCS Tech-Media News has moved. We've been pondering how to make our information more available and we want to try this format. It's a blog, created with our cssu.org domain. If you would like to get notification when a new item is posted, then subscribe--you can subscribe with email, or with an RSS feed. We may also send you a reminder occasionally when we have several new posts.

Microsoft Office Will Stay

     If you've been reading our SCS Tech-Media News, or even just heard the word, we--as part of a CSSU program--were going to remove Microsoft Office from our computers and begin to rely on Google Docs and Open Office. Between the time this decision was made and real transition was beginning, Microsoft agressively lowered their prices. The new pricing makes it afforable to stay with Office instead of moving to Open Office and providing training for the move.
     Discussions about whether we stay with Office 07 or move to Office 10 are now underway. There are advantages to both systems. We will keep you posted on the news when a decision is made. For now, Office will be with us, although we are encouraging folks to use Google Docs for most tasks--it's more easily accessible and performs most of the tasks we use everyday.

Webpage Readability in Google

Finding online resources that are written at a reading level that works for students is difficult at times. With Destiny Quest, we can search for books by readabiity. Some student search engines will filter their results
     There are several sites designed for younger students, including
KidsClick.org
KIds.Yahoo.com
Quinturakids. oom
KidRex.org     These are great with younger students, but for older students, Google now offers a readability option. There are only three settings: basic, intermediate, and advanced,  and the basic is not terribly low. But the basic results are usually clearly written or in a video or image format. T access the readability feature choose advanced search. Click on reading level under Need more tools?