Teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge
This blog is in response to he article Teachers’ Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge and Learning Activity Types: Curriculum-based Technology Integration Reframed by: Harris. I agree with others who posted in the VoiceThread that this article summed up our class really well, but it also could have been a great introduction to the purpose of the class. Focusing on our content areas and ways that technology can support them and great pedagogy is so much more useful than finding ways to use technology just for the sake of using technology.
The article states that often the training involved with using technology is too “technocentric”, meaning that there is little attention given to the interplay between technology, pedagogy, content and context. The authors discuss a framework they recommend that uses TPACK: technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge in order to better integrate technology instruction that is more meaningful for students. Each of these areas is essential areas of knowledge for teachers to teach effectively using technology. The weakness of this “technocentric” approach is stated as forgetting two essential aspects of teaching- content and pedagogy. The focus is all on the technology with little learning taking place in a meaningful way.
I know I have said this before, but I have noticed this with any training I’ve had with technology (besides this course). The training revolves around how to use the technology and not why we should use it or the learning gains students can make. This course is different because we can practice with the technologies and see how others in a variety of teaching contexts use different technologies. I also hadn’t looked at the technology standards before this course.
The discussion on technological knowledge was interesting to me because it says that it is always in a “state of flux” which makes defining what “technological knowledge” is so difficult. I used to have “technological knowledge” compared to my colleagues just because I was younger, but I am loosing my edge as I focus on content and pedagogy and grad school. It is a hard balance to keep. After reviewing many software and technology applications and the research behind a few of them I can see that the goal of adding technology into the classroom isn’t to entertain students or just to be novel; the goal is to engage students in social learning and in the social construction of knowledge. It is a blessing to work in a school and in a district that supports technological advances and trials and errors by teachers. I have the supports in place to try new things with my students and a great group of students this year to be my lab rats (I teach psychology…).
I come again to the end of a course where I have gained many new ideas for change in my classroom and I have to make everything fit together in a way that is useful for me and for my students. There seems to be too many resources for me to sift through, but each week is a new week and each schoo
l year is a new year. I can try new things and craft my teaching practice each year to make it better and better. Not many other professions can say that.
From apscms.net. This graphic summarizes the ideas in the article about needing all parts of TPACK.
The Wiki Way of Learning
Learning about how wikis can show student thinking and allow for reflection and problem solving has helped me to see the benefits of wiki in the classroom. Before reading this article I was ignorant about how beneficial wikis because they allow students to learn from each other, which is the best way to learn. Wikis allow collaboration, co-construction and demonstrates different ways of learning. There is no expert in a wiki, only collaborators constructing knowledge together.
Wikis provide a quick way for students to construct knowledge socially in an authentic way and provide them the space to reflect on their thinking and how their thinking has changed. Ruth (2004) says that students will be more engaged in learning if they can get help from teachers and other students and if they feel that the task is meaningful. Knowing why a wiki is used is so much more important to me than knowing how they are used. I am looking forward to seeing more examples of wikis working in science and psychology classes to implement the same ideas and wikis for reviewing major concepts in my classroom.
Social and cooperative learning have been shown to be more beneficial to a diverse group of students. Wikis may be another way I reach out to underserved students.
(from abpc.wikispaces.com)
The graphic compares collaboration via email with wiki
Bridging the Gap
I very much agree with this comment in the Bogle article: “Common barriers to uptake and development include time constraints, lack of experience or familiarity with applications and their purpose, reservations about the relevance of emerging technology for education, and importantly lack of access to support and expert consultation.”
Our school district does provide quite a bit of support for technology, but I still struggle with finding the time to fit certain newer pieces of technology into my classroom (Blogging, Voicethread, Vernier software, etc). Each of these pieces of technology can enhance the learning experience of my students, but sometimes I don’t see how it will help more than a class discussion or lab. If I had more time to sit with an expert and fit technology pieces into my curriculum I would be more inclined to use it. Implementing technology is something that needs to happen at the classroom level- it needs to be a grassroots endeavor, as the article says. Teachers need to be supported, but they also need to want to use the technology in their context. Individual teachers are the key to the model that Bogle suggests because we are the ones actually using the technology and learning processes with our students. I think that if more time and energy is given to the model below more teachers could more confidently incorporate technology into their classrooms.
The model given by Bogle seems like a great way to help more teachers incorporate more technology into their classrooms. The model tries to do 4 things that are essential for teachers as they try to incorporate technology:
o Increase awareness of emerging technology, particularly in its capacity to enhance learning and teaching;
o Model effective use and best practice in a way that holistically integrates pedagogical factors;
o Establish a comprehensive support framework;
o Embed eLearning activities in wider policy measures.
Overall I am feeling overwhelmed this week with the amount of learning I need to do to make technology more useful in my classroom context and look forward to more practice with different technologies in this class.
Technology is at the center of Marzano's "best practices"
Teachers, Not Technicians
Teachers shouldn't have to know programming in order to use technology in the classroom
(From cartoonstock.com)
I found myself agreeing, in large part, with the findings in the article Teachers, Not Technicians: Rethinking Technical Expectations for Teachers by Sandholz and Reilly out of UCR. Just intiutively it seems like teachers will be able to encorporate more technology in their classrooms if they are allowed to focus on curriculum first and not the ins and outs of technology. I have seen first hand that simply giving teachers more computers doesn’t help most of them to integrate their use in curriculum. One of my frustrations at the beginning of the school year is coming in to work early, not to work on curriculum, but to set up my teacher work station, projector and document camera. I love these pieces of technology and use them daily so I don’t mind putting in the time to make sure they work properly. Other teachers may not be so motivated.
The Apple Classrooms of Tomorrow (ACOT) project’s 5 phases of “instructional evolution” was very useful in helping me categorize where I fall in the continuum of integrating technology into my classroom instruction. The five phases are: entry, adoption, adaptation, appropriation, and invention. I, personally, haven’t found this continuum to be a linear progression, but one in which I move through the different phases throughout different times of the year and as I include more technology in my classroom. I mostly fall in the appropriation phase, but would like to challenge myself to be more innovative with the technology, grouping, and assignments I give my students.
As I work in a district with a great plan for our technology. I just need to ask for help and it is given to me almost immediately. Our professional development classes tend to be very tailored to our needs as teachers and I am excited to check more of those classes out in the future. This particular class on instructional technology will give me a taste of what is out there for students which I can practice now and incorporate into my curriculum as I plan this summer.
Standard 4 Meta-Reflection: Pedagogy
How Instructional Models Influence Student Academic Success
Standard 4: Pedagogy indicates I need to engage students in learning experiences that are meaningful, stimulating, and empirically proven to promote intellectual growth.
I created this artifact as part of the final course requirement for the Survey of Instructional Strategies. This paper was a reflection of the two teaching strategies that influence student achievement and well being in my classroom. Reflecting on why I use particular instructional strategies impacts student learning because I am more purposeful as I plan lessons. If I have set a clear target students are better able to reach that target. Using empirically proven teaching methods allows me to learn from the best practices of other teachers to improve student learning and well being in my science classroom.
As a science teacher I use Inquiry on a regular basis and expect students to construct their own knowledge and answer their own questions. This gives students ownership of their learning. I use direct instruction quite often as well. Direct instruction allows me to guide students through the metacognitive processes after their inquiry activities like analyzing and synthesizing their ideas. Using direct instruction after an inquiry activity also gives me opportunity to have students explain the evidence they have collected during their inquiry. Together we make connections between the activity and the standards. I have found that this empowers students to ask themselves questions about how they know what they know.
Both of these research-based instructional strategies give me a template to focus my instruction so that it is meaningful and stimulating. Incorporating research-based instructional strategies purposefully will increase student learning no matter what strategy I use for a particular lesson. Both of these strategies do not work in isolation. I also should use cooperative grouping, jigsaws, advance organizers, and other strategies, to access students’ multiple intelligences.
