Because digital literacy is becoming an increasingly important part of a person successfully functioning in today’s society, Literacy Victoria put forth and was accepted for its’ application to evaluate tablet computers, or iPads, as effective educational tools for low-literacy adult learners.
Participants taking part in this research study are learner-tutor pairs. These matched pairs can sign out an iPad whenever they meet in Literacy Victoria, and use the literacy applications available on the iPads during their sessions.
During the 8-month pilot project, learners and tutors incorporated the iPads into their sessions, and provided weekly feedback through the IPad Session Report, filling in which apps were used and any comments on the usefulness of those apps. Participants were also asked to fill in a more in-depth mid-project questionnaire in June, as well as a final discussion about the iPads at the end of the project. IPads are still available for individuals and learner-tutor pairs to use.
This project ran from April to November 2013, and a final report is available below:
IPAD FINAL REPORT
The applications that are currently available on the iPads are:
- Khan Academy
- Maths Wiz
- Fraction Basic
- Flash to Pass
- Grammar Lite
- Read on Sight
- SBSpelling
- Spelling Free
- Vowel Mvmt
- Sight Word Snapper
- GE Tenses
- PB Phonics
- Quick Math
- iBooks
- Word Tris
- Letter Forms
- Literacy
- Reading Trainer
- Wrong Word
- Algebra Pro
- Math Board
- Dictionary
- Dragon Dictation
- Reading 1
- SWF Spell
- 4th Grade
- Barefoot Atlas
- Scrabble
- Fill the Cup
- Phonics Genius
- Long Division
- Cool Writer