Sound Gecko: Read the Web with Your Ears!

www.soundgecko.com

This great site was recommended by one of our fantastic first grade teachers at Angling Road...Thanks Johnna Kline!

I spend a lot of time in my car....A LOT! One thing that gets me through all that time behind the wheel is listening to the radio. Music and NPR are frequently the companions that get me through the day. There are also a ton of web articles out there that I have bookmarked to read....if I ever spend enough time at my desk to partake in that particular activity. What if I could listen to these articles while I am driving from place to place instead of having to sit at my desk and read them...SWEET!

This is where Sound Gecko comes in!

Sound Gecko is a great app/website that will take websites and articles on the internet and read them aloud. There is a free version that will allow you to listen to 30 articles a day, or you can upgrade to the premium subscription for $2.95 per month for unlimited listening and many other fancy features.

Now this isn't just great for our personal use. Imagine what a great tool it could be for our students, especially those who struggle with reading and/or need things read to them as part of an accommodation in an IEP. They can do research and put the sites into Sound Gecko, stick in their ear buds and be ready to rock.

This site is SO easy to use. All you need to do is enter (I prefer copy and paste) the website address (URL) for the site you want read to you. You then enter your email and you are off and running. So simple!

There are apps for Apple devices, Android devices, Windows Phone and there is even an extension in the Chrome web store that would send a web page to Sound Gecko with the click of a button (great for chromebooks!)

Check it out today, and let us know how you might use it with your students!

Comments

Google Docs: Fonts for Early Elementary

Sample of search results from fonts.google.com A couple weeks ago, I was sitting in a training with a bunch of my favorite lower elementary teacher friends, and several of them were lamenting the fact that it is hard to find "good" Google fonts for the little people they work with on a daily basis. Specifically, it is a challenge to find the single story lower case a and the open 4 . This conversation, of course, sent me out on a mission to remedy this for these fantastic people. So, the next day I put on my headphones, turned up the tunes on Spotify, and dived into the website fonts.google.com . This website lists all the Google fonts available. It also allows you to type in your own letters and numbers and see them in all the various fonts. For my purpose, I typed in "abckgy 1234 This is the font." From here I could see all 877 fonts, and look specifically for the a and the 4. It was quite an adventure, and I came across a lot of really awesome font

It's time to change your password!

There are several times a year when it is important to change your password. Your password will expire every 90 days. When your windows computer informs you that your password will be expiring soon, CHANGE IT THEN! It is also always a good idea to change your password before going on break so that you do not get locked out of your computer, email or gradebook. Here is how you change your password from the school windows computers. On your Windows desktop/TEC computer , press the Alt, Ctrl and Delete buttons at the same time. Click on "Change a Password" on the menu below: Enter your username, if needed, and follow the directions on screen. If you are off site or working solely on a Chromebook , you can use the VDI (Virtual Desktop) to change your password. Simply go to vdi.portageps.org. Click "VMware Horizon HTML Access." Click "Accept." Login with your portage username (leave off the @portageps.org) and password. Click "Login." Cli

Skyward Tech Tip: Unlocking a Closed Grade Period

Have you recently attempted to change a grade from last quarter only to be met with the statement “ This Grade Period is closed for Grade Entry “? This occurs because the date for the end of a marking period or quarter has past and that grading period has been locked in the Skyward Gradebook. Below you will find the process for changing term grades, assignment scores, and other information from past grading periods. Google Docs Version Go to your gradebook Let’s start with the gradebook for the class where you need to make a change. In this example, we will be adding a score to a missing assignment and removing the incomplete grade from the quarter grade. (Note: The process to open or unlock the gradebook is the same regardless the change you need to make.) This change will be made for marking period three, Q3. In that marking period column, click on the “Options” dropdown button. From the Options dropdown, choose “Grade Posting Status for Term QX”, whe

PPS Instructional Technology

Search This Blog