__/ [Ignoramus19736] on Monday 06 February 2006 17:04 \__
> I have a 4.5 year old who is able to type somewhat OK. I have a old
> 700 Mhz PC that we set up as "his computer". It is firewalled using my
> main linux box to do address translation.
>
> There were a few reasons why I decided to give him linux. One is that
> he is not yet good enough with a mouse. I want to get him into a text
> mode shell and to teach him a few commands at first, such as commands
> to play music.
>
> Other reasons, such as security, evil microsoft, viruses, etc are
> obvious.
>
> So, my goals are
>
> 1) security
> 2) having something worthwhile for him to do
> 3) ease of use
>
> The areas I want to introduce to him are
>
> 1) text chat like "talk" and "ntalk"
> 2) playing mp3 files with mplayer by doing ls and typing commands.
>
> later, when he learns to use mouse better and develops better fine
> motor skills, I want to introduce him to stuff like tetris and drawing
> programs and viewing videos.
>
> I am reluctant to get him into messengers, but maybe there is some
> "middle ground" that I can find.
>
> I would like to hear some thoughts on this (introducing children to
> computers via linux).
>
>
> i
(Ed)Ubuntu would be my suggestion. Kubuntu might be a little too much to
handle and rather unnecessarily so. KDE in general doesn't seem most
suitable, yet it probably *could* be made less of a handful.
You can have a look at some fresh Edubuntu screencasts at:
http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=linux+tutorial
Ubuntu contains all of the things you require and its learning curve (which
might also be required from you) is minute. Once in the past I heard about
Ubuntu used successfully with children, which is why I recommend it.
Good luck,
Roy
--
Roy S. Schestowitz
http://Schestowitz.com | SuSE Linux | PGP-Key: 0x74572E8E
6:40pm up 20 days 13:56, 11 users, load average: 0.21, 0.43, 0.50
http://iuron.com - next generation of search paradigms
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