Understanding TPACK using the Activity Types Approach

It is important to start looking at ICT and technology as a way to assist teaching and learning, “in a context and not just as an end itself” (Queensland Government, 2011, p.1). I have seen that out on my prac when the teacher wants to incorporate technology in the lesson he begins by selecting the digital tools he ‘should’ be using first and then thinks about how and what he will teach using that technology. This is a perfect example of what Seymour Papert (1987) calls “technocentric”, “when focus is centred upon the technologies being used, more than the students trying to use them to learn” (Harris & Hofer, 2009, p.7). Planning on addressing curriculum areas and incorporating technology is extremely challenging. The integration of educational technologies into teaching must begin with the teacher focusing on, “standards-based curriculum requirements, effective pedagogical practices, and available technologies’ affordances and constraints” (Harris & Hofer, 2009, p.2). The model based on pedagogy, content and technology is known as TPACK.

But as a teacher how do I effectively plan using TPACK?

Harris & Hofer use the strategy of developing TPACK using learning activity types. Using activity types to plan personally made me understand how to use the TPACK model effectively and easily. As the teacher you first start with the curriculum requirements, then activities to cover the curriculum, lesson outcomes and then think about what technologies would help students gain a better understanding of the topic.

This approach has helped me in understanding how to, “align learning activities with compatible educational technologies and activity types that incorporate content, pedagogy, and technology knowledge, along with all of their intersections” (Harris & Hofer, 2009, p.8). In week two when I began exploring TPACK I was simply getting my head around the terminology and only had a basic understanding. I now have a better understanding on how to use the TPACK model when planning and teaching.

TPACK intersections:

Pedagogical Content Knowledge: How to teach particular content-based material

Technological Content Knowledge: How to select and use technologies to communicate particular content knowledge

Technological Pedagogical Knowledge: How to use particular technologies when teaching
                                                                                                         (Harris & Hofer, 2009, p.4).

Before I finish this blog post, I want to quickly touch on another point I learnt this week within the 21^st Century Skills reading. I realised that I still had a naive definition of what digital-age literacies are. I was under the impression that digital aged literacies was being able to use a computer efficiently. Whereas, digital-aged literacies include many other elements: basic literacy, scientific literacy, economic literacy, technological literacy, visual literacy, information literacy, multicultural literacy and global awareness (Metiri Group, 2003, p.2). 

Reference List

Harris, J., & Hofer, M. (2009). Instructional planning activity types as vehicles for

          curriculum-based TPACK development. Retrieved March 31, 2011, from 

          http://activitytypes.wmwikis.net/file/view/HarrisHofer-

          TPACKActivityTypes.pdf

Metiri Group. (2003). EnGauge 21^st century skills for 21^st century learners.

          Retrieved March 31, 2011, from http://www.metiri.com/21/Metiri-

          NCREL21stSkills.pdf

Queensland Government. (2011). Smart classrooms professional development
          framework. Retrieved April 19, 2011, from http://education.qld.gov.au/smartclassrooms/
       pdframework/ictc/indicators.html

Exploring the World without Taking a Step

Let me begin today with a new concept I haven’t heard of before, augmented reality. Augmented reality can be described as, “a variation of Virtual Reality (VR) that supplements reality, rather than completely replacing it” (Balog, 2007, p.1).  Now that I understand what it means, how could I use this technology in the classroom effectively? How engaging would it be for students to take a virtual tour around a museum, theme park, archaeological dig or even outer space without even leaving the classroom? Augmented reality has the ability to, “bring the field into the classroom” (Hopkins, 2010, p.1).  Augmented reality can provide learning experiences that are, “rich examples of complex phenomena (engineering, earth sciences, medicine, environmental applications, etc) while engaging students (Hopkins, 2010, p.1).

I found it interesting that the Horizon Report addresses augmented reality as a, “technology to watch” (Johnson et al., 2010, p.6) and will be introduced to schools on, “the far-term horizon, set at four to five years away from widespread adoption” (Johnson et al., 2010, p.6). Augmented reality has the ability to enhance the information available to students as a tool to for discovery-based learning. Recently, I have been introduced to ZooBurst which is a website that allows anybody to create a story book that in essence comes to life, or at least provides students with a 3D model as opposed to 2D text. ZooBurst is the perfect way to take ‘baby steps’ in implementing a simple version of augmented reality into the classroom (probably suitable for lower primary). Using ZooBurst has the potential to enhance student’s literacy levels as it is a more engaging way to read than paper back. Implementing ZooBurst as a tool to teach English to students through discovery based learning is an example of TPACK. This example demonstrates how the use of ICT is benefiting the teaching and learning of reading for students and not being used as an end itself.

This is an example of a storybook re-created using ZooBurst:

Reference List

Balog, A. (2007). Augmented reality in schools: Preliminary evaluation results from

             a summer school. Retrieved March 21, 2011, from 

             http://www.waset.org/journals/waset/v30/v30-21.pdf

Hopkins, D. (2010). Augmented reality: does it have a place/future in education?

            Retrieved March 21, 2011, from

            http://www.dontwasteyourtime.co.uk/technology/augmented-reality-does-

            it-have-a-placefuture-in-education-edtech/

Johnson, L., Smith, R., Levine, A., & Haywood, K. (2010). 2010 Horizon Report:

           K-12 Edition. Texas: The New Media Consortium.

Blogging in the Classroom

WOW! What an amazing idea to have a classroom website for all students, parents and teachers to access. My blog today is going to concentrate on exploring the concept of a classroom website and blogs, stemming from exploring the 2M Gems website. The class 2M Gems blogging began in 2008 created by their teacher Amanda Marrinan. Each year Amanda introduces her class into blogging within the classroom. The class has three blogs: writing blog, reading blog and blogger café.

The classes reading blog is where they post about books that they are reading. They post comments, book reviews and recommend other books they think their peers would enjoy reading. The writing blog is used for students to write freely and independently. It can cover anything from what they are learning to what they are doing on the weekend.

The link to 2M Gems website: http://2mgems.blogspot.com/ 

Introducing a blogging atmosphere into the classroom has a many benefits:

·         Highly motivates students, especially those who otherwise might not become 
           participantsin the classroom

·         Excellent opportunities for students to read and write

·         Effective forums for collaboration and discussion

·         Powerful tools to enable scaffolding learning or mentoring to occur

                                                                                   (Nguyen, 2011, p.1)

As students learn a lot, if not more outside of the classroom environment, why should we keep the classroom and home separate? Having a classroom website and blog also brings the classroom into the home. Parents can have access to their children’s learning and progress throughout the year. Rather than having children answer ‘nothing’ to the question, what did you learn in school today? A daily updated classroom blog keeps, “parents well-informed of skills and lessons being taught within the classroom, we are enabling the parents to reinforce what is taught during school at home” (Ronaghan, 2010, p.1). For those parents who are not aware of the concept of blogging or ‘posting’ comments on blogs, Amanda Marrinan employs the great idea of using the orientation meeting with the parents in the first week of the school year to tutor the parents about the blogging world in her classroom.

Amongst all the learning benefits that students are getting from having a classroom blog they also learn lifelong skills of being safe online. The students learn that they are not allowed to post their last name, mention passwords or their address; they are not allowed to describe what they look like or match a photo with their name.

I personally think that this is a wonderful idea to employ into the classroom! I cannot think of a better way to involve the parents in the classroom, get the students excited about writing and reading and encouraging the students to be technological learners. By having a class website and blog it demonstrates how, “ICT can be used to benefit teaching and learning and is most effective when used in the context of learning and not as an end itself” (DOE, 2011, p.1). This teacher is demonstrating a real life effective example of the TPACK model within the classroom.

Having a classroom blog is so 21^st century learning.

Reference List Nguyen, T. (2011). Blogs in education. Retrieved March 18, 2011, from http://thanhnguyen75.blogspot.com/2006/11/use-of-blogs-in-education_14.html Queensland Government. (2011). Smart classrooms professional development            framework. Retrieved April 19, 2011, from http://education.qld.gov.au/smartclassrooms/            pdframework/ictc/indicators.html Ronaghan, D. (2010). Bringing the classroom into the home. Retrieved March 18,          2011, from          http://community.prometheanplanet.com/en/blog/b/blog/archive/2010/12/06/          bringing-the-classroom-into-the-home.aspx

Am I a Digital Immigrant?

The second lecture began to delve into the Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework. This framework looks at three primary forms of knowledge: Content (CK), Pedagogy (PK) and Technology (TK). Equally important in this model, “are the interactions between and among these bodies of knowledge, represented as PCK (pedagogical content knowledge), TCK (technological content knowledge), TPK (technological pedagogical knowledge), and TPACK” (Koehler & Mishra, 2009, p.62). Therefore, this framework is grounded on believing that quality teaching does not exist without the combination of all three components.

From what I understand (based on my readings) it is not enough to know only the content of a subject, the teacher must also know the best pedagogy as well as using technology so that students remain technologically relevant.  When implementing TPACK in the classroom, “viewing any of these components in isolation from the others represents a real disservice to good teaching” (Koehler & Mishra, 2009, p.66).

I found some interesting YouTube clips that talk about TPACK in some detail; there are five parts on YouTube:

The reading ‘Digital Natives’ talks about how students going through the education system have already spent “around 10,000 hours of their lives playing video games and 20,000 hours watching TV” (Prensky, 2001, p.1). Technology is such an integral part of their lives so why should we take it away, or ban them from it when they walk through the classroom door? ‘Digital immigrants’ is a term that the writer uses to describe people who choose to reject the idea of using technology. As students have so much information available to them in the form of computers, mobile phones and other portable devices, it is important that teachers accept and take advantage of the ever evolving technologies and try to integrate them into the classroom.

I found it interesting to read that teachers are complaining about the short attention spans of their students, when if you think about it, they actually do not have short attention spans.  These students can spend hours upon hours on one video game. They just have a short attention span for what is being taught to them in the classroom. These “digital natives crave interactivity” (Prensky, 2001, p.4) and that is what teachers now have to base their teaching methods around.

This pedagogical shift for the teacher, involves moving away from teacher-centred direction and rather focusing on student-centred activities that provide each individual with a meaningful context.

I’m looking forward to exploring in more depth the sort of activities that can be used in a classroom which will provide students with the information that needs to be taught but in a way that will capture their attention fully.

Reference List Koehler, M., & Mishra, P. (2009). What is technological pedagogical content          knowledge? Journal of Education: 9(1), 60-70. Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants. Retrieved March 5, 2011,          from www.marcprensky.com/.../prensky%20-%20digital%20natives,          %20digital%20immigrants%20-%20part1.pdf Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants, part II: Do they really          think differently. Retrieved March 5, 2011, from            www.marcprensky.com/.../prensky%20%20digital%20natives,          %20digital%20immigrants%20-%20part1.pdf

Just a Little Overwhelmed

The first lesson of ICT and pedagogy was interesting and overwhelming. Before entering the tutorial and lecture the other day I was unaware of the amount of multimedia and technology that is available to be used within the classroom. Although, I was aware that chalk and talk is in the past, I had no idea that cloud computing and iTunes are being used within the classroom. If the children in my classroom room are keeping up with this fast-moving technology, I should be fully equipped with the knowledge and understanding as well and be able to use it with appropriate pedagogy throughout lessons.  Throughout the first tutorial all the information received was overwhelming, so I would like to delve a little deeper into some of the technologies presented.

Firstly, Interactive Whiteboards (IWB) are replacing traditional whiteboards and blackboards. They can be used to, “show students anything which can be presented on a computer's desktop (educational software, web sites, and others)” (DOE, 2010, p.1). During the discussions in the tutorial it became evident that electronic whiteboards come with both positives and negatives.

Some of the positives include: 

• Digital storytelling
• Teach whole group computer or keyboarding skills 
• Brainstorming
• Teaching students how to navigate the Internet
• Use the Interwrite software to create lessons in advance at home or at school. Then save them for future use or to be shared with other teachers
• Diagramming activities
• Teaching steps to a math problem.

                                                                 (DOE, 2010, p.1)

A negative that was discussed in the tutorial is that although the IWB involves students engaging in activities on the board, it usually only involves an individual or small group of students completing the activity up the front and the remainder of the class are passively listening to what is being taught.

A new program that can be used in the classroom only using ICTs is ‘cloud computing’. Cloud computing is a concept that I had no idea about before entering the first tutorial. Cloud computing is, “a general term for anything that involves delivering hosted services over the Internet” (TechTarget, 2011, p.1). Cloud services are cheaper and more flexible because it is internet-based and you can access it anywhere at any time. This allows students to work collaboratively on group projects either together or separately, because students can access their work from any computer it enables their group projects to be worked on at home.

As a student, carrying around textbooks from class to class becomes a tedious job. Thankfully this will soon be in the past. The tablet or book reader is another ICT that can be used within the classroom. These small, portable devices will allow students to, “download and read entire books, magazines and newspapers in a digital format” (Wordpress, 2011, p.1).

Another educational tool that is being implemented into schools is online games, which I found interesting. Not being a ‘gamer’ myself I always thought playing video games was a waste of time. Although, video games enable students to learn through play, challenges their thinking, provides them with instant rewards, involves levelling, creativity, allows students to take risks without any consequences, rapid prototyping and problem solving skills. Different games can involve different skills for students. For example: The Sims is a life simulation game which can be used to teach students life skills in an interactive and play based way.

Currently, there are a variety of new technologies available, which makes teaching more interactive. I am confident that during this course I will slowly become more confident with my abilities to use these technologies within lessons effectively.

Reference List Department of Education. (2011). Interactive whiteboards in the classroom. Retrieved                 March 1,  2011, from http://rmtc.fsdb.k12.fl.us/tutorials/whiteboards.html TechTarget. (2011). Cloud computing. Retrieved March 1, 2011, from                 http://searchcloudcomputing.techtarget.com/definition/cloud-computing Wordpress. (2011). The digital book reader. Retrieved March 1, 2011, from                http://thedigitalbookreader.com/