Schools buy 2300 Palm TX handhelds

Posted on 18. Jul, 2006 by Joanna in News, PDA & Pocket PC, Palm

Palm TX

In the US schools have long recognised the value of PDAs in the classroom, and now schools in Kansas have added 2,300 Palm PDAs and keyboards to their high schools, bringing their total up to 5,000. But what do schools want with business tools?

Well, by integrating the wireless technologies, it gives “administrators, teachers and students” access to the school network, email, printers and PCs where and when they need it according to Palm. With laptops out of the schools’ budgets, Palm handhelds were a logical choice for the school boards. The school district’s head of technology also says that they plan to give the campuses Wi-Fi access, hence buying Palm TX PDAs, probably the least expensive Wi-Fi handhelds available.

It isn’t only access to information that’s needed for these education programs to succeed, the staff and students actually need to learn how to use them. Apparently it takes 15hours of training for a teacher to be trained on how to make the handhelds work for them and their teaching. All teachers have to learn how to use them as the plan is to integrate the technology into every subject on the curriculum.

The older models get handed down to Junior and Elementary schools, and the special needs schools are also receiving funding for the use of the equipment. Nice to know that PDAs are getting used across the ages, and not just becoming the staple of a business diet.

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