The Snipping Tool!

Whenever I mention the Snipping Tool in any training, it's the one thing that teachers love the most! I'd like to think I'm always presenting really cool things, but it's the Snipping Tool that sticks. For the uninitiated, Snipping Tool allows you to take a picture of any part of the screen. It's so much easier than the old "print screen" because of all the added functionality, mainly being able to choose what you want from the beginning.

If you are running Windows 7 or Vista, you already have this great tool available to you and you may not even know it. It's found through the Start Menu and "Accessories". I train my teachers to drag the Snipping Tool icon to their toolbar because once it's found, you are going to want fast access. Once you get it on your toolbar, it should look like this (snipping tool in the middle with the scissors):

Now it's time to get snipping! Simply select the Snipping tool and you'll see a light panel cover your entire screen. There will also be a pop-up menu for you to use:

Use your crosshairs to crop the portion of the screen you want to use. Once you drag, let go of the cursor and you'll see another pop-up appear with the portion you snipped. There you will find all the great options: save as a JPEG, copy and paste, email, or annotate. Teachers will most likely use the save and copy functions the most, but I always like to mention the email function. Now you can easily snip a computer error and email it to someone for help. 

And that's as easy as it gets! When teachers get this information, it will be hard for them to keep their excitement levels down. Snipping Tool makes it so easy to create. Bet you can't guess how I retrieved my images for this post!