TPACK and its added values for teachers

In this section I would like to discuss the core components of teachers knowledge and after which try to reflect on some advantages of TPACK based on my personal experience as a teacher. The first part will address a general description of teachers’ knowledge on the basis of Mishra and Koehler’s work: each individual component of the knowledge, paired components of the knowledge and the combination of the three bodies of knowledge. The second part will deal with reflective discussion on the added values of TPACK.

The three domains of teachers’ knowledge: TPACK

It is undeniable that teachers’ knowledge of pedagogy and content is essentially important, but as technological advance is playing increasingly important roles in our educational practices in which technology - such as chalks, blackboards, and markers in more traditional innovations or computers, PDAs, and smart phones in more advanced innovations – has come to our classrooms. This reality requires teachers to integrate or adopt technology into their classrooms for better educational practices as an additional capacity to their knowledge in pedagogy and content knowledge. Therefore, being a teacher should have a sort of required knowledge: three domains of teachers’ knowledge.

The three domains of knowledge include technological knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, and content knowledge, or the so-called TPACK for they become the core components of teacher knowledge, and are fundamental for effective instructional practices. First is content knowledge. It is teachers’ knowledge and understanding of the subject matter or course being taught to students, e.g., Math, Natural Science, English, etc. Without this, teachers would teach nothing to students. Second is pedagogical knowledge. Having a great deal of content knowledge is not enough for effective instruction. If content knowledge answers the question of what teachers teach, then pedagogical knowledge answers the question of how teachers teach the content. This knowledge is teachers’ understanding of instructional approaches, methods, and classroom techniques with which teachers would be able to provide powerful learning environment.  Third is technological knowledge. It refers to teachers’ capacity to appropriately select and use technology that best support and promote effective instruction. This capacity allows teachers to integrate technology into their classrooms in which teachers can benefit technology for their own classroom practices. This knowledge also requires teachers’ skills to operate technology they use, for example teachers may have to be able to operate a computer and other technology devices.

These bodies of teachers’ knowledge can be connected in pairs as pedagogical content knowledge (PCK), technological content knowledge (TCK), technological pedagogical knowledge (TPK). Pedagogical Content Knowledge refers to how teachers teach particular content-based material to students, Technological Content Knowledge is how teachers select and then use technologies to communicate particular content knowledge, and Technological Pedagogical Knowledge mainly addresses how teachers use particular technologies when they are teaching (Harris & Hofer, 2009). These all three pairs form as Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPCK) as illustrated in figure 1.

Figure 1. TPACK Framework

As seen in the figure, the intersection of the three circles forms a combination of three knowledge domains, the so-called TPACK. This model of teachers’ knowledge is inseparable with the work of  Mishra and Koehler (2006).

What advantages can teachers take from TPACK?

In this part, I will discuss some advantages of TPACK which I mostly reflect from my experience as a teacher.  I have been teaching since 2003 in that time Information and Communication Technology (ICT) especially the introduction of internet was booming in my region. I firstly didn’t know at all if such innovation would affect educational practices around the world. I was really curious about it and tried to learn from some expert friends. With little knowledge triggered me to learn more about it especially how ICT would be possibly integrated into my classrooms. I then participated in seminars as well as international conferences to enrich my pedagogical knowledge as well as technological knowledge; at the time I was not familiar with the latter term. I realized afterwards that technology is important to support my teaching practices; I read some literatures on how to use technology in teaching, and practised it in my classroom. There are some advantages of what I could learn from such experience in which I combined the three knowledge domains in my teaching practices.

Cost-effectiveness is the first added value. In teaching I used to copy materials and students also did the same; students handed in assignment in paper-based copies in which they had to print them out. It meant we had to spend money for that. But, with technology lesson materials should not always be printed due to the availability of digitals like e-books and so on. I posted materials online on a virtual classroom I created for free and gave my students the class key I gave to them and then they created their own account to join the class; I also asked my students to send their assignment via e-mail to me without necessarily printing it anymore. I realized that having knowledge and skills on technology could save my money and students also experienced the same thing. Another advantage is that teaching and learning process becomes easy. The ease of teaching would be in terms of delivery. If teachers know how to effectively disseminate information and transfer materials to students, then they find it easy to do so with technological skill. Previously, I always got difficulties in communicating with students. Calling by phones or cell phones to every student is impossible because it took times and charged me a lot of money. By e-mail and other messengers communication becomes easy and cheap.

Having good content knowledge, using effective teaching strategies, and knowing what and how to integrate technology would increase students’ motivation and behaviour to create a learning environment that encourages positive social interaction, active engagement in learning, and self-motivation in learning. For example, when I taught general English to fresh university students, I invited them to learn in a multimedia language laboratory instead of learning in a normal classroom. Students were very enthusiastic; they were happy because they wanted to learn language with computer applications. For me I was trained by the lab supplier on how to operate the lab; it’s a kind of technological knowledge for me. What I found with students was that most students were motivated and we didn’t realized at the time that class time was over. It is important to note that language lab itself is a thing and would not give any advantages, unless I knew how to use it for my teaching purposes.

I also personally believe that TPAK would be able to create a student-centred learning and low-structure situations where students are provided with numerous options and a great deal of autonomy. In the context of a student-centred learning, I just introduced students how they could operate the computers in the lab to learn language. The applications in each computer allowed students to focus on the four language skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing) they wanted to learn. My role at the time was only facilitating students and gave support when they got troubles. Learning was steered by the students. It was amazing for me; technology as well as knowledge about technology did help me a lot in shaping students’ learning. In foreign language teaching, therefore, it is necessary for teachers to be familiarized with CALL or Computer-assisted Language Learning, CMC or Computer-mediated Communication, CALI or Computer-assisted Language Instruction and so forth because in the context of foreign language teaching those learning models are able to facilitate students with spoken or written native English. With regard to a low-structure situation, options in my opinion represent flexibility. With technology, several learning options could be offered. For instance, as was stated, learning should not always take place in normal classrooms. Learning in a lab or at distance from home would offer a new situation, and learning can be enhanced through computers with some educational applications. Students could also choose what they wanted to learn first. They could start with listening part or they wanted to begin with reading part. It’s flexible and learning is self-directed!

Figure 2. Language Laboratory

It is important to note here that the added values of TPACK are not limited on the above-mention advantages. It depends on the tools we use, the context where we use the technology, and other contributing factors. What I want to say is that TPACK would enable teachers to create a powerful, productive learning environment. With content knowledge, I know what to teach; with pedagogical knowledge, I know how to teach; with technological knowledge, I know what technology best suits and how to use it to support my instruction; and with TPACK, I understand what and how to teach effectively with technology support.

References:

Harris, J., & Hofer, M. (2009). Instructional planning activity types as vehicles for curriculum-based TPACK development. Chesapeake, VA: Society for Information Technology in Teacher Education (SITE).

Mishra, P., & Koehler, M. J. (2006). Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge: A Framework for Teacher Knowledge. Teachers College Record, 108(6), 1017-1054.

Cooltoolsforschools is really cool.

Last lecture in ‘Pedagogy for flexible learning’ concerning more technology and education was absolutely inspiring for me. What made this lecture so special is that it’s just like opening windows to the world: opening my mind to the richness of technology for educational purposes. On the lecture my teacher introduced us what a wonderful website I have ever known for technology in education. It’s http://cooltoolsforschools.wikispaces.com/.

This website is really informative on a number of tools which are beneficial for educational practices. It ranges from presentation tools, writing tools to file storage & web pages. I would say, all tools attached to this website are definitely useful either for teachers or students.  During the lecture our teacher asked us to explore one of the available tools, and I was even confused with selecting one because all tools are title-catching for me. But, with other group members we decided to get to know more about file storage and web pages and presented to the class. Wow...it’s a lot. I am only familiar with few of them: most are new to me. There are 16 for free storages, 18 for free websites and 7 for website builders. We then selected dropbox and webs.

Dropbox is a network-based application and it is a free service with which people can share documents, photos or the like easily. With dropbox people should not email documents as attachments to their friends, colleges, or family anymore. If you want to use it, just install it to your PC or laptop and then you can invite people you want to share your documents with. Visit http://www.dropbox.com/ for more information concerning installation and other information. Next, if you want to create your own web page, you can use webs or freewebs. You can either use the free one or upgrade to the premium one. I had some experiences with webs or previously called freewebs. For me it’s nice because it provides many templates and other interesting components. 

simSchool as a pedagogical and technological application to support novice teachers

simSchool is a network-based classroom simulation. It is just like a flight-simulator. It is also called the game of teaching (Zibit and Gibson, 2005). This simulation helps us practice classroom management before entering real classrooms. It is aimed in analyzing student differences, adapting instruction to individual learner needs, gathering data about the impacts of instruction, and seeing the results of their teaching (http://simschool.org/). For you, to be able to use this simulation, you have to register. Further information about it, just visit http://simschool.org/. That’s at least short information about simSchool.

With this simSchool, I tried to learn how it works and how beneficial it is for real classroom practices. I firstly wanted to learn about classroom management, and I worked out with ‘Everly’s Bad Day’. First of all, I tried it with one student and understood his personality and academic record in the simulated class. The student has a good academic record. He likes working either in group or individually, but he has low self-esteem. That’s what I know about the student from the record available in the simSchool. Then, I started the class by assigning him a task on level 1, that is “go over last week’s lessons”. Afterwards, I continued the lesson on level 3, and assigned him a new task, namely “take notes during lecture”. And the class ended with level 1 task, which is “take an oral quiz”. The results of these classroom activities are not really bad not good, a little bit neutral; there is no great improvement in terms of openness, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. However, His academic aspect decreased. The results are illustrated below:

Upon the completion of some practices with simSchool, I now try to reflect on it. In this discussion, I shall focus on what I found very useful from simSchool as well as what I saw some weak points of it, and finally try to relate it to the pedagogical concept.

Overall, I found simSchool very helpful for me in shaping classrooms. It helps me understand students’ personality, preferences which are the bases for effective instruction as well as types of possible learning activities in the classroom. simSchool simulation has also simple components in it. The interface is not so complicated that I can easily search and do the practice.  To my opinion, this simulation is better for my learning since it gives a picture of how real classrooms look like. What I found most interesting with simSchool simulation is that it can improve my confidence and self-efficacy.   Most importantly, I really want to practice it in a real classroom situation and see what is going to happen. This real experience would enable me to appraise this simulation or the other way around. In addition, simSchool simulation could develop some components of my knowledge as a teacher, such as my practical knowledge or the repertoire of classroom techniques and strategies, contextual knowledge or my familiarity with classroom context and phenomena, my pedagogical knowledge or my ability to plan, adapt, and improvise, my personal knowledge or the personal beliefs, principles and approach to teaching, and indeed my reflective knowledge with which I am capable of reflecting on and assessing my own virtual practices before entering real classrooms.

On the other hand, it took me some time to understand the rationale and the concept of simSchool simulation although I have already got some information from the professor. The simulation represents only a small classroom setting and certain cultural philosophy; I doubt if this simulation would benefit a lot to teachers with a large number of students and with students from multicultural backgrounds. Managing small classrooms is, to my understanding, easier than organizing large classes. In my country particularly in primary and secondary education, teachers are overwhelmed with a large number of students in one classroom.

Instruction is sometimes difficult for some instructors. It has evidently been true because instructors have to search for a lot of information about students’ characteristics and background and think of how they can best explain things. As technology could improve the transfer and transmission of knowledge in education, instructors today can easily teach materials; one of which is through simulation. According to Ruskin, Fanning and Gaba (2009) simulation is “an imitation of some real thing, state of affairs, or process and consists of techniques that provide a teaching tool that is particularly well suited to dynamic and challenging environments (p, 476)”. simSchool is a kind of simulation-based training with technology. It is known that computer simulations are pedagogical and technological applications. In this regard, Summers (2004) stated that simulations allow training to occur almost anywhere and anytime, and this flexibility can be used to reduce or eliminate many of the variable costs associated with traditional training, such as classrooms and instructors (as cited byBell, Kanar, & Kozlowski, 2008). It is clear that simulation, like what simSchool provides, could benefits people around the world, and learning become enriched.  

References:

http://simschool.org/

Bell, B. S., Kanar, A. M., & Kozlowski, S. W. J. (2008). Current issues and future directions in simulation-based training in North America. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 19(8), 1416-1434. doi: 10.1080/09585190802200173.

Stonemetz, J., Ruskin, K., Fanning, R., & Gaba, D. (2009). Simulation-based learning as an educational tool anesthesia informatics (pp. 459-479): Springer New York.

Zibit, M., and D. Gibson. 2005. simSchool: The game of teaching. Innovate 1 (6). http://www.innovateonline.info/index.php?view=article&id=173

What should be flexible in learning?

The nature of what is meant by flexibility could mean different things to different people, and the term used for it suggests that there is no universal agreement among theoreticians and scholars about its definition. However, a nice definition given by Khan (2007, p. 1) could better serve flexibility in learning:

Flexible learning can be defined as an innovative approach for delivering well-designed, learner-centered, and interactive learning environments to anyone, anyplace, anytime by utilizing the attributes and resources of the Internet, digital technologies, and other modes of learning in concert with instructional design principles. Can we do what learners want?

With regard to this flexibility, Khan further maintains that a well-designed flexible learning course allows learners to become actively involved in their learning processes (p. 4). Furthermore, as flexible learning is not only necessarily related to distance education, several flexibilities could be offered in the light of learners (Collis & Moonen, 2001):

1. Learning modes: Offering learners with options such as on-campus or off-campus learning modes characterizes flexibility in learning. These alternatives are provided for learners to fit their needs in order that they can learn more flexibly. Rapidly evolving information technology dramatically influences the way educational institutions (e.g., universities) serve their students; distance learning becomes possible for those who want to learn at distance. Learners can learn from any places with this kind of learning mode through Learning Management Systems (LMS).
2. Social organization of learning:  Understanding learners’ learning styles is important for it is basic information for learning organization. Some learners prefer working individually and some others collaboratively. Offering inappropriate learning organization would hinder learning. This social learning organization could be in the forms of individual, group, or the combination of both types.
3. Content: Flexibility in learning content might be offering choices to learners what they want to learn. In this case, learners are involved in selecting course contents.
4. Learning materials: Learning materials are not only limited on textbooks. Learners are provided with various learning sources, such as journal articles, web-based materials, videos or audios, and other authentic materials.
5. Interactivity: As learning is an active process, interactivity becomes a basis to engage learners. Providing learners with several methods of acquiring information, knowledge and skill would make learning more flexible, for examples, human-to-human interaction, human-to-computer-interaction, and so on.
6. Media to support learning (technology): A variety of media can be offered to learners with which learning is supported and flexibly done, such as computers, PDAs, smart phones, etc.
7. Language: Some learners are better at certain language, and the others prefer another certain language to use for their learning effectively; therefore language is also another component that can make learning more flexible by offering some language choices for learning (e.g., English, Indonesian, and Dutch).

http://www.nicenet.org/

An example of a website supporting flexibility in learning related to learning modes is Nicenet Internet Classroom Assistant. This is a non-profit organization. The website allows teachers around the world to create a virtual classroom for free.

References: 

Collis, B., & Moonen, J. (2001). Flexible learning in a digital world: Experiences and expectation. London: Kogan Page

Khan, B. H. (2007). Flexible learning in an open and distributed environment. In B. H. Khan (Ed.), Flexible learning in an information society (pp. 1-17). Hershey: Idea Group Inc.