Applications

Homework Management on the Mac

By Steven Coburn ⋅ May 19, 2008 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

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I, like most of the contributing writers here at MacFocus, are teens and students, and everyone that I know integrates, in one form or another, school and technology. Whether it be simply using a word processor to type up a paper, or utilizing the internet as the valuable information resource it can be, it is definitely an asset. Unfortunately, most people will never go very far beyond that, and, especially those of us with Macs,  are missing out on a lot. In fact, computerized homework management is the only way I’ve been able to survive thus far, totally replacing ye’ old pencil and paper. Even iCal, my BlackBerry, and Stickies have totally replaced any need for my former life line– Post-It notes.

Although some of you might be thinking that you are fine with your current system, I strongly suggest trying this alternative for at least a week, as you will most likely find that it will integrate better with your life, and things, over time, will  become easier to manage.

I would start by downloading an application called School House. Among all the home work management options, including simply using TextEdit or possibly Stickies, this is the best in my opinion. It is a somewhat simple yet amazingly powerful desktop application that helps you input, organize, track, collaborate on, manage and hopefully complete your school assignments. It has everything that you would ever expect out of an home work program, including organization of different classes, priority labeling, and notes, as well as the ability to attach files to assignments, support for projects with multiple steps or tasks involved, and multiple partners on that project. The list goes on and on, and everyone I show it to is amazed by its features and ease of use.
There is no support for syncing of any kind, so you’re only going to be able to use this from your computer, and basically from just School House itself. Surprisingly there is no support for iCal integration/reminders or anything of the like thus far. But I wouldn’t be surprised if the next update included some of these improvements. Also, speaking of updates, if you’re running Leopard, you should be careful, as an early Leopard update “broke” School House in a way. But there is a way around it: find School House in the Finder and right click then go to “Get Info.” Find and check the box that says to run the application in ‘Rosetta’ mode. This means that OSX will force the app to run in Power PC mode, fixing any problems you may have had due to the Leopard update. The only side effect is that it will take significantly longer for the application to start up, but after that it runs at normal speeds.

There are plenty of other ways to do home work management on your Mac, but I find this to be the best way. Little things like having the number of assignments due the next day displayed on the icon in the dock (similar to when you have unread emails in Mail.app) make it easier for me to remember things and leaves less room for excuses. :)

Tags: help, homework, Mac, school, School House