Local School Hoping iPads Will Boost Students' Skills
WILKINSBURG (KDKA) -- Fifth graders are riveted to their screens at Kelly Elementary School in Wilkinsburg.
They've received free iPads, to increase students' achievement levels.
Their teacher, Kelly Polostky, and other Wilkinsburg teachers, had special training to catch up with the 21st century technology. Each student works at his or her own level.
"Every student has their own set of skills that they're working on," their teacher says. "And they can move at their own pace. And hopefully, they can feel successful after they do it independently. And it helps me. Every week I get an email of the pace and the progress, and they can move on to the next level once they have met the challenge."
Superintendent Daniel Matsook and the school board came up with grant money to provide Kelly and Turner schools with a total of 300 iPads.
"It was just enough money to do this pilot project for half of our sixth grade through pre-school kids," says school board president Ed Donovan.
These kids are the pioneers. One class in each grade gets an iPad, to test how the program works. Next year, every class gets one.
For Sheila Haute's first graders, iPads beat notepads any day.
As student Tia Hawes puts it, "You can learn from the iPads, and you can also read and do math on iPads."
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