Mobile Technology: Altering Time and Space???

I know the title seems laden with metaphysical implications, but I think there might be some truth to it, in a manner of speaking.  Let me explain:

We are now in exam week.  Our first semester is coming to an end, students are panicking about exams, and finally handing in much needed assignments.  As I've mentioned in earlier posts, my grade 11 Ancient Civilizations class has been using our school's new iPads to research and prepare a board game and write a research essay.  The iPads are a class set, 24, that for the time being remains in my class.  For almost three weeks my students have used them every day.  It was a good exercise in classroom management for me and self-control for them.  Facebook is such a tantalizing distraction for so many of my students.

To get back to my point about time and space.  I've been thinking and reading a great deal about iPads or any mobile tablet computer and how to best use them.  I've come to a simple conclusion:  Every student should have one.  Fraser Speirs make an excellent case for this in his latest blog post (http://speirs.org/blog/2011/1/21/how-the-ipad-wants-to-be-used.html).  He is a teacher at a private school in Scotland, and has just instituted a 1:1 iPad to student program.  Granted he works at a private school and I work at a public one, but the argument for them is no different.   A mobile device, like the iPad allows students to complete their work on their own schedule.

An excellent example of this happened last weekend.  My history class had been working on their research essays.  They were due on Friday, but I extended the deadline to Monday.  I received an essay from a student on Monday morning at 1:35 am.  That's right I got it in the middle of the night.  The student wasn't coming in to school on Monday but was still able to send in his work.  This gets to the core of my post.  He could do it because he had access to a computer and the internet.  Many of us take this for granted, especially those of us who live in an urban area.  My school provides for students who live in a rural area.  High speed internet is not always an option, and some students can't even get dial-up!  One potential solution to this is to get those students a Wi-Fi+3G iPad, and come to some agreement on the data plan.  This would go a long way in eliminating the digital divide in our area.