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Software Suggestions for Elementary School Workstations?
krog asks: "I've recently signed a contract with a local middle school to replace their aged Apple /// cluster with a roomful of IBM Aptivas running Linux 7.3. Now surely I will be installing such ease-of-use tools as KDE3, Gnome, and screen, but I am looking for suggestions of other software to install. Anyone know of any good text editors/BASIC interpreters/shells/etc suitable for eight-year-old children?"
Screen? KDE AND Gnome?! Slashdot is not the place to ask for suggestions on what software to use - your school district should have somebody who specializes in educational software and stuff of that nature - the software has to fit the grade level, because, as much as you use the computer for fun, and for computer science - these are elementary school children who will use it as a tool to learn fractions and other basics of Reading Ritin and Rithmatic. Don't force useless, rather advanced programs on them because they are 'cool' - purchase or isntall programs taht assist your teachers in instructing the students in their classes.
And yes, I know what I'm talking about - I've been working in K12 IT for over 4 years now.
1. The best person to talk to to find out what applications should be installed on an educational machine are the teachers and school administrators.
2. Determining what apps to install should begin with finding out which ones best meet the need of the curriculum.
3. Unfortunately most open source apps are best suited for geeks like you and me than for children. Most apps designed for kids are also designed to run on MS platforms.
I myself just set up a multimedia lab for an elementary school. It consists of 16 IBM NetVista A21's, a SmartBoard (i.e a touch sensitive projection screen that acts as an input device), and a projector with a laptop.
Most of the teachers are familiar with MS Office and kid oriented software that run on an MS OS. I am trying to expose them to Open Source versions of the tools they use (i.e. OpenOffice, Mozilla, Opera, etc.). It's hard enough to get them to embrace these let alone a whole new OS.
My recomendation is to go slow. I have set up these machines as dual boot. Only a few people in the school know this. Introducing the entire school to Linux, GNU, et al. is going to take time.
They've already done your work for you. Don't reinvent the wheel again.
Nope, no sig
LISP...right. My god, think of the children.
Your first stop should be Here
Your second stop should be here
Your third stop should be here
Your forth stop should be here
Your fifth stop should be here
Open Office would be my choice for an office suite (that or Star Office)
KDevelop is a decent enough development suite for use in a school, but with
this age group I would use this
project
For a good teaching language This
is a good place to start.
Hope this helps!