Open Source Software

[Cyndi Danner-Kuhn]

As a Teacher in the Trenches, could you tell us what you think about Open Source software. Are you using any, if so what, if not why? Is your school district using any open-source yet and if so what? If not are they considering and discussing using Open-Source. Can you point us to any resources or good open-source software or articles? ( I have attached the file my students used to research Open Source for you information)

[Adelyn]

My neice is heading to college in the fall and her mother just bought her a new macbook. She and I have loaded OpenOffice on both our machines and are trying it for the summer to see if she wants/needs to purchase Microsoft Office for the fall. So far, we are seeing that it works great! We are having to think about how we want to save things in order to make them the most useful--and how she might be able to troubleshoot for friends if she sends them documents.

I am also trying NeoOffice for Mac, but I just recently added it...I am a little concerned about all the warnings on the website, but am going to see how it goes. Seems like it should run a little more smoothly since it is for Mac directly.

[Heather Burleson]

My district is not quite ready to consider OSS alternatives, but I am able to use them in my computer lab. Audacity is one of my favorite apps. For school I use it most frequently to record articles I want my students to read. Thanks to Audacity's ability to export as MP3, the kids can read/listen to the articles at their own paces, rewind/reread and review. This helps my auditory students get just as much information from an article as my visual students.

We also used Audacity this year to record an off-the-cuff interview on Digital Social Networking for one of Wes Fryer's workshops for teachers. I grabbed two kids on my way into the building that morning, plunked my MuVo down on the table and they discussed the values they see in sites like MySpace and IMVU. Five minutes of interview, five minutes to clean it up in Audacity, and I was able to send it to Wes about 10 minutes before his workshop started!

We also use Inkscape for graphics. Hopefully we'll add GIMP in the coming year.

I second Adelyn's vote for OpenOffice. I use it all the time on my own computer, and suggest it to students and teachers who are looking for an alternative to MSOffice.

[Maureen Brisson]

Want to engage your younger students and spark their creativity and see them smile, try Tux Paint? It is a free down-loadable open source drawing program that has multiple uses for ages 3 and up. It is similar to a KidPix format, but can really help stretch our limited technology budgets.
Students of all ages have fun with this program. I have been using it for about a year and have had no problem with it.

It was a great find!
Maureen

[Sky Davis]

I looked at the Tux Paint, looks like lots of fun without the mess of cleaning up! Can't wait to try it out! Thanks.

[Christy Buck]

Maureen,
I downloaded Tux Paint and I love it. I have had a ton of fun playing with it with my daughter!!!
Thanks for the info!

[Veronica Deines]

Im going to download Tux Paint for myself and check it out! Sounds like something that would be really fun.

[Nick Perez]

I had experience with Tux Paint when I was working as a para. Our sped students enjoyed it.

[Denise Dolechek]

Thanks for the tip, Maureen. I will be teaching high schoolers, but this is a great idea to expand my daughter's creativity.

[iMon]

I love OpenSource, especially for building websites. I used Joomla to build my personal site, which is a Content Management Program or CMS. Even though I do not think this is vital for new teachers to invest their time into at first, I do think it is worth a look. Some may find it a fitting challenge to learn and use. I will admit there is a learning curve with some of these CMS programs, but I think Drupal is being used by schools with good support too. This website Open Source CMS is a place to try out some of these CMS before actually installing. This site provides a great sandbox to play in at the beginning.

http://www.opensourcecms.com/

Also, Tux Paint is a nice free addition to stretched budgets for elementary school technology just as Maureen mentioned. A good KidPix alternative.

http://www.tuxpaint.org/

Finally, TheOpenCD is a good location for an all-in-one place to get OpenSource Software. When you click on the website, you can click on Programs tab in the top right hand side of the webpage to see the list of software they have for download.

http://www.theopencd.org/

[Cyndi Danner-Kuhn]

WOW!! thanks for the great resources.

[Lucas Moll]

iMon,

I am wanting to build a simple internet site where I can upload powerpoint files and list links for my students. I may eventually expand the website form there. Would you suggest using Joomla? I was going to use iWeb but web design is new to me and i am not really sure how to compare the 2.

[Sue R.]

I'm in a private K-8, so tech money is scarce! I would recommend others in my position look at techsoup -- they have software donated by the big guys to help nonprofits....

But, to get on point, we are running windows pcs. Actually, I see that the replies you have already aren't always about open source (as in, you get to see the program code and tweak it yourself). I think we tech teachers really love to share what we have found useful, so we're talking about freeware (free to the user, not that the user can mess with the program code--like Audacity). In that spirit, I continue...

We have used Audacity much the way Mac users use garageband, I take it, to record and then play with tracks to edit and put them into shape for anything (our Primary teacher recorded kids reading their first fairy tales and compiled a cd to go with a classroom book, complete with turn-the-page tones, where the kids illustrated the fairy tales in Kidpix and we printed it out--found she had to produce multiple copies for families and friends--she used fairy tales to avoid copyright problems.)

Camstudio does a great job for screen captures, so you can do "how to" videos. Teachertube has lots of those videos, and even a video about how to use camstudio!

For the kids, there are a ton of "educational" game offerings, and the only ad free, free for educators, game I've found that really proves the power of the computer, is TimezAttack--where students use an avatar and go through a dungeon defeating trolls by solving times tables problems. It has a great visual/auditory composition, and is completely free in the basic version. Students who get through the dungeon really know their times tables, and beg to be able to play it!

Hope that helps!
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