Whitepad

Education has a lot to benefit from advancements in technology, with the computer alone capable of providing access to a large variety of information, and interactive simulations. For instance, Whitepad comes as an alternative to the classic classroom whiteboard, containing a large canvas, and several drawing tools.

Particularly useful for teacher is portability, because it allows the application to be easily carried around on a thumb drive and launched on other computers without having to wait for an installer to finish. Moreover, system registry entries remain intact during the whole operation, so every computer it runs on remains in good shape.

The application covers your entire screen when launched. This is an advantage if used on large touch-enabled devices, because it provides and abundance of space to write or draw in. File options and drawing tools are cleverly placed in different sections and under intuitive icons to make identification easy.

After a while of using it you realize the application is simple an electronic representation of a whiteboard. In other words, you only benefit from a few colors and an eraser to easily fix any mistakes.

However, everything you write or draw on the canvas remains there unless you create a new file. Moreover, the pan tool makes it possible to fill up virtually an unlimited amount of space and navigate without having to browse different files.

The canvas is saved on exit and resumed when launching the application again. The only inconvenience here is the lack of an export option for anything other than the program’s own format to at least be able to save pictures.

Taking everything into consideration, we can say that Whitepad is a neat little tool which can greatly enhance the workflow in classrooms. Sure enough a proper experience is delivered when using large touch-enabled screens, while the pan tool makes sure you keep everything on the same canvas.