Ipad air will not unlock

Be sure to check that your battery has enough power to provide this help. Just plug in your charging cable and walk away. Check back in an hours and try powering off or unlocking the screen again.

Hi, I found this on the apple website. Does this help you?

Restart your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch - Apple Support

https://support.apple.com > en-gb
9 Dec 2015 - Press and hold the Sleep/Wake button until the red slider appears. Drag the slider to turn your device completely off. After the device turns off, press and hold the Sleep/Wake button again until you see the Apple logo.

Press and hold down the Home button on the front of your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad while still holding down the On/Off button. Keep holding both buttons as the screen turns off keep holding both buttons until the turns back on again and displays the Apple logo

Rotate the tablet so you can use a different part of the screen to unlock it.

First, try turning your iPad off then back on. Sometimes iPads get weird and won't let you unlock them without a reboot.

Try removing the battery for 30 seconds.

As for unlocking iPad, there are several ways you can resort to. Just follow one of them as below shows.

If you've neither synced with iTunes nor set up Find My iPhone in iCloud, you'll need to wipe your iPad to factory setting to remove the password, which means you'll suffer losing all your data on iPad and get it as a new one.
Please pay attention there is a slight difference in putting different models of iPad into recovery mode.
iPad Air

• 1. Turn off your iPad Air, press and hold the Home button.
• 2. While holding the Home key, connect the USB cable to the device. Wait until the Apple logo appears and keep holding the Home button for few more seconds.
• 3. Continue holding the Home button until the iTunes logo appears.

iPad mini/iPad pro

• 1. Connect your iPad to your computer or laptop and open iTunes.
• 2. While your device is connected, force to restart it.
• 3. Press and hold the Sleep/Wake and Home buttons at the same time. Don't release when you see the Apple logo. Keep holding both buttons until you see the recovery mode screen.

Now you have entered the recovery mode, and

1. When you see the option to Restore and Update, click it.

2. Wait for the process to finish. Then you can set up and use your device.

For more methods, check: How to Unlock iPad?

If you forgot iPad password, there still are several methods to unlock iPad. Here take one of them as an instance.

If you've neither synced with iTunes nor set up Find My iPhone in iCloud, you'll need to wipe your iPad to factory setting to remove the password, which means you'll suffer losing all your data on iPad and get it as a new one.
Please pay attention there is a slight difference in putting different models of iPad into recovery mode.
iPad Air

• 1. Turn off your iPad Air, press and hold the Home button.
• 2. While holding the Home key, connect the USB cable to the device. Wait until the Apple logo appears and keep holding the Home button for few more seconds.
• 3. Continue holding the Home button until the iTunes logo appears.

iPad mini/iPad pro

• 1. Connect your iPad to your computer or laptop and open iTunes.
• 2. While your device is connected, force to restart it.
• 3. Press and hold the Sleep/Wake and Home buttons at the same time. Don't release when you see the Apple logo. Keep holding both buttons until you see the recovery mode screen.

Now you have entered the recovery mode, and

1. When you see the option to Restore and Update, click it.

2. Wait for the process to finish. Then you can set up and use your device.

For more methods, check: How to Unlock iPad?

Turn off ipad
open itunes in your computer
connect ipad to computer
follow instructions in itunes

What do you mean it does not slide? Swipe the screen to the left or to the right to unlock.