DLTK's Sites for Kids
Help for printing our templates and activities.

This print help page is for users of DLTK's Crafts for Kids and its sister sites. We hope to provide you with suggestions to help solve any problems that you may be having while trying to print the activities and templates on our sites.

If you are having general difficulties with your printer or you are not able to print from any applications, you should refer to the troubleshooting guide that came with your printer or check the online support on the website for your printer manufacturer.

Most print problems I experience when I'm surfing are the result of temporary glitches. The first thing I always do is bookmark where I was, reboot my computer (including shutting down my printer) and then start everything up again. I then go back in to where I was and try printing again. I've found that 90% of the time this solves whatever is wrong.

Still not working? Below is a list of common problems and their solutions. These solutions will help most of you but if you are still having trouble you are welcome to contact us using our print help form.

Printing FAQ's

Why can I see the image template on the screen but when I print the image does not show up on paper?
Why am I unable to view or print the images / templates?
When I try to print a page, I only get part of the page. Do I have to do something special to make the whole page print?
The right side of the picture is getting cut off. What can I do?
I use A4 paper. Do you have your projects available for this size?
When I try to print some pages, I receive the error message "NO PAGES AVAILABLE TO PRINT". Why?
I use WebTV. Do you have a no frames version of the templates that I can print?
I started using Netscape 6.0 and suddenly the templates won't print for me. Why?

Q: Why can I see the image template on the screen but when I print the image does not show up on paper?

A: This is our most common problem and can be caused by a variety of things. Here are a couple of solutions that have worked for some viewers:

If you are using Microsoft Internet Explorer you need to ensure that your advances options are set to "Print background colors and images." To do this:
- Click "tools" from the menu bar at the top of the browser .
- Choose "Internet Options" when the menu drops down.
- Click on the "advanced" tab.
- Scroll down to where it says "Printing" (that should be more than halfway down)
- Check the box below "Printing" that says "Print background colors and images"
- Click "apply", then click "OK"
Some viewers with Lexmark printers continue to experience the problem even though their browser is set to print backgrounds and images. I don't know the technical reasons for this but it has to do with the settings in your printer software. Basically, if you want to print in BLACK and WHITE you need to "tell" (set) the printer to print only B/W -- if set on automatic it prints a blank page or doesn't print at all, the same procedure has to be done for color printing, set to color and print. For some reason It does not read automatic setting. Here is a more technical explanation provided by Lexmark that one of our viewers shared with us:

"For Windows 2000/XP, to check the print processor, right click on the printer driver icon and left click on Properties. Choose the Advanced tab. Click the print processor button. The Lexmark Print Processor is the first choice of print formats, with the LEMF datatype best for use with Lexmark inkjet printers. Using RAW or NT EMF is also an excellent test. If this fails, try the WinPrint processor. This is the Windows resident print processor."

Another viewer was able to print the images by changing their print settings to "QuickPrint".
Also see help with graphics accelerator features.

If all of these options fail to correct the problem and you are unable to print from the browser there is another option to print a template. If you right click on the image and choose 'Save As' to save the image to your hard drive. You can then open the image in your favourite software and print from there. Depending on the software installed on your computer you may also be able to right click on the file you saved on your hard drive and choose 'Print Using Windows Picture and Fax Viewer'.

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Q: Why am I unable to view or print the images / templates?

A: We have had new problems with viewers not being able to view or print the images. We have discovered that the problem is with Internet Explorer or other browsers using graphics accelerator features. The fixes are found in the links below. By disabling/turning off the accelerator features in the browser the images can be viewed and therefore the viewer can print. It seems that that the accelerator feature will either hide the images or convert them into a different format that reduces its size - it depends on the type of accelerator and browser the viewer has installed.
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=181836
(Solution #4 usually resolves the issue - turn off accelerator.)
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;817177
(In some cases the only way to resolve the issue is getting this fix from Microsoft or wait until the fix comes in the next update or installing a different browser. A couple of viewers have switched to another browser to be able to print.)
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/176945/EN-US/
(Some specific video cards that do not work with Internet Explorer.)

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Q: When I try to print a page, I only get part of the page. Do I have to do something special to make the whole page print?

A: This problem can be caused by one of two things. In one case the template was interrupted while downloading and is showing incomplete on your screen and also prints incomplete. The second problem can be related to your computer memory. To solve the problem try these steps:

Step 1 - Reload the template page.
Hold the CTRL key and press F5. This forces your browser to reload the page from our web server and ignore any cached information that may be saved on your computer. If this works the image will now show complete on your screen.

Step 2 - Free up your computer memory.
Some of our templates are quite large and require a lot of computer resources to print. (A good example are the mini-books on dltk-teach.com) Large images like these need a lot of free memory. When your page doesn't print or only partially prints try freeing up some memory:

Reboot your computer and start again fresh.
To prevent this problem from occurring, in the future reduce the number of templates you're trying to print at one time (give your printer a chance to get part way or all the way through the template before moving to the next).
Be aware that the color templates are larger files than the B&W ones so you'll need to give the printer extra time to get through those.

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Q. The right side of the picture is getting cut off. What can I do?

A. The size of the image will vary depending upon your browser. The margin size will also vary. Some browsers will allow you to adjust the size of the margin as well as the header and footer.

To set your margins to zero (or the minimum settings) before printing:

With Internet Explorer - Choose FILE --> PAGE SETUP and change the margins in the lower left corner of the Page Setup Window. You may also want to remove your header and footer information at the same time.

With Netscape Navigator - Choose FILE --> PAGE SETUP and change the margins in the middle of the Page Setup Window. You may also want to remove your header and footer information at the same time.

If that does not work you can always right click on the image to save it to your hard drive and print from another program.

Note: You cannot adjust the margins in AOL but I believe you can scale down the image. Try making it 95% of the original size if your printer is having trouble with them).

Tip from Tonya (a viewer): I had printing problems, but this was remedied by going to FILE then Page SetUp and on paper size, changing it from Letter to Letter Borderless and that allowed me to change my margins to 0" and everything printed just fine.

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Q. I use A4 paper. Do you have your projects available for this size?

A. No but you can right click on the image, save it to your hard disk and open in another program to scale and print.

Q. When I try to print some pages, I receive the error message "NO PAGES AVAILABLE TO PRINT". Why?

A. Not sure wha the error message means but if you refresh your browser it will usually solve the problem. Click your browser's RELOAD / REFRESH button (or press CTRL+F5) and try printing again or right click on the image, save it to your hard disk and open it in another program to print.

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Q. I use WebTV. Do you have a no frames version of the template that I can print?

A: Over the years we have come up with a couple of ways to offer a no frames (no ads) version of the template to print. Most recently we have added a link to a no frames or WebTV version at the top of the page displaying the template. Simply click on this link to open the template in a window without frames. Some of the older templates do not have the link but you can usually access the no frames version of the template by adding an "L" to the end of the URL in the address bar.

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Q. I started using Netscape 6.0 and suddenly the templates won't print for me. Why?

A. Netscape 6 did a few things to fix the "problems" in Netscape 4.7. Unfortunately, the things I did to make the templates print properly in 4.7 for people who use Large Fonts instead of Normal fonts make the templates not print in Netscape 6 (I'm not sure whether to laugh or cry at this point). Anyways, to print templates in Netscape 6, simply right click on the image and choose VIEW IMAGE. Print from there.

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If none of these questions/answers have helped to solve your problem please let us know using our print help form.

DLTK's Sites for Kids Help for printing our templates and activities.

DLTK's Sites for Kids
Help for printing our templates and activities.