HomeComments
You may leave comments, feature requests, or bug reports here. I’ll do my best to respond.
Tar Heel Reader
Books for beginning readers of all ages
You may leave comments, feature requests, or bug reports here. I’ll do my best to respond.
June 4th, 2008 at 1:28 am
No suggestions at present. I suspect there will need to be an editorial board or some screening process ultimately to make sure folks like me don’t go too over the top. I enjoyed making “No Butts About It” and will continue to explore the site. Thanks for your work.
June 4th, 2008 at 8:50 am
Gary, Can you create a new account for Amy Williams? She is a literacy/special education doc student working with me. She will be teaching with Karen and me in Australia. Her email address is ????????????. She’d like to create some books also.
June 4th, 2008 at 9:04 am
Can you make it possible eventually to allow authors to put their names in (instead of automatically placing log in name)? E.g., what if DavidK wants his books to be authored by Reed A. Booke? Or if Amy Williams and David Koppenhaver co-authored the banana book on DavidK’s account?
June 4th, 2008 at 9:38 pm
I’d love to make a book or two! The log in screen wouldn’t accept my wordpress username–do I need an account with you specifically? And tell Karen Erickson hi–we were in grad school together at UNC.
June 16th, 2008 at 4:36 am
I am wanting to make a book but unable to access website.
June 16th, 2008 at 8:43 am
How do I get a username and password to access write a book
June 16th, 2008 at 8:45 am
I have just been to a seminar with Karin and David and now looking at this website i can not access it to write a book
June 16th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Same as above - cannot find Registration process on your site - keen to get started to show our staff at school. Thanks, Jeni Griffin
June 16th, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Send email to gb@cs.unc.edu to get an account. Include your name and tell us how you heard about Tar Heel Reader.
June 16th, 2008 at 11:15 pm
Same as all the others aussies!! We enjoyed the greatest seminar yesterday with David, Karen and Amy and are keen to start writing, but can’t access the site and you definitely need a book about cricket!
Tom and Susan
June 17th, 2008 at 1:00 am
Again another email from Australia. Thanks for putting information on how to join up. My problem is that I haven’t been able to download the stories to Powerpoint. I have tried on computers with Vista and with XP. Will this be fixed once I have a log on? Thank you from all of us for a wonderful story book site.
June 17th, 2008 at 6:27 am
Dear Gary
Found about about TarHeel from Karen and David at the AGOTSI conference in Brisbane, Australia yesterday- what amazing and inspiring people they, along with Amy, are. Have enjoyed creating books- now how do we download them? My machine doesn’t seem t let me do so in powerpoint etc?
Can I save books to the hard drive and load them on to a flash drive from there?
Regards
Kim
June 17th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
You can register yourself for Tar Heel Reader now. Click the registration link on the front page and fill in all the fields. Karen, Gretchen, David, or I can tell you the secret registration code.
June 17th, 2008 at 8:06 pm
Dear Gary
Heard about the site from Kim Smith, a colleague, could I please have a log on name and password?
Thanks
Judy
June 17th, 2008 at 9:32 pm
Could someone forward me the password to start making books. I was at the AGOSCI seminar with Karen and David on Monday.
June 17th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
Dear Gary
Could I ask for a log on name and password for my colleague Ruth Edwards, who attended the AGOTSI session on Monday?
Regards
Kim
June 17th, 2008 at 11:28 pm
I just wrote a book and put it up (icecream) but just realised that I made a mistake on the last page, is there any way to edit??
June 18th, 2008 at 8:53 am
You can edit your book by clicking on the Edit link just below your book on the Find a book to read page.
June 19th, 2008 at 12:10 am
Hi Gary,
I’m an SLP from the Cerebral Palsy League of Queensland who attended Karen & Davids workshop here in Brisbane on Monday, which was inspirational! I would appreciate a passsword and the invitation code so I can sign up and get to work.
Well done on great initiative which will greatly benefit many of our clients.
Mark
June 19th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
Icecream is 2 words, but wow, what a great idea!!
eileen
June 20th, 2008 at 9:49 am
Hi
I was at the PD in Perth today and am trying to either logon or register as a new writer but am having trouble doing either and am not getting feedback to my email could you please try using the logon and password that we were given as I can’t seem to get it to work.
Thanks
June 20th, 2008 at 10:50 am
WOW is all we can say about this site!!!! Jessie is SO VERY into all these books!!! What a wonderful thing you are doing for kids like her ….we just wanted to take a minute and say THANK YOU and let you know she is THRILLED to have a site where she can go and enjoy books! :o)
Happy Reading!
June 20th, 2008 at 10:52 am
By the way David K …..Jessie LOVED the “butt” book :o)
June 20th, 2008 at 7:43 pm
Thanks!Ihave logged in and played already. Have to admit it was very easy to use and I will be back later.
June 21st, 2008 at 8:31 am
Penny I really liked the lullaby book!!!
June 21st, 2008 at 4:58 pm
Thanks Melissa! I’ve been enjoying a lot of the contributions–it’s fun to see different styles emerge, even from the same basic format.
June 23rd, 2008 at 10:52 am
Hi
I just tried creating a book in English and a version in Spanish. Of course, the speech is fine with the English version. Any way to have the Spanish version read correctly?? I thought it might be nice to create some bilingual resources since there aren´t a lot out there.
June 23rd, 2008 at 10:56 am
Wow! I had no idea that would work. I’ll have to figure out what to do about text-to-speech in other languages.
Perhaps we could support recording the captions…
June 24th, 2008 at 1:18 am
Whoo-hoo! We’ve passed 100 books. Any chance of a list-of-titles index as well as the pages we now have for choosing a book to read? Seems like we’ve developed some sizable categories now, too, like food, clothes, counting, colors, animals, sports, weather…
Loving the Spanish-language books, thanks for those. And it’s fun to see which books are written by US folks, which are written by Australians (by vocabulary, mostly–notable differences there).
June 24th, 2008 at 6:23 am
Good suggestion, Penny. I’ve added an index to the list of things to do.
June 24th, 2008 at 10:50 pm
Would like to register but need a code. Can you let me know? ta
June 25th, 2008 at 1:08 am
Hi everyone,
the books are looking fantastic. i just noticed a spelling mistake in one though, in the ‘teachers’ book, on the page about math. Might wanna correct that one… Cheers
June 25th, 2008 at 7:12 am
fixed.
June 25th, 2008 at 8:28 am
Sorry, should be fixed now.
June 25th, 2008 at 1:28 pm
I’m not sure if I’m doing this right but when I save my book as a draft there is nothing saved on the page that says “If you had any books saved as drafts they would appear here.” Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
June 25th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
Hi -
I am sure you will get some comments on this, but currently can’t see the whole text on the online version. I LOVE how you have made a background color choice (great for low vision folks like my daughter). Also, she can better control the page turning now that you have fixed it to work wiht the space bar. Thanks!
Claire
June 25th, 2008 at 5:03 pm
Claire,
Thank you for reporting this bug. I don’t know about many of them unless folks tell me. I’ve fixed it though we lost page numbers in the process. I’ll restore page numbers when I find something that will work for both.
Everyone. When you see a problem, follow Claire’s example and let me know. If you see a problem, then lots of other people probably see it too.
June 25th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Page numbers are back and you all should be able to see the text. Let me know about issues you see. Better to hear from too many than too few.
June 26th, 2008 at 7:39 am
Any way we could have a “My Books” link that shows the books you have created?
June 26th, 2008 at 9:18 am
There’s probably a more elegant way, but one way would be to tag all your books “JBrown”–then when you click that in the tag menu, you’ll get all your books.
June 26th, 2008 at 10:23 am
Search will do it. Just type jbrown in the search box at the top of the page. It will give you a page (not as nicely formated) of your books.
I could make that page be formatted like the find a book page if it will help.
June 26th, 2008 at 4:18 pm
For the “My Books” solution - could you make it so the “EDIT” link appears next to each book?
June 26th, 2008 at 10:57 pm
was wanting to have a look at your site but unable to register can you help me please thanks
June 27th, 2008 at 12:58 am
Susan,
To register, just e-mail Gary (link in his responses above) or me (techieteacher@gmail.com) for the invite code.
- Jeremy
June 27th, 2008 at 1:00 am
Found a few minor issues with the text-to-speech translation. The text-to-speech software is not reading the following grammatical symbols: ‘ (apostrophe) or & (and sign). Take a look at my Restaurant Choices book.
June 27th, 2008 at 4:57 pm
text to speech should be working better now.
June 29th, 2008 at 7:21 pm
unable to log in, although using the user name and password sent by e-mail.
July 1st, 2008 at 9:38 pm
My colleague Ruth Edwards is having difficulty logging on with the user name and passwordgiven to her. Can you do anything that end?
July 1st, 2008 at 9:55 pm
Students are loving reading the books. The right arrow to move through book choices and left arrow to choose a book would be a terrific feature.
An automatic “The End” page would be helpful.
200 books! Wow.
July 2nd, 2008 at 12:57 am
I love love love hearing about real students really reading these books! Any tips or requests for the authors would be very welcome–subject matter, concepts, language, tone, stuff to avoid, just let us know!
I’ve made a couple books here specifically because a kid or a teacher mentioned an interest or a need– but the rest I’m just going by my own kids’ interests, and random inspirations for creative use of this format, and sometimes just spinning off something cool in the flickr choices. So any feedback from users is most welcome.
July 2nd, 2008 at 5:36 pm
I just want to say Thank You! to the team that developed this site. This is a great resource and really will give a voice to so many students, teachers, and other adults. Thank You, Thank You, Thank You!!!!
July 6th, 2008 at 10:22 pm
Hi,
Great website… thanks! I have enjoyed reading other peoples books. I am keen to start making my own but am unable to sign in with my username and password. I have tried using the ‘forgot your password feature’ but then the email link sent to me each time comes up with an error saying “Sorry, that key does not appear to be valid”. Please help!
Many thanks.
July 7th, 2008 at 9:02 pm
Hi Again,
Just attempted to register using the invitation code you e-mailed but I get an error message saying ‘wrong invition code’??
Mark
July 14th, 2008 at 12:43 pm
Noticed that when you search for a book, there is no link for add to favorite page. Could you please look at that? Thanks
July 18th, 2008 at 6:48 pm
Thanks for the suggestion. I’ve implemented update favorites on the search results page.
July 19th, 2008 at 5:20 pm
How do you delete a book you published and then decided you don’t like it. We were playing with writing and published UNC-a great topic but not ready to publish. Thanks for your help.
Sherrian
July 19th, 2008 at 7:05 pm
Go to the Site Admin page linked from the Welcome page. That will take you to the Dash Board. From there click on Posts. You should see a list of your posts on the Manage Posts page. There you can delete them from there.
July 25th, 2008 at 3:37 pm
I am working on a MacBook and tried to upload photos for a page in my book Saving the Planet. Are there special instructions for browsing and uploading from the MacBook? I was unsuccessful after 25 attempts.
July 26th, 2008 at 11:31 pm
I tried uploading my pictures again. The problem is the size of the file. If it is less than 900KB it will upload. Anything larger will not upload. It is not a function of the MacBook but the size of the images.
Sorry I took your time. I should have looked at that earlier. I will know to use smaller images.
I really like the ease of using this for students!
July 28th, 2008 at 7:54 am
This is such a WONDERFUL site. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I am at the Literacy Camp at Camp Courage that this summer is under the direction of Dave Koppenhaver and Sally Clendon. I am trying to make a book with some pictures from camp. I can’t get those pictures to upload. I was able to do this two days ago but have been having problems since I went back to editing my book. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
Thank you!
July 28th, 2008 at 8:13 am
Hi Barb,
I’m glad you like the site.
I’ve heard of people having problems uploading pictures that are too large. About 900k appears to be the limit. When I get a chance I’ll look into that limitation. But in the meantime, you might get them to upload by resizing them to make them smaller first.
July 29th, 2008 at 5:12 pm
Thank you so much for this FANTASTIC resource. We do not have Firefox on our school computers yet, and I am not sure what version of Explorer we have. At home, using explorer the books appear to be working fine. At school many of the pictures are not showing up, even on the “choose a book page”. Any ideas what might be happenning. I am going to try loading “firefox to go” on my flashdrive and see if the school computers will accept that….in the meantime let me know if you have any idea what the problem is and how I should try to address it.
Thanks again for all you are doing!!!
July 29th, 2008 at 8:14 pm
Love it Love it Love it!! Am having fun creating books. I keep checking books to add them to my favorites but whenever I come back my favorites is empty.. any suggestions??
thanks!!
thank you for creating this site!! It is wonderful!!
Bridget
July 29th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
I’m glad you like it. Did you press the Update Favorites button at the top or bottom of the page? You check the ones you want to add then press the Updates favorites button.
July 29th, 2008 at 10:13 pm
I’m DavidC’s mom. We wrote a book tonight but made a mistake on two pages. How can we go back and fix the errors?
PS Tarheel Reader is fabulous and perfect for David !! Thank you for creating it.
Thanks.
July 30th, 2008 at 6:05 am
Hi Gwen,
When you see the book, on the Find a book to read page, or elsewhere there should be an Edit link that will allow you to edit the book.
A quick way to get to it is select the “Your unpublished books” link from the list on the right. On that page it will list your published books as well. The names of the published books are links to edit your books.
Let me know if that doesn’t do it.
gb
July 30th, 2008 at 6:19 am
Bridget,
Oh! By “whenever I come back my favorites is empty” do you mean when you come back another time? Like on another day?
If so, the answer is “It doesn’t do that” but you can. We didn’t set it up so the site remembers your favorites because we wanted favorites to be associated with readers rather than authors and we didn’t want readers to have to login.
Here’s how you do it. Bookmarks. Your browser lets you bookmark a page. Get your Favorites page set up just like you want it and have speech, and colors set as well. Then tell your web browser (IE or Firefox) to Bookmark that page (in the Bookmarks menu). When you go back to that Bookmark (you’ll find it in the Bookmarks menu) all your favorites will be there.
The great thing about Bookmarks is you can email them to other people, or save several different sets of favorites under different names (perhaps the names of your students).
I hope I’m guessing right about the issue. If not, let me know and we’ll try to figure it out.
July 31st, 2008 at 9:45 am
Allison, Please contact me so we can figure out what is going wrong at your school.
August 7th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Hey, we’ve passed 500 books this week!
August 8th, 2008 at 10:18 am
I love NO BUTTS ABOUT IT. David K– look for new content to be uploaded on Route 66– there’s a book about underwear that will make a nice companion to it.
August 11th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
I would like to creat books and share this with my staff but don’t have the special code.
Can you send it to me - I learn of this from QIAT
August 14th, 2008 at 12:32 am
Hi Garry,
I have tried to register using the invitation code you sent me but it is not working. Could you please email me again.
Many thanks
Trish Hull
August 15th, 2008 at 10:12 am
please send an invitation code… thanks!
Kathy
August 21st, 2008 at 4:17 pm
I’m a special ed. teacher in Mississauga, Ontario with autistic high school students. I’m interested in adding some of my own books. I was able to create some favorite books but unable to register because the log in requires an invitation code - help? Thanks Kevin.
August 22nd, 2008 at 3:16 am
could you please send me a log in invitation code so that I may register to write my own stories. I am a special education teacher in a primary school and the children will get so my enjoyment and learning opportunities through writing their own stories.
August 24th, 2008 at 8:46 pm
Hello! I am interested in created books and sharing with others. Is there a possibility that I may get an invitation code? If you need further information, please feel free to contact me.
August 27th, 2008 at 8:41 pm
I’m a special ed assistant for a school that just started our first literacy program. We are really excited about getting started and has just bought the Meville to Weville literacy program. Also we had a fantastic siminar with Karen Erickson and Penny Hatch , she talked alot about this website. I’m very interested in the books but also in making my own. Please send me an invitation code. Thanks
August 28th, 2008 at 7:51 am
Could I please get an invitation code? I am a parent and my children would love to make their own books.
September 2nd, 2008 at 2:46 pm
I would love to get an invitation code so I can make books with kids on my speech and language caseload. Would you please send me one?
September 4th, 2008 at 12:05 pm
I am an SLP, AAC specialist and was introduced to Tar Heel in Montreal at ISAAC this summer. I would love to get a registration/invitation code to create books and share. Thanks for creating this resource!
September 5th, 2008 at 5:51 am
I was at one of the first PDs in Australia and have been watching and more importantly using this sight to make reading books and social stories for my class. It is a good as I thought it would be. Fantastic! There are not many things that you can say that about.
September 8th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
As a HS special education teacher who teaches SID/PID students, this could be just the thing to help me make some content available to my students. Could you send me a login code or make the program you are using available as an open source project?
Thanks
Dan
September 8th, 2008 at 11:43 pm
The updates are terrific. I really like the options when the book ends. Nice work cleaning up the interface!
September 9th, 2008 at 11:56 am
Hi there,
I am having difficulty downloading the books. Is that feature open to public already? Thanks!
September 9th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
Ack! I found a bug in the downloading. See if it works now.
September 11th, 2008 at 6:45 am
I’m having problems logging on - I am using the “aussie” username, but it’s not accepting the password that we were given at the conference in Perth, has this been changed, why can’t I access the website any more? My students love it and are very disappointed that they aren’t able to get on any more.
September 11th, 2008 at 3:15 pm
Would like to begin using with my students. Requesting an invitation code to get the registration process going.
September 11th, 2008 at 8:10 pm
Hi,
I am an OT working in a special school in Melbourne and love your tarheel stories. We would love to be able to write our own stories but need the invitation word. Could you please pass this on so we can use this great resource.
Thanks
Leah
September 13th, 2008 at 1:39 am
Hello I am an OT and ATP working for the state tech act program in NC and would love to get an invitation password. I am very passionate about spreading the word about all things having to do with adapted books! Molly
September 13th, 2008 at 7:11 am
The reason I would like to download into powerpoint is because of the continuous loop feature that I could use for my class during certain times of the day and not have to have a student or teacher access the mouse or switch to turn the page but as you know I would have to take the time to put all of the voice in. If this is possible to add this feature - Thanks! This site is great - now my students can always have access to books!
September 13th, 2008 at 9:46 am
I also can not get my own photos to upload. What can I be doing wrong.
September 13th, 2008 at 10:04 am
The most common problem I see with uploading photos is they are too large. Try shrinking them down before uploading them. After upload they are automatically resized so their maximum dimension is 500 pixels so anything that size or a little bigger should be OK.
September 15th, 2008 at 8:26 am
Hi Gary,
Thank you SOO much for helping with the firewall issue. We can now see pictures on almost ALL of the site at our schools. We still can’t see all the pictures once books are saved to the favorites page. Any thoughts? We’re also having some trouble using two switch scanning. Are there directions on the website somewhere for what function to set the switches as? Thanks for your help! My high school junior who is sitting here with me thinks this website is HAPPY! Thank you thank you!
September 15th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Allison,
Thank you for the bug report. I failed to fix the firewall problem on the favorites page. It *should* be working now. Please confirm that it works for you.
On two-switch scanning, the mover (advance) keys are any of Space, N, Right Arrow, Down Arrow, or Page Down. The chooser (or go back when reading) keys are any of P, left arrow, up arrow, or page up. Set your device to generate any of these and it should work.
September 15th, 2008 at 9:01 pm
Hi I attended a Erikson PD in Perth and the 8 classrooms with 50 staff at Kensington Secondary school were merrily using the “aussie teacher” log in password…can I please have an invitation code so we can arrange another log in that is just as accessible?
Many Thanks
September 18th, 2008 at 1:49 pm
This website is a great idea, but some screening needs to be done on these books if they are to be used with small children. I’m sure the authors did not intend to do this, but there is a book on cupcakes that talks about “drinking all the delicious drinks our tummy could hold” and the accompanying picture is of rows of alcohol bottles on the back of a bar. I do not feel that is appropriate for young children.
September 20th, 2008 at 5:38 pm
I REALLY would love to make books for my Kindergarten class, but do not have an invitation code to register. How can I obtain an invitation code? Please help me with this! I love your site and would love to take full advantage.
Thank you!
Valerie Morris
musicv@msn.com
September 22nd, 2008 at 7:29 pm
I teach grade 1 at Queen Elizabeth Public School in Picton, Ontario and would love an invitation to register. Your site looks extremely useful.
Thank you.
September 23rd, 2008 at 4:02 pm
I was wondering if I might be able to have an invitation code. I teach students with visual disabilities and I think it woudl be fun to make some books. Love the website. Looks fabulous!
September 23rd, 2008 at 4:56 pm
I am having difficulty uploading my own images, I cannot get anything to upload…Any suggestions?
September 24th, 2008 at 12:18 pm
There are some really inappropriate books on here, such as:
Sexy Girls From Around the World
Date Night
I was hoping to let my children pick their own books, but the subject and pics are inappropriate for beginning readers.
Sue
September 24th, 2008 at 1:00 pm
Hi Sue,
Note the headline says “Books for beginning readers of all ages”. Many of our readers are not young children. Many are teenagers who aren’t that interested in fluffy animals.
Also, you should never allow your students to access the web unsupervised.
Instead choose several books you think are appropriate for your students and click the little check box in the upper right of each books box on the “Choose a book” page. Then click the Update Favorites button. It should say something like “You have 8 books on your Favorites page”. Now go to the Favorites page by clicking on the link there on the page or at the bottom of the Reading list on the right.
The books you selected will be the only ones there. Now the children can select from the set you approved.
I hope that soon we will be able to implement a way to exclude books in some categories from the search. But no amount of automated selection is going to replace your good judgment about what is appropriate for your students.
gb
September 25th, 2008 at 1:27 pm
Gary, the site just keeps getting better and better. Thanks for your creative talents. Next question, is it possible to delete drafts? I tried deleting a draft by deleting the images but the draft remains when I return to Books I Wrote. Thanks.
September 25th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
Yes, I should add that. I was about to launch into a project to revise the writing wizard but I’ll try to enable deleting drafts first since it should be quick.
September 29th, 2008 at 1:59 am
Do you know anything about posting pictures on flikr to make them available when on Tar Heel? I wanted to share some pictures especially those that don’t come up in a search but can’t seem to find any of my pictures (that I posted on Flikr) when I search on Tar Heel. Any thoughts?? Thanks!!
Bridget
September 29th, 2008 at 11:08 am
I need an invite to register so I can write books. I am an slp. Thanks.
September 29th, 2008 at 4:03 pm
I am confused! I registered in the early days of Tar Heel Readers and have from time to time downloaded books. Now I can’t find the option for downloading? Am I missing something? I will be so disappointed if that option is no longer available as these books have been so very, very useful.
September 29th, 2008 at 4:06 pm
It moved onto the Reading Controls page. On the front page of a book you should see a row of buttons down the left side. The 2nd button is “Setup”. Click it. On that page you should see the links to download books.
October 1st, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Hello. I would love to have invite to register. I am a SLP and work only with children who are considered to have severe to profound disabilities. Thanks!
October 2nd, 2008 at 8:54 am
Is there a way to enlarge or move the page turning button for head mouse users? The size and location the current page turn buttons make this very difficult for my head mouser. Being so near the bottom corner of the screen above the task bar means so many accidental activations of other computer features that I have to “rescue” my user enough as to reduce her independence. Thanks!
October 2nd, 2008 at 10:06 am
Hi Rose-Marie.
I’m sorry your student is having problems with the buttons. We’re trying to keep the number of options to the bare minimum in order to keep the site easy to use. We could enlarge the buttons a bit but I worry about them taking away from reading for other kids.
I have some suggestions for avoiding the problems you mentioned.
1) Run the web browser in Full Screen mode. In Firefox or Internet Explorer, if you hit the F11 key or choose the View menu and select Full Screen, the browser should take over the entire display, including the task bar.
2) Also, hide the status bar on the browser (that is the bar at the bottom of the screen) by going to the View menu and clearing the check that is there (if it is). Now the bottom of the screen is the bottom of the page and border is a help in hitting the target rather than a hindrance.
Let me know if these help.
October 2nd, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Can I get an invitation code so I may register and be able to write books for my EC students? I am an occupational therapist, email address anne.macri@cms.k12.nc.us. Thank you.
October 5th, 2008 at 8:13 pm
Gary,
I think there may be a problem with the “favorites”. I went into my favorites page via Firefox and got the message that my favorites page is empty. I have tried several times on several different computers to re-build my favorites page. Every time I go to the favorites page, it says it is empty.
Thanks for all you are doing for so many beginning readers.
October 5th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Hi Barb, Thanks for the report. It should be fixed now.
October 7th, 2008 at 9:50 pm
who “reviews” the books? is this a new feature? also regarding ratings what do C and E stand for? I think I know but am not sure. I couldn’t find an explanation.
thanks!!
October 8th, 2008 at 8:29 am
Quoting Karen: Reviewing books is a new process we are just starting. The need for it came about when we started getting books posted that were clearly written by students. We needed to have some way to leave original submissions up while also creating a reviewed version that is grammatically correct, has an ending, has appropriate pictures, etc. The people who have permission to mark a book as reviewed are all CLDS staff.
The C and E ratings have to do with our attempt to mark things as E for everybody or C for Caution. This came up because there are a handful of really great books that address dating or other adolescent topics or include some picture that might be scary for a young reader. We haven’t perfected a way to make these rating clear so that part is still a work in progress.
Like most links on the site, if you hover your mouse over the Rated: E link a little “tool tip” will popup with further explanation.
October 17th, 2008 at 6:19 pm
Thanks for this wonderful site! I had some trouble logging in - ‘wasn’t sure what my password was and then you graciously sent me a new one. Is there anywhere where we can access our name and password to change it to something we can remember? Thanks. Terri
October 17th, 2008 at 7:19 pm
Hi Gary,
thanks for all the work you are doing with this site!! One of my favorite things to do now is dream up creative story lines and topics for those teen readers!!
thanks!
Bridget
October 20th, 2008 at 7:46 am
Hi Gary,
I’m a teacher trainer in ESL/EFL. I run a website community of teachers, many very versed in technology. I”d like to be able to make a few books to show as examples of Text to Speech.
I’ve been very active in promoting TTS and think your bookmaking site is A+! Really simple - thus, unique. Thanks for considering us.
PS> you might check out our bot which I created as a no typing needed chatterbot. Something essential for language learners. http://eflclassroom.com/bot.html
Again, great stuff!
David Deubelbeiss
October 20th, 2008 at 11:24 pm
Hi Gary,
I’ve recently tried using Tar Heel Reader on 3 brand new PC laptops (Toshiba A300’s) I can’t get the sound to work on any of these new computers. It works fine on my slightly older Toshiba A200.
It looks to me as though audio and text-to-speech settings are the same on both models. Do you know of anything I might be missing?
Many thanks for your help. I have students who would love to read some of your books.
–Paul
October 21st, 2008 at 9:10 am
Hello Gary,
I am a Reading Specialist (I am also a certified special educator and Wilson Reading Teacher) at Sherwood Middle School. I love your website and would like to create some books with my life skills students. What are the qualfications needed to get a invitation code? Also, is there a way to have the page read more than once on a page?
Thank you,
Laurie
October 21st, 2008 at 1:57 pm
I need codigo de inivitación .
October 21st, 2008 at 3:11 pm
Paul,
Thank you for the bug report about speech not working on some new laptops. I think I have fixed the problem which resulted from a change in version 10 of the Adobe Flash player.
October 22nd, 2008 at 11:54 am
Please invite me, so I may register to write a book. Thanks
October 22nd, 2008 at 11:56 am
Can I get an invitaion code to begin creating?
October 27th, 2008 at 9:07 am
How do I get an invitation….I use literacy with my special needs students frequently and include repetitive story lines to increase literacy skills. I can submit a sample we made for Halloween.
Karen
October 27th, 2008 at 10:37 am
How do I create a blank page without a picture, just a repetitive story line.
K
October 27th, 2008 at 10:39 am
The site doesn’t support pages without pictures.
October 28th, 2008 at 1:24 am
Hi Gary,
Have forgotten how to print off my books…Could it be included in the FAQ page? Thanks, Natascha
October 28th, 2008 at 11:35 am
We have recently been introduced to Tarheel Reader. What a great resource. Would you be kind enough to send along an invitation code so we can make our own books for our special needs students? Thank you
October 28th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
I am an OTR from Sweden, living in Texas. Please send an invitation code so I can teach my students to make some books. Thank you
October 30th, 2008 at 1:55 pm
I am an SLP in Minnesota serving a high needs program. Would it be possible to get an invitation code to make a book? I see that you are getting a number of requests!
Thank you for all your hard work!
October 31st, 2008 at 9:06 pm
If people are looking for ideas for making books, I have a friend that would love to see books about tractors.
November 2nd, 2008 at 10:16 am
Hello! Like many others making comments here, I am wondering about how to get an invitation code to this site. I am a junior high school tech facilitator, and the instructional academics teachers with whom I work love the “read a book” part of this site. They would like to delve into having their special needs students write their own books. Thanks in advance for you assistance.
November 2nd, 2008 at 10:23 am
Nevermind! I figured it out. Thanks.
November 2nd, 2008 at 2:38 pm
All of my favorites appear in the same row. I now have a wonderful problem–I have so many favorites that I can no longer see all of them on my favorite’s page. (I know I can get to them by pressing the right arrow key to access them.) Would there be a way to have more than one row of favorites?
I’m thinking that if this is not an easy fix, I can make more than one bookmark of favorites. That would work, tool
Many thanks!
November 3rd, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Hi,
just a quick comment about getting the PowerPoint books to speak. (You might know about it already - but I didn’t see it in the comments…)
There is a nice little freeware program available at oatsoft.org (open source assistive technology software) which reads text in PowerPoint presentations. I tried it with one book and it seems to work fine. You can find it here: http://fullmeasure.co.uk/powertalk/, or go there via oatsoft.org (look for “powerpoint reader”). Since the program is using the operating system (i.e. WIndows XP) speech generation, it should work in other languages too… (Hi Paul, das waere dann was fuer die deutsche Version…) And you don’t need PowerPoint because you can use a free PowerPoint viewer.
Hope that is of some use…
It’s a fantastic site, I have already made a lot more friends by recommending it…!
Cheers
Rolf
November 4th, 2008 at 12:37 am
What an incredible site…I will put it to use right away. Was wondering if there was any way to highlight the words as they are being read?
Thanks Mary Beth
November 4th, 2008 at 9:25 am
Mary Beth, I’m glad you like the site. We have no plans to support word-by-word highlighting at this time.
November 7th, 2008 at 12:45 pm
I heard about Tar Heel Reader during a week-long course in Ontario wiht Karen Erickson and David Kopenhaver. I am wondering when and if you will be accepting registrations. I work in a children’s rehabilitation centre for children wiht physical, communication and developmental disabilities in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. Tar Heel Reader will be a wonderful tool for our children.
November 7th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
Cynthia, We are accepting registrations. You just need to know the secret, which I will send to you via email.
November 9th, 2008 at 7:48 pm
Is there some way to scale the text so it fits in the display area?
The book Service Dogs has great information but without text scaling or scrolling, it is difficult to read.
This is a problem for Enrichment and even Transitional books.
November 9th, 2008 at 7:52 pm
Page without a picture - how about a “picture” that is a 1 x 1 pixel white or transparent square?
November 9th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
While it is technically possible to make the text scale, we have no plans at this time to do it. We’re hoping people will think of ways to simplify their text. I’d love to see someone rewrite the service dogs book. I think simply adding more pictures, or even duplicating pictures (trivial to do in the editor, just press control while dragging and dropping the page) would result in one short sentence per page.
The main goal of the site is to provide simple transitional books for older beginning readers.
If you *really* need a particular book with more text, simply download it as a slideshow and shrink the picture.
November 11th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
I am a teacher for the blind/visually impaired and I was wondering how do I get an invitation?
November 11th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
Hi,
I just discovered your website while looking for accessible books for my students. I teach high school students with autism, five of my students are non-readers who are nonverbal. These books will be an excellent resource to help them build their literacy skills. Could you provide me with an invitation code, I’d like to also help them contribute to your collection. Thanks so much for this great resource for students with disabilities!
Angela
November 12th, 2008 at 10:25 am
How about more options after reading a book
* add it to Favorites
* return to the screen where the book was selected - especially if it was the result of a search
These would be very helpful for setting up reading lists of appropriate books.
Any other suggestions for making lists of books. I want to pick several appropriate books (grade level, interests, vocabulary}, then let the reader select the ones they want to read. I was planning to do this using Favorites.
..vt
November 12th, 2008 at 10:40 am
Any plans for adding some readability index? It is pretty time consuming trying to find books at an appropriate level. Good books are missed, because it isn’t easy to find them. Even something simple - color code, anything NOT numerical tied to grade level would be helpful. For example, visual scales for more/less “difficult” might work.
I’m working with Gr 1-3 readers. I want to challenge them but not overwhelm them. But that’s my problem.
For more independent, older learners, this could be a big factor in their success. Having worked with young adult new readers, it is really important to get the readability about right so they aren’t frustrated. And they love it when they can see progress.
November 12th, 2008 at 10:48 am
You know you have a huge success when people are offering suggestions on small details! That’s a good sign. This is a really wonderful resource.
Now you have a growing community of appreciative users. What would you like us to do for you? How can we help give back?
November 12th, 2008 at 11:47 am
Not returning to the search results after reading a book was a bug. It should be fixed now.
November 13th, 2008 at 6:10 pm
Tarheel Reader is great - but I’m having problems finding my pics on Flickr
I have to say that Flickr is one of the best things I have come across recently. I am very grateful to the developers. I am working on a book of signs in the environment. I took some photos yesterday and put them in my Flickr space. The Flickr search in Tarheel Reader would not find them. Also, I tried adding tags in Flickr; still Tarheel Reader would not find them. Any suggestions how to mark my files in Flickr so that I can find them in THR would be appreciated.
Otherwise Wow. I’ll be working with a group of teachers and additional needs auxiliaries tomorrow on Making Tar Heel Reader books for young people in this area.
THR is the easiest way to create powerpoint prsentations and with the open source Powertalk and a good voice, you can use the presentation on computers thata re off line.
Thanks again - ictsan42
November 13th, 2008 at 6:17 pm
ictsan42,
Perhaps you need to adjust the license on your pictures? We only use pictures that are licensed with the Creative Commons license.
November 14th, 2008 at 10:29 pm
Muchas gracias for the great books! I’m a Tarheel/Four Blocks alum, working in an afterschool program for students with disabilities including autism, cerebral palsy, and other developmental disabilities. My older kids have just discovered your website and are eating it up, even the ones who say “I don’t read!” We also have a number of Spanish-speaking bilingual students and staff, so we’d also love more Spanish books (although our kids get a kick out of reading the German and French books). We’d like to write some books as well, in English and in Spanish, so could we get an invitation code as well?
Thanks for all your hard work in getting this going.
Many thanks (and may the Tarheels get to the Championship game this year).
November 18th, 2008 at 1:08 pm
How can we get an invitation to join? We are interested in creating books.
November 18th, 2008 at 11:16 pm
I would love an invitation to join. I didn’t see anywhere else to request it. I am a special educator and am loving your site, we are using it daily. Thank you. Kat
November 19th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
Is there anyway to upload a book written in Powerpoint to Tarheel Reader or does it have to be created in Tarheel Reader? Thanks, Tessa
November 24th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
HI How do i get a secret password to join the site and create books? I am a teacher of Special Ed who does inclusion of students within reg ed classrooms and would love to use this resoruce. thanks for creating such a wonderful site!
November 25th, 2008 at 9:43 am
How do I get an invitation code?
November 26th, 2008 at 6:32 am
Hello!
We couldn’t understand what the “invitation code” is and who is going to invite us .
We are trying to create a book in our CAL club with students at the moment. Unfortunately we failed
Thanks for your help in advance !
November 26th, 2008 at 7:53 pm
I want to publish a book but don’t have an invitation code.
December 2nd, 2008 at 3:56 pm
Could you provide a code word to allow me to register for your site? I am a technology teacher at Challenger Elementary school in Howell Michigan. I would have some of my older students write a book using your pictures and tools.
Dave Eggleston
December 4th, 2008 at 12:17 am
Could I have an invitation to join? I am an SLP and work as a consultant for Prentke Romich Company. We have an AAC support group in Southern CA that is a BookClub.
Thank you,
Margaret Perkins
December 4th, 2008 at 11:10 am
I would like to register so that my students could create some books. However, I do not have an ‘invitation code’. How can I get one?
Thanks.
December 4th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
I am an SLP who would like to register my special ed department of 7 teachers to use and create books. May we have an invitation code?
December 4th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
I too have found I can’t create books without an “invitation code” how does one go about getting this code?
Thanks in advance,
Veronica
December 8th, 2008 at 8:44 am
I’m trying to use tar heel reader with a student; I can’t register without an invitation code; I also can’t hear the sound. Can you help? THANKS!
December 9th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
would like the password to make a book for my autistic kids, please send code. love the site
December 9th, 2008 at 12:56 pm
Hi,
Thanks for making this available. We just discovered it this morning and look forward to exploring the available stories and maybe creating our own. I was wondering if there’s a way to group the stories by language? That way I could just click on a language and then see all titles in Spanish or German. Thanks again, Tammy
December 9th, 2008 at 12:59 pm
Hi Tammy,
Every book in Spanish has the tag Spanish associated with it. If you go to the index of tags and click on Spanish you’ll get all of them. Searching on Spanish is pretty effective too, though it might turn up the occasional book in English that happens to contain the word Spanish. This applies to the other languages as well.
The URLs have a simple form. For example, the URL for all books written in Spanish is: http://tarheelreader.org/tag/spanish/
December 9th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
How can I get a code to create books. I do assistive technology in my school district?
December 9th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
May I please have an invitation code so that I can utilize your site for AT?
December 10th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Can you send me an invitation code please and thanks? I teach spec ed.
December 11th, 2008 at 4:42 pm
I am wondering about the invitation code required to register. I would like to register. How do I get the invitation code?
Thanks.
December 11th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Can I please have an invitation code? Am dying to create my own book for a social story!
Thanks,
December 12th, 2008 at 1:10 pm
Please send me an invitation code. I am a preschool special education with Buncombe County Schools Thanks Linda MacKay
December 13th, 2008 at 8:18 pm
Please send me an invitation code. Thanks!
December 14th, 2008 at 8:09 pm
Hi
I love this site for my handicapped students!
Can I please have an invitation code?
Thanks!
December 17th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
I am a technology integration specialist in Parkway School District in St. Louis, MO. I would like a registration code so I can use your resources to write a book. I want to share these amazing reading resources with teachers in the district. Thank you.
December 18th, 2008 at 9:00 am
This is a great site for my students. May I please have a invitation code?
Thanks a bunch.
December 31st, 2008 at 2:09 pm
Hi,
I teach 1st grade and would love to use your site with my students. Could you please email me the invitation code?
Thank you,
Renee