Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, 2014

In this paper, we discuss how iPads offer innovative opportunities for early literacy learning but also present challenges for teachers and children. We lent iPads to a Children's Centre nursery (3-to 4-year-olds), a primary school reception class (4-to 5-year-olds) and a Special School (7-to 13-year-olds), discussed their potential uses with staff in pre-and post-interviews and observed how they were integrated into practice over a two-month period. We found variability in the ways iPads were used across the settings, but a commonality was that well-planned; iPad-based literacy activities stimulated children's motivation and concentration. They also offered rich opportunities for communication, collaborative interaction, independent learning, and for children to achieve high levels of accomplishment. In some cases, this led teachers favourably to re-evaluate the children's literacy competence, and enabled children to construct positive images of themselves in the literacy classroom. Practitioners particularly valued the opportunities iPads afforded to deliver curriculum guidelines in new ways, and to familiarise all students with touch-screen technologies.

Tablet technologies such as the Apple iPad (iPad) have been garnering interest and increasingly adopted as a potential learning tool and resource to engage children’s learning. Despite a growing literature on the ways educators have attempted to use iPads in their teaching across the compulsory schooling and tertiary sectors, there is a scarcity of studies in the early childhood education (ECE) context. This exploratory qualitative research project, the iPads and opportunities for teaching and learning for young children (iPads n Kids), is intended to inform the current debate on young children’s iPad use. It aimed to better understand the iPad use for educational purposes from the perspective of teachers, young children and their parents/caregivers. It recognises that young children are increasingly exposed to (and to an extent expected to make use of) digital and mobile technologies as members of a digital generation. Teachers and caregivers are further expected to take advantage ...

Integrated Experiences and Implications, 2015

As tablet technology becomes more widely available for preschoolers at home and at school, it is necessary to examine the effects of these tools in early childhood education classrooms. This chapter focuses on the use of iPad electronic books (e-books) and their effects on preschoolers' understanding of vocabulary and story comprehension as well as engagement during reading activities in an urban New Jersey school. The results of this study highlight the positive ways in which iPad e-books can be used to support literacy in preschool classrooms. This chapter also includes recommendations for preschool teachers who may be considering using e-books in their classrooms.

Frontiers in psychology, 2014

Nordic Journal of Digital Literacy, 2012

We have explored the role of a tablet computer (the Apple iPad) and a shared display as extensions of a practitioner’s repertoire for language learning and literacy practices in a multicultural kindergarten. In collaboration with a practitioner, an intervention was designed that included the use of two iPad apps in a language learning and literacy practice session with a group of 5 children aged 5. We have analysed the conversations around the tablet computers and in front of a shared display, trying to identify types of talk. The roles of the iPads, the apps and the shared display are discussed in relation to the types of talk, engagement and playfulness observed in the activities. We argue that the intervention led to valuable activities for language learning and literacy practices. The two selected apps differ in their levels of structure (directed vs. open) and genre (show and tell vs. fairy tale), and this difference will be discussed in relation to the types of conversation they initiate, and the extent to which they enable the children to transfer experiences from books and hence develop their literacy to include digital and multimodal resources.

This non-experimental correlational quantitative study was designed to explore the effects of specialized professional development, age, gender, and years of teaching experience on the successful integration of iPads into classroom literacy education among K-6 students. The study uses the teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) scores to measure the successful integration of the iPads.

Since Apple released their iPad tablet to the market in 2010, teachers and early education experts have slowly started advocating and experimenting with ways to implement the device and others similar to it into classrooms, investing in the technology and the literacy applications to help children stay interested in and facilitate learning. Due to its user-friendly motions of tapping and swiping, young students can comfortably navigate the tablet and consequently use the educational apps, making these devices especially useful in the early education market. This paper supports the proposition to continue supplementing early learners' classrooms with iPads and other tablets from a number of levels, including advances in ways of teaching mathematics, literacy, and leadership. In addition, the paper will postulate future developments and improvements in the educational technology field, such as adding more tablet-inspired features to other sources to make them more useful to young students.

This study explored the viability of tablet computers in early education by investigating preschool children's ease in acclimating to tablet technology and its effectiveness in engaging them to draw. A total of 41 three-to six-yearold children were videotaped while they used the tablets. The study found significant differences in level of tablet use between sessions, and engagement increased with age. Teachers reported high child interest and drawings as typical to above expectation. Children quickly developed ease with the stylus for drawing. Although technical issues in learning this new technology were encountered, children were interested and persisted without frustration. What seems to matter for children's learning is the ways teachers choose to implement this technology. (Keywords: technology and young children, tablet computers, computers and early education, pentop computing)

IRA e-ssentials, 2014