Good free educational software for both Windows and Linux [closed]

Question

Forgive me if this has been asked before.

My church, a non-profit, has a bunch of old donated computers that they would like to use for their after-school program. These computers will not be connected to the internet at all. I will likely have to reinstall the original Windows 98 or XP on them, for the ones who have it, or install Linux myself.

They would like some educational games and other programs on these for the children, ranging from early grade school to early teens. Because there is not a lot of money for the project, they are looking for preferably free or possibly inexpensive options.

EDIT: As asked in the comment, this is for Florida, in the US, so definitely English, possibly Spanish as well. I don't know the demographic of their program since I don't have kids in it.

I know about Edubuntu, but I don't know how well it would work for the wide range of ages.

I've made this community wiki, because I don't think there's a definitive answer.

Answer 1

If linux is acceptable then I would suggest to have a look at edubuntu

• Education suite Gcompris - Over 80 learning games and skill building activities for children aged 4 to 10
• Tux Paint - An easy-to-use drawing program
• Tux Math - An arcade style maths game
• KPercentage - A program to help learn and calculate and learn percentages
• Kalzium - An application enabling students to explore the Periodic Table
• Full Multimedia Software - Applications for playing music and movies
• Advanced Imaging Software - Applications for viewing and creating 2D and 3D graphics
• Productivity - A complete office suite
• Internet - Web browser, email and instant messaging

Answer 2

EDIT: Just noticed the lack of internet. Sorry! I won't delete as these might be useful to someone else, but I withdraw my answer from helping your needs. Apologies.

For cross platform, you might want to focus on sites rather than applications

• Primarygames has loads of good ones.
• Orisinal has loads of really nice child friendly games, not really educational althoughI justify it by saying that it improves coordination and mouse control!
• European_Geography- good map game.
• nrich.maths from the University of Cambridge has loads of playables and printables. Try this one.
• Teachingtables
• stellarium and celestia are two excellent astronomy tools.
• And the brilliant space trade game Gazillionaire has a free trial for download on Windows only.

Answer 3

Qimo is an operating system built specifically for kids 3 and up. It's built on top of Ubuntu.

Answer 4

If you felt like getting games from the net for free, then installing them on the system after, look for emulators. Dos Emulators (Dos Box works nicely) often have games that are no longer made or supported, but may still serve your needs... Oregon Trail, Carmen Sandiego, Captain Keen, etc. can normally be found at random Dos emulator sites, and many sites will not host them if the creators spoke against it, or it was somehow illegal. I've recently stockpiled a bunch of nostalgic games I used to play in elementary school (Oregon Trail being the most nostalgic).

Answer 5

There are a number of "edutainment" programs that are part of the KDE suite. I believe there is a typing tutor, a hang-man style game, and a decent number of puzzle style games that may keep the older kids entertained.

Answer 6

GeoGebra AWESOME graphing software Italc Monitering/remote desktop software