The Electronic Newsletter of the Palm Beach County Library System

Contents:
1/ Introduction to Books & Bytes
2/ CHIS – Diseases & Medical Conditions
3/ Database of the Month – “TCR Connections for Kids”
4/ A Quick Byte – The Task Bar
5/ In Next Month's Issue

1/ Introduction to Books & Bytes

Welcome to the September issue of Books & Bytes. This month we will tell you how to find information about diseases and other medical conditions through our Community Health Information Service. In addition, we will show you a great resource for young students, teachers and parents called TCR Connections for Kids. Finally, “A Quick Byte” will show you how to make better use of your task bar.

We hope you enjoy receiving Books & Bytes. Please let us know what you think of our publication by writing to: webmaster@pbclibrary.org

2/ CHIS - Diseases & Medical Conditions

If you are looking for up-to-date, unbiased health information, look no further than the Community Health Information Service (CHIS) of the Palm Beach County Library System. In addition to telephone and e-mail research services, CHIS provides an excellent web directory that links users to the best health web site online today. In this issue, we will be showing you how to research illnesses on the Diseases & Medical Conditions page: http://www.pbclibrary.org/health-diseases.htm

The Diseases & Medical Conditions page contains links to a dozen different health web sites. One particularly useful site is Healthfinder, which is supported by the Federal government. It is an easy-to-use site with a huge health library. For example, a search for information on “heart disease” provides links to over 200 news articles and over 80 different government web site. The information provided covers such aspects as the effects of heavy drinking, the importance of your cholesterol level, and the links between depression and heart disease. The site also provided links to 28 important heart-health organizations, such as the American Heart Association and the American College of Cardiology.

Note: all the links that we provide are to free, high-quality web sites. So when you need to learn more about diseases and medical conditions, you will find great information on the Community Health Information Service web site at:
http://www.pbclibrary.org/health-diseases.htm

3/ Database of the Month – TCR Connections for Kids

Where can you find a tool that is designed for students, teachers, and parents? Look no further than TCR Connections for Kids. It has features for all three groups to help aid the learning process and it can be found through the library’s Electronic Databases page: http://www.pbclibrary.org/edb/patronlinks.asp

TCR Connections provides hundreds of online activities to help you improve learning by connecting. Students can have a good time learning about people, places, and things - with fun activities such as:

• reading, writing and thinking skills in all subjects
• state learning standards
• research-based, best practices
• assessment and test preparation
• critical thinking, problem-solving and decision-making skills
• curriculum topics to the real world

The topics covered are widespread, from social studies and health and fitness, to life skills. TCR Connections for Kids provides access to recent articles from the NewsBank database. It can also be used to locate maps of countries all around the world, which is particularly useful for activities regarding current events.

The parent and teacher modules provide information to help guide students along in their studies. It gives a summary of what they will learn and lesson plans to guide the activities and provides links to current articles on the topic being studied.

TCR Connections for Kids is a fun tool which young students can use to explore the world around them. To use it, simply visit our Electronic Databases page at: http://www.pbclibrary.org/edb/patronlinks.asp

4/ A Quick Byte – The Task Bar

Computers are very good at multi-tasking. That is, you can have many different programs open at once on your computer without it affecting overall performance. However, once you have several programs open, it may be hard for you to keep track of them all. When you want to see what is currently open, there is no faster way than taking a look at the task bar, which sits at the bottom of your monitor display. Every time a program is open, a block with that program’s name will appear on the task bar. You can quickly jump between programs by clicking on the desired task bar block. You can even close programs through the task bar by right-clicking on its block and selecting the “close” option. Understanding how the task bar works will go a long way to making your computer experience much easier and more enjoyable.

5/ Next Month in Books & Bytes

Next month we will demonstrate how to find information on ElderHealth in the Community Health Information Service. Then we will look at Today’s USA Today in our Electronic Databases.

Books & Bytes is published on the third Monday of each month.

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