Sharing iPads rather than requiring students to have individual devices—or having none at all—may help young children improve test score and literacy skills, according to a new study.

Using Kindergarten students only, the "study involved 350 students from three schools in a Midwestern school district where iPads were being phased into classrooms," according to the article on LiveScience.com.

"This created a natural experiment in which one school had an iPad for every student, a second school had 23 iPads for students to share, usually in pairs, and a third school that had no iPads."

At the end of the study, students that shared iPads scored 30 points higher on their end-of-the-year achievement test, beating out the students who had their own or none at all.

But because the study only considered three Midwestern schools, more research needs to be done on the subject to provide better results and more definitive conclusions

Still, considering the latest push to get iPads into schools with the belief that the 1:1 iPad ratio is better for students, more research into the subject could save education budgets a lot of money if sharing does in fact prove to be better.

"'...schools may reconsider their tablet implementations for younger children, given the large financial investment needed to provide 1:1 iPads and the lack of evidence to support the need for individual iPads in kindergarten,' the researchers said," according to the article.

The researchers want schools to consider integrating group activities into iPad usage and increase social interactivity between students, something using a 1:1 iPad ratio won't do.

Read the full story here and comment below.

Article by Nicole Gorman, Education World Contributor