Justification in using Edubuntu instead of Windows

[Scott Balneaves]

Isaiah wrote:

Snip...

> Their
> main complaint is that Edubuntu is not a good tool for the children to use
> because it is not what is being used in the corporate world and everyday
> life.

Well, I for one use it in my everyday life at home, and we use Ubuntu here
at work for all our 165+ desktops.

> They are under the impression that the children will be at a
> disadvantage if they ever have to use a Windows environment.

Couple of problems with this reasoning, especially for an elementary school:

1) These kids are, at a bare minimum, at least 6 years away from graduating
high school.  Chances are, any program they learn will have a new version out
by the time they get to the "corporate world".  So learning version X of
program Y really isn't going to provide them with too many advantages.
2) For grade school kids, they're probably not sitting down learning Word
Macro Programming, but rather reading, math, comprehension skills, etc.  So,
whether they learn these things on Linux or on a Windows box makes no real
difference.
3) Learning should focus on skills, imho, rather than rote memorization of
feature sets.  Our users here who understood the *concepts* of word processing
(i.e. indenting, styles, treating information in a structured manner, etc)
had no problem converting from WordPerfect to OpenOffice.org.  They knew
what they wanted to do, and just had to look up the corresponding function
in OO.o.  Users who knew that if they wanted to do task X, they pressed
ctl-alt-key y, on the other hand, had no end of trouble, because they
didn't really understand what they were doing.  They had memorized keystrokes,
not concepts.
4) Most, if not all, of the "corporate" programs within Edubuntu can be
downloaded for Windows as well.  Firefox, OpenOffice.org, the Gimp, etc, are
all available for Windows.  For free, I might add.  Legally free.
5) Linux use is on the rise around the world.  What's "non standard" today
will be tomorrow's "commonplace".

Cheers,
Scott

-- 
Scott L. Balneaves | "Eternity is a very long time,
Systems Department |  especially towards the end."
Legal Aid Manitoba |    -- Woody Allen