The Answer

We’ve made some changes to the way you can access our extremely popular Tutor.com Live Homework Help resource. In order to make sure that everyone has equal access to our stable of live tutors, we’ve had to set up a few restrictions. Here goes:

• All Live Homework Help users now need to create a Tutor.com account. When you first log in to the service, Tutor.com will prompt you for your name, library card number, and prompt you to create a password. You can then use this account to access Live Homework Help from anywhere, including the mobile app.
• All users are limited to 5 tutoring sessions per week.
• Did we mention the mobile app? You can now download Tutor.com to your iOS or Android device, or access Live Homework Help through the Skokie Public Library app.

We know it’s a pain to create yet another password. But in the long run, it will make it much easier for you to access Tutor.com, and make sure everyone has a chance to use Live Homework Help.

Questions? Need help? Please let us know.

Languages Students in Skokie Speak at Home Fall 2011 (with attachments)

Are you traveling with kids on your next vacation? Are they balking about going with you?  Here is a new series of travel books designed especially for your younger companions to involve and interest them in their journey.  Published by Lonely Planet, we own the entire Not-For-Parents series including New York, Paris, London, and Rome. These books are filled with unusual facts and trivia that you wouldn’t usually find in “regular” travel books.  Even if you aren’t going anywhere, these are fun to browse through for any age. Find these and other travel books on the second floor in the travel alcove.

The Visual Thesaurus is an interactive dictionary and thesaurus which creates word maps that show the various meanings of a word and branch to related words. Its innovative display and thought-provoking articles encourage exploration and learning and helps users to understand language in a new way.

Check it out, it is really fun to see the web between words!

American History in Video provides an online collection of over 5,000 videos available for the study of American history. The collection features documentaries and series from The History Channel®, A&E Network®, and Biography Channel®. Several types of videos including documentaries, newsreels, and public affairs programs have been chosen to provide a well-rounded collection for historical study. Text transcripts of the videos are available and searchable. A tool is included that allows users to make video clips and and link to them from a multimedia presentation.

We know you love our wireless network. Some of you have even been spotted sitting in our parking lot after hours, laptops aglow. With more people coming into the library armed with laptops, netbooks, tablets, smart phones, and eReaders, we’ve got to make sure that we can keep the flow of sweet bandwidth going.

To that end, we have recently completed a major upgrade on our wireless Internet access points. The new network is faster, more efficient, and compatible with both 802.11g and 802.11n network standards.

But like all too-good-to-be-true deals, there’s a catch. We’re calling the new network “SkokieLibrary,” and phasing out the old SkokieLink network. We’ll keep both networks up for a few weeks to allow for the transition, but eventually you’ll want to point your device toward SkokieLibrary for the best level of access.

Let’s put that in bold for good measure : The new wifi access point is named SkokieLibrary. Change your settings accordingly.

Do you have any suggestions for improving our wireless network? Please share in the comments.

Cross posted from the Radar
Starting June 15th and running Monday – Thursday to August 18th (minus a few days here and there) we will be hosting a Digital Media Lab Genius Bar in the East Lobby area in the Library!

The Genius Bar will take place at:

- Mondays 7-8

-Tuesdays 8-9

-Wednesdays 5-6

-Thursdays 8-9

Come by and ask your Digital Media questions. For example, how do I get rid of red-eye in Photoshop? Can you show me how to make music on my computer? How do I take better photos? What can I do to make my videos look awesome?

CQ Researcher is an excellent resource for those English 101 research projects for college and could even prove useful for high school students.
CQ Researcher writes:

“CQ Researcher is often the first source that librarians recommend when researchers are seeking original, comprehensive reporting and analysis on issues in the news. Founded in 1923 as Editorial Research Reports, CQ Researcher is noted for its in-depth, unbiased coverage of health, social trends, criminal justice, international affairs, education, the environment, technology, and the economy. Reports are published weekly in print and online 44 times a year by CQ Press, a division of SAGE Publications.”

Some example topics I have helped students find information on in just the last few weeks are Impact of the Internet on Thinking and Managing Nuclear Waste.  The entire report is useful but I like to go straight to the bibliography and further reading to find even more information on the particular topic.

If you have a paper due soon and don’t know what to write about, check out CQ Researcher asap.

Check out our new research resource!

MediaFinder is a directory of print media publications from Oxbridge Communications. Find contact information or create lists of magazines, newsletters, newspapers, or catalogs. Subscription price, advertising rates, circulation figures, and staff contacts are also included in each entry.

Great for finding out more information on your favorite (or least favorite) publication.