publishing writing workbooks - Which application for this?

Hello all,

I bought my first ever Mac just last week (MacBook Pro). I worked a little on Macs before in different schools I taught at but now have my very own. Like so many others, all I can say is WOW.... what a huge difference! Beautiful, elegant.... just wonderful.

My work is that I own a language school in Japan and I am interested in publishing writing workbooks for my students. I have been looking around the web but can't find a font or program I can download that I can use to generate worksheets for writing and penmanship. As kids we had to write our ABCs in print and cursive on those sheets of paper with the dotted lines, tracing at first, and then free writing after that.

I would be DEEPLY grateful to any kind soul who can advise me how to either find the right program to use, or to point me to what is already on this machine that I can use to get the job done.

Best and kindest for any assistance,

Mark G. (in Canada for this week)
Takamatsu, Japan

I wonder if a simple word processor program will do what you need? Most have the ability to use specialized templates of which I'm sure you can find one to do up your worksheets. Take a look at MS Office 2008, Open Office 3.X for the Mac, and iWork 09.

As an alternative, you might try a simple desktop publishing program. iStudio is an inexpensive desktop publishing program which reminds me (although not as good) of MS Publisher. Take a look at it here.

Regards.

You may want to take a look at NeoOffice as well. It does everything I want it to.
It is the Mac version of the Open Office and is free.