I.E. using staff of fireball will it increase my destruction skill? I love how they use stffs in this game but are they just there to give non mages an edge? or will they increase skills with use?

Enchanted Items are Magic for Dummies. It takes no skill in the magic school to cast the enchanted spell, so it stands to reason that you get no skill boost in magic using the Enchanted Item.

thats what i thought. guess ill have to sell this staff then, no point using a weapon that wont help me level when I have perfectly good spells.

but...................

You skill in the staffs magicka school dictates how many times you can use the staff before it depleates as the cost of using the staff each time is lowered as your skill in that school increases.

Here are your options in the elder scrolls series for magic

enchanted items
-each item is limited to their own individual charge uses, not your entire magicka pool
-anyone can use items to "cast" any school of magic as long as they are skilled with enchanting
-you need to recharge your items with soul gems, they do not recharge on their own like in Morrowind
-You must disenchant items to learn the magical properties, not just learn the spell like in Oblivion and Morrowind.
-If you find enough staffs with a high damage output, you can "cast" as many times as you wish as long as you have the soul gems or filled enchanted items.

casting spells
-each spell is limited to your magicka pool, not individual uses
-you need to recharge your magicka with potions. It also recharges on it's own
-the higher your skill level is in a particular school, the stronger the spells of that type you can cast like in Oblivion and Morrowind.
-Unlike the previous games, your perks define your school's power, and the higher your skill level, the more spells you will be allowed to purchase by the trainers at the college.
-You can cast as many times as you want as long as long as you have the magicka potions to fill your magic pool.

So would you rather collect soul gems, and magical staffs/items, or potions and spend a ton of perk points per school? Your choice.
I should also add it's possible to enchant equipment to reduce magicka spent on a class, making you virtually unstoppable if you keep a set of equipment for each school you wish to cast. I also heard that the higher your skill level, the slower enchanted items for that school deplete.

Only the Enchant Skill determines the amount of the Soul's charge in the gem that is used up per use. Not even sure if that has the same effect in this game as it did in prior games. In this game I think the Enchanting Skill is what determines the number of charges when you make an item, not how much charge is used. Although, it really has the same net effect over time.