Amazon is trying to get its Kindles into as many hands as possible with an initiative announced on Wednesday, which will bring Kindle e-readers and tablet computers into schools.

Amazon today announced "Whispercast for Kindle," giving schools and business customers a simple online tool for deploying Kindle devices and Kindle content.

Whispercast provides a single access point to purchase and distribute Kindle books and documents for educational, marketing and employee incentive programs across Kindle devices and free Kindle reading applications for iPad, iPhone, Android phones and tablets, PCs and Macs. In the coming months, Amazon said Whispercast would support distribution of Kindle Fire applications. Whispercast works with Kindle e-readers and Kindle Fire tablets, including the $69 Kindle, Kindle Paperwhite, Kindle Paperwhite 3G, Kindle Fire, Kindle Fire HD, Kindle Fire HD 8.9" and Kindle Fire HD 8.9" 4G LTE.

Whispercast gives teachers and educators access to Kindle books, they can easily purchase and distribute to develop educational programs for every age group and level. Whispercast support for Kindle Fire, Kindle Fire HD and the free Kindle reading apps on iOS, Android, PC and Mac gives students the ability to explore and learn with full-color Kindle books, including interactive children?s books and websites. Schools can also register and manage the settings on all their Kindles, including adding password protection, centrally configuring wireless connectivity to their organizations' private networks and restricting individual purchases.

Whispercast also makes it easy for business owners to manage and deploy fleets of Kindle e-readers and tablets as a way to support employee productivity or customer marketing initiatives. Additionally, Whispercast makes it easy to centrally distribute PDFs and other business documents such as a conference agenda or training materials to employees or customers.

With Whispercast, administrators can register and assign users to all of their organizations? Kindle devices at once. Administrators can also assign users into one or more groups, such as specific class, grade level or corporate department.

Schools and businesses can configure device settings across all their Kindles, including configuring wireless connectivity to private networks as well as restricting web access and purchases.