The state of educational software is pathetic for Windows

[Todd33]

I bought a family PC for the three kids. My first thought was Reading Rabbit and Encarta. Well Encarta is dead, Encyclopedia Britannica is the only game in town the interface and tech is from 1995. Reading Rabbit is still around, but it is all software from Win 98 era and most of it does not run in Win 7. No one makes modern educational software for new computers? Must I make a VM to run old crap at 640x480?

No DD service for educational software, I have to leave CDs in the drive? Come on Steam this crap!

Very discouraging so far. The best thing out there is flash based web sites, so at least they are free.

Anyone else have young kids, what do you do?

 

[zebrax2]

I guess easy access to the internet and sites like wikipedia killed them

 

[Gooberlx2]

The state of educational software is pathetic for Windows

:\ Is it any better for other OSes?

Anyway, I have no real good suggestions other than getting the one of those "Complete National Geographic" sets.

 

[Todd33]

:\ Is it any better for other OSes?

Anyway, I have no real good suggestions other than getting the one of those "Complete National Geographic" sets.

No idea, I run Fedora on my laptop, not much better there. It seems like a huge market. Millions of families with kids and no software except stuff from a decade ago, most of which won't run on the latest Windows.

 

[Chiefcrowe]

that seems crazy that there are no good modern ones. the internet can only do so much i think.. if i were in software, i'd try to do something like this!!

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

How about you call the professionals? I like "The way things work" for kids. There are also some good resources through the Smithsonian. You got to do your due diligence.

 

[Todd33]

How about you call the professionals? I like "The way things work" for kids. There are also some good resources through the Smithsonian. You got to do your due diligence.

I am, I have been searching high and low and decided to check here. What else can I do?

I did find Kizui, interesting kids web browser for kids. My wife found Zoodles. But these are just content portals, I was hoping there was a world of modern PC apps for learning, guess not.

 

[EagleKeeper]

The basics for children in K-6 does not change.
Reading Rabbit. JumpStart and a couple of other series will do the job nicely.

Stuff I obtained for grandkids 10 years ago is still applicable for the current crop.
As for running under Windows 7; setup a VM for Win98 or XP if you need to.

checkout Learning in Fun

 

[swinger222]

There's always... books *gasp*
There've been numerous studies done to show that information you learn through a screen isn't absorbed as well as from a book.

 

[EagleKeeper]

There's always... books *gasp*
There've been numerous studies done to show that information you learn through a screen isn't absorbed as well as from a book.

Interactive tutorials will work better than straight reading.

But the tutorials need to be of quality; kids learn quickly and need to be challenged.

 

[doan]

I bought a family PC for the three kids. My first thought was Reading Rabbit and Encarta. Well Encarta is dead, Encyclopedia Britannica is the only game in town the interface and tech is from 1995. Reading Rabbit is still around, but it is all software from Win 98 era and most of it does not run in Win 7. No one makes modern educational software for new computers? Must I make a VM to run old crap at 640x480?

No DD service for educational software, I have to leave CDs in the drive? Come on Steam this crap!

Very discouraging so far. The best thing out there is flash based web sites, so at least they are free.

Anyone else have young kids, what do you do?

My kids play those old Reading Rabbit games on Win7. Some of the games require compitibility mode. Then some of them will run in a small windowin the center of the screen or compatibility mode supports resolution changes as well. Also, I imaged all the CD's and stored them on the hard drive. Just double click to play in a virtual drive.

Lately they have also been playing a lot of web based flash stuff in stead of the old CD games.

 

[lxskllr]

You could try Edubuntu. I've never used it, so I don't know how good the packages are, but it's free to try. You could do a LiveCD, or put it in a vm for testing...

http://www.edubuntu.org/

 

[HexiumVII]

Yep, Windows got nothing now. Honestly, get an iPad. They are ALL there.