News

In 2016, the Secretary of State’s office conducted the first-ever statewide Tennessee Student Mock Election. Your school may have even participated in that mock election and it was a joy to see students across Tennessee excited about voting and engaging in the electoral process. We hope it was a memorable experience that they will take with them as future voters and leaders of our great state. We are conducting another Student Mock Election this fall for the 2020 Presidential Election. We hope this will again be a chance for your students to learn more about the voting process and the importance of participating.

The Secretary of State's office is also conducting their annual Civics Essay Contest, where students have the opportunity to earn scholarship money. Eligible students aged sixteen or older will be asked to work as a Poll Official in their county on Election Day and submit an essay on their experience and the importance of performing our civic duty by November 25, 2020. Please find more information about the Civics Essay Contest on our website at sos.tn.gov/civics.

TEL will no longer be providing online access to some literary criticism databases including Gale's Literature Resource Center, Twayne's Author Series and the Scribner Writer Series.

There are still a number of resources that are available within TEL that can help you learn more about literary works and authors including:

Looking online for information can be overwhelming. Where should I look? What should I be searching? What resources can be trusted? We've put together a list of resources that you can return to again and again to find trusted information about coronavirus or other health and wellness topics.

TumbleBook Library - K-6 children's ebook database

TumbleBook Library is a curated database of children’s e-books, available by subscription to Elementary Schools and Public Libraries around the world. TumbleBook Library has over 1100 titles for grades K-6, and includes our unique animated, talking picture books, read-along chapter books, National Geographic videos, non-fiction books, playlists, as well as books in Spanish and French. Plus, the collection features Graphic Novels – a student favorite!

• TumbleBook Library titles

TumbleMath- Grades K-6 math ebook database

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th amendment and Tennessee’s important role in helping women gain the right to vote!  How can you and your students get involved? The Official Committee of the State of Tennessee Woman Suffrage Centennial and the Tennessee Department of Education, the Tennessee State Library and Archives, the Tennessee State Museum, the First Lady’s Office, and the Tennessee Secretary of State’s office are sponsoring a statewide competition for grades K-12 to help students engage and reflect upon this momentous commemorative event.  It is the goal of this committee to have as many students and teachers learn about women’s suffrage and Tennessee’s unique role in the ratification of the 19th amendment.

Through Testing & Education Reference Center, students can take timed practice ACT tests, a self-paced online prep course (with more practice tests) or work their way through the ACT Prep Guide (even more practice tests!).  All the following resources are available anytime and on any device for Tennessee residents.

ACT Online Course

The ACT Online Course starts with an initial diagnostic pretest to determine your strengths and weaknesses.  Based on your results, interactive lessons with quizzes provide you the information you need to build your skills. The ACT Online Course contains three full-length practice tests.

ACT Practice Tests

Take one or all of the three timed full-length practice tests. For each question, you can review detailed answer explanations. Tests are divided into English, Science, Reading Comprehension, Mathematics, and Writing sections to mirror the real testing experience

Peterson's ACT Prep Guide Ebook: The Ultimate Guide to Mastering the ACT 2018

Early Learning by World, formerly Early World of Learning, now has new name and new features for our youngest learners!  If you were familiar with Early World of Learning, the same great stories and topics are still available to guide your young learner as they explore different age-appropriate topics and activities, but now there are even more stories, videos, games and activities to keep them engaged!

Topics range from animals in Dinosaurs, Sea Creatures, Wild Animals, and Creepy-Crawlies to transportation in Tough Trucks and On the Move to early childhood themes in Rainbow Colors and Counting Numbers. These different topics feature a wealth of expository content and serve as a child’s first interactive, visual online encyclopedia.

Early Learning also is a great place to start honing digital navigation skills.  All navigational buttons, instructions, captions, and titles are automatically read aloud on Early Learning when moused over or when tapped on a tablet or mobile device to help young users with reading comprehension.

Access toTransparent Language has been restored.

Dios mío! Transparent LanguageOnline is currently unavailable. The vendor has been contacted and we hope to have this resolved as soon as possible.This message will be updated as we learn more about the issue.

On June 20th, the ability to search across collections was restored.   

Currently we are experiencing issues with being able to search across multiple collections of Tennessee Records.  You may see an error message that state "Whoops, no search form! Please refresh the page to try again." We are working on getting that fixed as soon as possible. 

In the meantime, you can click on the direct link to a specific collection just below that "Whoops" message and you will be able search for records within that collection.

This month, World Book is retiring the following databases: World Book Info Finder and World Book Reference Center. Don’t worry, the content from those databases will still be available in the other TEL resources including World Book Kids, World Book Student, and World Book Advanced.

If you currently have direct links to World Book Info Finder and World Book Reference Center, users will be redirected to the World Book Online screen where they can choose an alternative World Book resource. We recommend removing links and icons for Info Finder and Reference Center by the end of the month.

The Tennessee State Library and Archives is pleased to announce that starting October 1st, Tennesseans will have free online access to the full run of The Tennessean (1812 to today) through the Tennessean Electronic Library (TEL). 

Previously, Tennesseans were only able to access full-text articles from The Tennessean back to 2002. With the addition of the historical Tennessean,Tennessee residents will be able to search and view news articles, photos, advertisements, classified ads, obituaries and cartoons from 1812 to 2002.  The Tennessean began in publication 1907 as the Nashville Tennessean but this service includes earlier titles such as the Nashville Whig and the Daily American. These papers reported not only Nashville-area news, but carried stories from around the state and the nation.

The Tennessean (1812-2002)

Why your patrons and students will love The Tennessean:

Did you know that you can keep current with your favorite newspapers and magazines through the Tennessee Electronic Library (TEL)? From TEL, you can read articles to the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today or peruse articles from the Economist, the New Yorker, WIRED and more.

These newspapers and magazines are mobile-friendly, so you can take your news with you wherever you go – over your morning coffee, on the bus, on campus or at home! Below is a list of the most popular newspapers and magazines that TEL offers online. If you don't see anything you like, don't worry; this is just a sample of what is available.We have something for everyone.

Popular Newspapers

Now available in Testing & Education Reference Center on TEL is the following content additions and updates. 

Test Prep

• Nursing Practice Tests: PAX, PSB-RN, TEAS

Ebooks

• Master the ASVAB
• Master the NCLEX-PN Exam Ebook
• Master the PCAT
• Peterson's ACT Prep Guide Ebook
• Peterson's SAT Prep Guide
• Master the GRE Ebook
• Catholic High School Entrance Exam Ebook
• Master the HiSET Ebook

Study Guides

• AP Biology Study Guide
• AP European History Study Guide
• AP World History Study Guide
• AP Calculus AB Study Guide
• AP Calculus BC Study Guide
• AP Chemistry Study Guide
• AP Statistics Study Guide
• AP U.S. Government and Politics Study Guide

On Sunday, April 1st, Tennessee residents will be able to use Transparent Language Online to learn over 100 different languages through the Tennessee Electronic Library (TEL)! Transparent Language Online is replacing Gale’s PowerSpeak which will not be available after March 31st.

Transparent Language Online --

• Builds all four core skills of a language: listening, speaking, reading, and writing
• 100+ languages to choose from
• English lessons for speakers of over 25 different languages
• KidSpeak has kid-friendly lessons and interface in 6 languages
• Mobile apps are available
• Save progress on lessons completed

Transparent Language requires all users to sign up for an account with a user name and password. Email is optional but recommended to access account and reset passwords.

TEL is pleased to announce the release of a new and improved Health and Wellness Resource Center with an updated user experience and tools available in other popular Gale digital resources. Enhanced functionality includes: 

• A mobile responsive design
• Google and Microsoft integration
• Citation tools
• Readspeaker technology
• Language translation
• Accessibility compliance

The new homepage features four major topic groupings: Diseases and Conditions; Drugs; Diagnostics and Tests; and Therapies, Treatments, and Surgeries. This rich digital resource offers access to thousands of full-text medical journals, periodicals, reference works, multimedia and more, covering a full range of health-related issues, from current disease and disorders to in-depth coverage of alternative medicine. Also, to address the need for access to authoritative medical content for Spanish speaking patrons, the resource offers a search limiter by Spanish content.