Six+Million+Dollar+Tips+and+Tricks

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**Capturing a Screen Shot**
1. Hold down **Command+Shift+4** from keyboard. Your mouse pointer changes to crosshairs. 2. Click and drag part of screen you want to copy. 3. File is automatically saved to your desktop.

**Using Stickies**
1. Open Stickies using Spotlight

2. File Menu > New Note

3. Type in your Stickie.

//**Changing the Color**// Color Menu > select color from list.

//**Floating Stickie**// You can choose to have a sticky note “float” in the foreground of your computer screen to prevent it from being hidden by other document or application windows. (Stickies Help) This enables you to take notes using your stickie as you navigate through other applications because it always keeps the stickie on top. Note Menu > Floating window

//**Minimizing the Stickie**// Double-click the stickie title to minimize its contents.

**Saving to a PDF/PDF Annotation**
//**CREATING PDF’S**//

PDF stands for __P__ortable __D__ocument __F__ormat. For our purposes, this means that a PDF is a digital picture of any document that you would like to share or read. As a first step, we are going to create a PDF using OpenOffice.

1. Open up **OpenOffice** and create a “Text Document” with the content you want to use as a PDF. 2. Save that Text Document (**File -> Save** OR **Command+S**). 3. Now start the process of printing the document (**File -> Print** OR **Command + P**) but __DO NOT__ hit the Print button. 4. Instead, in the lower left hand corner, click on the small triangle next to **PDF**

5. Now click on **Save as PDF…** 6. Your OpenOffice document is now a PDF, a digital picture of your document. **__NOTE__**: Because it is a digital picture of the document, if you make any changes to the document, you need to save it again as a PDF.

//** ANNOTATING PDF’s **// // You may know that on Windows machines, Adobe is the most popular software to read PDF documents, but our Macs open PDF’s using Preview. //

1. Open **Preview**. This program is allowing you to look at the PDF, but not edit the content. If you want to edit it, you must go back to OpenOffice, make your changes there (see above), and then save it again as a PDF.

// HOWEVER, you can still ANNOTATE the content. Think of this as writing in pen or pencil on a printed piece of paper. But you are doing it digitally. //

2. Click the **Annotate** button and a small tool bar will appear at the bottom.

This Tool Bar allows you to do one of 12 things:

Arrow, Oval, Rectangle, Text, Note, Link, Highlight, Strikethrough, Underline, Color, Line Width, Font

This is a great way to have students take notes on documents you would otherwise hand out on paper!

**TitanPad**
Titan pad is a way to have students work on one document simultaneously. Works great on a big screen projector and is great for those students that do not normally participate "Verbally" It can be used for a game show. Small groups of students would work together trying to answer a question and then submitt it on Titan Pad.

1. Go to http://titanpad.com/ CLICK on the blue "create public pad" button.

2. To Share the link to this pad CLICK on the blue "Share this Pad" button. 3. This window will pop up with the link to the pad. Cut and paste this link into an email and send it off to your kiddo's. They can log in and participate. Tell them spelling counts :-)



ENJOY Titan Pad**!**

**Using Quicktime Player to Create an Audio File**
1. Open QuicktTime Player using Spotlight 2. File Menu > New Audio File



3. Click the **red button** to start recording.



4. Talk into the internal or external microphone. 5. Click the **black button** when you have finished speaking.



6. File Menu > Save As

**Customizing Firefox**
//** NEW TAB **// If you want to look at more than one thing at the same time on the Internet, hit **Command + T** to get a new tab. You can then switch between tabs (like file folder tabs) by clicking on the one you want on the top of the screen just beneath the address bar.

//** BOOKMARKING **// One way to hold on to the address for frequently used websites is to bookmark them using **Command+D** or **Bookmarks->Bookmark This Page**.

//** BOOKMARK A **////** LL TABS **// This feature allows you to bookmark any tabs you have open. If you have a number of tabs open and need to stop working, you can save all the open pages in one place. The feature also allows you to name this group of tabs so you can remember what the work / research / task you were working on when you were interrupted.

//** CHANGING PREFERENCES **// Firefox will allow you to customize the choices you make for your browser by clicking **Firefox->Preferences** or **Command + ,** The choices include: General, Tabs, Content, Applications, Privacy, Security and Advanced.

//** FULL SCREEN BROWSING **// If you would like Firefox to fill your entire screen, hit **Shift+Command+F** or **View -> Full Screen**

//** ZOOMING IN / OUT ON A WEBPAGE **// Ever have trouble reading small text on a webpage? Or is a student having a hard time seeing the screen? You can zoom in and zoom out with **Command and +** or **Command and –** to increase/decrease the font / picture size.

//** SPEED DIAL **// Speed Dial is a visual organizer for your most frequently used websites. It is your default homepage on your MacBook. Speed Dial is incredibly easy to customize and can significantly reduce the amount of time it takes for you to navigate the web. The Speed Dial “Extension” (i.e. extending Firefox’s functionality) creates a series of buttons on the screen that are links (Bookmarks) to the pages that you choose. You can choose how many buttons to show and what the buttons look like. You can also change the set up for Speed Dial at any time.

1. Open Firefox. **Control+Click** (also called “Right Click”) in the margin of your Speed Dial page. Then click on **Speed Dial Options…**

2. Put a check next to **Bookmarks Menu**. This will allow you to make a Speed Dial button for any webpage you are visiting from the **Bookmarks** menu. 3. Now you can add a webpage to your Speed Dial. Just visit that page and click on **Set As Speed Dial** under the Bookmarks menu. 4. The default setting for Speed Dial is 12 buttons. But you can add or subtract the number of available buttons by setting the number of Rows and Columns in the **Defaults** menu.

5. The default image for a button is a thumbnail version of the page. However, you may change the image for a particular button if you **Control­+Click** on that button. Then select **Edit** and put a check next to **Make Image From.** You can **Browse** to get an image from your computer or you can enter the website for an image in the blank text box. You can also change the button’s **Title** on this screen. 6. To change colors / fonts, **Control+Click** in the margin of your Speed Dial page. Click on **Edit Group** and select customized colors. There are also **Additional Style Options** available here. .