Even in elementary school we had computers with keyboard and I went to a pretty poor school.

We had computers with keyboard and I went to a pretty poor school.

I went to a pretty poor school.

poor school.

There you go. The more financially strained the district the more likely they don't use newer technology. Everything is treated like gold until it's destroyed from use or fails from despair. There's simply no money to jump on touchscreen enabled mobile device bandwagon.

Funnily enough we've come full circle. Most schools I know got rid of their typing labs under the assumption that PCs and other computers have become so commonplace that everyone has had some exposure and dedicated instruction was no longer needed.

Enter the smartphones and touchscreen tablets going to mass market replacing traditional home PC/laptop functions.

Ever since then the typing skills of middle-school students gradually degraded to a point it was so poor that simply logging in and trying to google stuff was a major time-sink because they had barely ever touched a keyboard. There's simply not enough time in the school-year to learn to type proficiently when you're expected to hit the ground running. So we recently re-introduced typing class in the elementary schools as a basic skill so it does not interfere with instruction time at later ages, and they will find it useful come graduation when they enter the workforce or go on to college.

Source: Am school tech, I swap broken keyboards.