👷 T H E T A S K

TASK 2:  TPACK

Hello Archilearners!! 

This week our task was to learn about the concept of TPACK

TPACK is a work model to improve effective teaching used to help teachers, it is composed of three elements.

This are the essential elements of TPACK

• TECHNOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE: There is not a fixed definition for this term due to the fact that it is continuously changing. Technology allows teachers to use this in a productive and dynamic way of working. Nevertheless, it depends on social and institutional context because if they do not know how to use the different types of technology they cannot teach in this way.

• PEDAGOGICAL KNOWLEDGE: It is the knowledge teachers have about how to treat their students, how they learn, how to plan and asses. It includes their values, objectives,aims and  methodology.

• CONTENT KNOWLEDGE: It is the information about a component which will be taught by the professor. It includes knowledge of concepts, theories, proof, and  established practices, among others.

This three content are not independent . They depend of each other.

Now we are going to explain the relationship between them!!

• TECHNOLOGICAL CONTENT KNOWLEDGE: According to the influence between them, teachers need to control the subject matter they teach and how to teach that matter with the application of particular technologies. A cycle is formed. Depending on the subject one technology or another will be used. For example: when professors teach languages, Word program can be used; when they teach Mathematics, Excel program can be used.

• PEDAGOGICAL CONTENT KNOWLEDGE: It is how the teacher adapts the matter of the subject to teach, according to the necessities of each student. It includes the links among curriculum, assessment and pedagogy.

• TECHNOLOGICAL PEDAGOGICAL  KNOWLEDGE: It is the consequence of using the technology in the teaching and learning process. This includes the control of technological tools.

To sum up TPACK  is a concept about how technology affects school and the best way to teach students with technological methods according to their necessities.

Teachers have to take into account the context in which they are teaching, because it influences the type of technology they have access to, the type of students and the methodology used to teach them, the content and the pedagogy. It is not the same to teach in a low SES school than in a higher one, because the access to electronic devices, the lifestyle of the students, the parenting style are different.

In our poster we have represented the TPACK in the thoughts of Manolo (our pet, who symbolizes an effective teacher). We have selected a Spidergram to show what a TPACK is, due to we wanted to focus the attention on the concept of TPACK placing it in the centre of our poster and connecting it with the main ideas.

The pieces of the jigsaw puzzle are not connected because the knowledge is something that a teacher has to keep improving day by day.

The elements (T, Pa, C, K) are connected by wires with the main ideas due to the fact that nowadays technology connects everything.

As future teachers TPACK is very useful to us because it tell us how to be an effective teacher.

We will have to transmit the student the concepts, so first we have to command the subject. Then we will have to plan a good methodology according to our students to be able to transmit them the knowledge. And won´t let a single student left behind. Moreover teachers have to find the right  technology to transmit it.

In our degree we have specific subjects to help us in building our TPACK model. We improve our Technological Knowledge in subjects as Research and ICT or School Organization and Educational Resources. They also grow our Technological Pedagogical Knowledge and our Technological Content knowledge. In subjects as Tutorial Action, Psychology and Planification we improve our Pedagogical Knowledge and our Pedagogical Content Knowledge. The Content Knowledge is worked in the Didactics subjects, this year we have Spanish and English Didactics and next year we are going to study Maths and Social Sciences. The main purpose of our degree is to teach us how to be effective teachers, that is the reason why we grow our TPACK with every assignment.

From our point of view, TPACK is really important, but it doesn´t include the personal relationship between the teachers and families, students and peers. Teachers have to create a good environment for the students, they have to be in touch with parents to cooperate to help the children and they have to have a good relationship with other teachers.

We think that TPACK is not enough because the teacher must be actualized to the new models for an effective teaching, due to the fact that in few year this model will be antiquated. So, in a short term, it is enough to understand the work of a teacher but in a long term, it is not.

We hope that now you Know exactly what a TPACK is!!
See you next week with our next task!
Have a nice week 👷🔨