Student iPod Touch Pilot Program: More Homework Done, Some Fumbling
An Australian pilot program using the iPod touch as a classroom tool has some high school students doing more homework, others puzzling over the device.
Though the small program — eight 14-year-olds — using iPod touches is far from giving a scientific answer of how they might change learning, a few interesting things have cropped up.
One: Louise Duncan, the teacher who started the program at Shepparton High in Victoria, found that some of the kids had trouble using them.
“We assume that 14-year-olds are really technologically savvy, but they’re often not,” she told Perth newspaper Western Australia Today.
Students use the hand-held media players to search the internet, download music, do quizzes, research and submit assignments and work with students in Singapore.
Duncan found that students in the test program were more willing to come to school, did more homework and used their iPods more than laptops or desktop computers.
The iPods are on loan from Apple and run on the Study Wiz platform; the test is part of a global mobile learning project.
Via WA today
Nicole Martinelli is a San Francisco native who has lived in Milan and Florence, Italy. She's written for Wired.com, The New York Times and Newsweek. You can find her on 
