Using technology

I was excited to recently be the recipient of an iPad 2 as part of my job as lead teacher of the Autism Support Team. However, I feel like I am struggling to make good use of it. It's great for email, and to access the web, and there are some nice educational apps that have been preloaded on it. However, there have been some issues as far as being able to get internet connectivity in each building. I also have trouble typing on the virtual keyboard, and there's not a good app I've found for any type of lengthy word processing. Has anyone else been using an iPad and having better luck?