I am trying to determine how I will stay in touch with my family while I spend 10 weeks in Germany this summer. I have a Blackberry and am considering purchaing an Ipad to check on my email and skype with friends and family. But I do not know if this is practical and hope to get some advice. I have a Dell Studio, but figure it is too cumbersome to bother taking.

WiFi is everywhere, free WiFi at McDonalds or Subway.
From my motebook I get more than 30 Wifi networks, all are WPA or WPA2 encrypted. If you want mobile internet, a UMTS prepaid SIM is the way to go. It will cost you 25€ per month on the o2 network. A 2 year contract will cost 5€ per month but requires a German bank account. LTE/4G is available from Vodafone/T-mobile in the smaller towns, but on other frequencies than yours. An unlocked UMTS stick will cost you 15€.

Generally German hotels are still charging for wifi (not ture for most of Europe) so expect to get ripped off unless you can use Macado (USA's deliverer of choice of cholesterol) etc as Logos mentions

How about just finding a call center or internet cafe.

On my last trip, which included various German cities, the more expensive the hotel, the more outrageous the charges for Wifi. 18 euros a day for wifi! At less expensive hotels, wifi was free.

I'm actually interning at a hotel, they are putting me up. I am a pastry chef educator in the US and "working" in Europe is on my bucket list. My phone is Verizon, but if I get an unlocked Ipad it will have to be with AT & T, so I am finding all this rather confusing. Another option is of course an Iphone, but I think the email can get rather expensive.

a lot of hotels will have a shared pc in reception for use by customers. But as staff I have no idea what back-office facilities they will have. I'd suggest asking the hotel.

can't you get Skype for your phone???

No, Skype is not available on Verizon on my phone