Phones, netbooks and iPods are finding a place in the curriculum and expanding student access to technology.

Fifth-graders at Chormann Elementary School in the Southgate (Mich.) Community Schools are in their second year of using iPods. This year, they are discussing the novel Coraline with Peers in Australia, England and Singapore.

Technology has finally progressed to where mobile devices are cheap enough and powerful enough to use,” observes Elliot Soloway, a professor at the University of Michigan and at that school’s Center for Highly Interactive Computing in Education. Soloway, who believes that cell phones are the true one-to-one computer option for schools, is also co-developer of GoKnow, a mobile learning environment that runs educational software on handheld computers.

At West Elementary School in the St. Marys (Ohio) City Schools, District Technology Coordinator Kyle Menchhofer helps fifth-graders use cell phones to learn vocabulary terms and definitions in social studies.

In other schools they also take quizzes and tests and store their work in an “e-locker,” from which they can transfer files to other devices such as laptops or desktop computers at home. Teachers can use management tools to record and monitor student progress and time spent on task.