Office For MAC 2011?

You can try using Pages. Since it comes free with your MacBook you can install it on the white MacBook due to the family sharing option. No cost option if you just need a word processor and not Word.

You can also try OpenOffice, a free office app. Or you can use Google Docs, which is free and accessible anywhere you have internet.

Only buy Office 2011 if you really need it.

 

Agree with above open office and libre office is great replacements in PC so mac should be just as good a replacement.

Dont buy it if only for your kids to do homework etc as I'd say not worth the cost unless find cheap copy on ebay etc.

 

I would personaly say that Libreoffice is more polished and better. The interface is in my opinion easier to use. Except for the fact that Libreoffice on macOs Sierra is broken :/ Not sure if Open Office is broken too. They are both based on the same code base. Libreoffice is a fork of Open Office. Libreoffice is also the default program on most Linux distros.

 

Look into LibreOffice. It's a MUCH better fork of OpenOffice that has more and better features. And it's free.

 

I am still running Office 11 on El Cap. My guess is should run even better on 10.6.8

 

Pages, Numbers, Keynote are free with new Macs bought after 2013 (or so). So if you get a new MacBook, you can try it out for free. Due to the way Family sharing works, you can put those apps on the white MacBook at no additional cost. Then you can compare them all to see which one you like more.

 

As far as homework for the kids, the school may set your direction. Around here, the schools are big on Google Docs and even providing ChromeBooks to qualifying low income students. You might also think about Office Online since the interface is so close to Office 365, which many universities are giving to students for as little as $10.

 

I thought apple blocked you from installing on non current OS?

 

No. As a matter of fact, the latest version of the iWork apps (Pages, Numbers, and Keynote) require macOS Sierra. The iWork09 apps (if you can find them) will work with Snow Leopard.