Engage Me!

Pensky's suggestion that Technology use in the classroom should engage, not enrage, is a powerful message. I feel this video best sums up our 21st century learners and what we are dealing with as education facilitators in the 21st century. Some scary thoughts there - primary school children blogging? Pretty amazing stuff.

These children are engaging with their learning through modern mediums. No more are we using the HB pencil and red and blue lined paper, but we are using an iPad to blog our stories for a nation wide story writing competition that encompasses over 10000 students. These children are not enraged, but engaged!

TPACK Framework

This is my summary of how the TPACK Framework works. I find it to be a very helpful system for integration of Technologies in the classroom.

Brief History

The Technological, Pedagogical and Content Knowledge Framework (TPCK or TPACK) was postulated by Mishra and Koehler in 2006 as a constructive addition to Shulman’s Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) Framework in 1986. The new framework addressed the issue of how ICT’s are being used in the classroom. Mishra and Koehler suggested that ICT’s were being introduced to the classroom separate of the pedagogy and content and not providing a homogenous learning environment, but a broken one where the ICT’s were either taking over the learning environment to the detriment of PCK or being of poor quality to supplement the PCK (2006, p. 1018).

How IT Works

The TPCK framework builds on the PCK framework of Shulman. The PCK model stipulates that content (the major focus of teacher education till the early 1990’s) is only learnt when working in harmony with the pedagogy, and vice-versa. Pedagogy has been the main focus of teacher education since, to the detriment of content. Teachers have to ensure that the content being taught is of appropriate standard and the pedagogy is effective enough to ensure learners make meaning from learning experiences. The measure of effective pedagogy is that learners must be able to make meaning from these learning experiences that introduce new content or build on previously acquired knowledge. As Mishra and Koehler (2006, p. 1021) summarised, “PCK represents the blending of content and pedagogy into an understanding of how particular aspects of subject matter are organized, adapted, and represented for instruction.”

Diagram 1: PCK as a Venn Diagram

An example of effective PCK could be such: is it appropriate to teach John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme with an analysis of the harmonic and melodic content to a group of thirteen year olds who have never heard of a seventh chord by making them analysis the  song in note form? Or would it be more helpful to play a simpler jazz song like Coltrane’s Mr. P.C. to the same group and introduce a simple blues form, the most basic building block of jazz music by allowing students to create music in a scaffolded activity? This is the kind of interaction between pedagogy and content that needs to be addressed by educators.

The addition by Mishra and Koehler is the Technological facet. As Shulman realised in 1986, content and pedagogy are not mutually exclusive of each other, but rather their dependence on each other is critical to an educator’s success. This same principle applies to technology and its relationship with PCK and the relationships between the three aspects are nuanced and delicate. Correct manipulation of the three and their interactions is now the most critical to educator’s success in the learning environment.

Diagram 2: TPACK Framework as a Venn Diagram

As seen in Diagram 2, not only is the TPCK essential, but the Technological Pedagogical Knowledge (TPK), Technological Content Knowledge (TCK) and the PCK have significant bearing on creating educational episodes.

TPK is about the ability to manipulate technology to change the course of how a learning experience occurs. This is also the case in reciprocal (pedagogy manipulating technology).

For example, would Garage Band be a more effective tool to teach sound recording on compared to an industry standard recording interface such as ProToolsHD 10? What difference would that make to the learning experience and how would the pedagogy of such lessons be altered? What difference would it make to different levels of students, e.g. year eight to year twelve?

TCK is about the ability to manipulate technology to change the course of the lesson content. This is also the case in reciprocal (content manipulating technology).

For example, if the content to be learned was an aria for flute, an iPad with the sheet music on it that is also able to play the music back for the student and highlight sections of music and give useful hints would be a benefit to the student’s learning experience, as opposed to simple sheet music. This would be of obvious benefit to the content taught in the lesson.

TPCK is about how technology, pedagogy and content come together and work harmoniously to create optimal learning experiences. All three aspects are interdependent on each other, and a change in one dimension will have bearing on the others. An example of this interdependence might be this:

Students may be focussing on what constitutes Baroque music. After the teacher provides a few examples from YouTube or some other source of what is and isn’t Baroque music, students are asked to create a list of some characteristic of Baroque music. They are then asked to go to the class wiki and listen to some links of music that the teacher has provided them. These links are found in a table, and beside them are ‘For’ and ‘Against’ columns. Students are asked to provide arguments for and against each piece of music in the wiki and through collaborative learning (maybe over a week or so) the table is finished. After this, a classroom discussion occurs with each student deciding whether the table is accurate and what is and isn’t Baroque music. The teacher can them come up with a summary of the characteristics of Baroque music using the student’s ideas.

This learning experience blends the technology aspect (wikis) with an engaging pedagogy (due to the wiki and musical aspect) as well as covering the main content that covers characteristics of Baroque music. If the technology aspect was the essential part of the lesson, then maybe the dullness of Baroque music may not have been covered. If the pedagogy hadn’t included list making, and objective decision-making via the wiki (moving from Lower Order to Higher Order thinking skills in Blooms Taxonomy), the dullness of the content wouldn’t have made an influence. This is the kind of process that TPACK ensures for effective learning.

Conclusion

My summary on TPACK has greatly enhanced my understanding of the framework and I will try to use it as much as possible to integrate technologies into my classrooms. Please leave as many of your thoughts as possible on my summary in the comments section, the further I can improve my understanding of the model the better!

A copy of the journal article that was postulated by Mishra and Koehler on the TPACK theory can be found here.

References 

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

Week 1 Reflection - Learning Theory

This week in the GDLT program has proved very exciting. With a large workload to start the year plus an enormous amount of information to process from the Residential School, I feel like I may soon be overwhelmed with it all. I have resigned myself to the fact that this year will be challenging, and the hard work nose-to-the-grindstone approach is probably the only way I'll make it to November.

I feel I work best if I get proactive about the material and work hard earlier, so I get better work. This development in my work ethic has taken a long time to achieve, but I believe it has helped me immensely through my undergraduate study and will hold me in good stead through this program and hopefully into the teaching workforce. Work practices and ethics such as these are essential for all students to have and should always be a part of learning design - focused on in the Dimensions of Learning dimension one - attitudes and perceptions. This part of learning isn't something taught directly, I believe, but through prior planning, reinforced throughout all learning experiences.

This week has been a whirlwind for me personally, moving into a more 'academic' focussed degree has been a welcome change for me, and I am thoroughly enjoying my experience so far, enjoying learning how to teach.

Investigating my learning style was quite insightful, though fairly self explanatory. I feel stongly that students should be aware of how they learn best so they can achieve appropriately. Teachers should be able to identify this. My thoughts on learning style can be found here.

Learning Theory Models

This week's ICT for Learning Design covered an introduction to Learning Theory. Three main ideas were discussed, and as I read through each one, I saw how these directly impacted the way I have learnt in time. These ideas are not exactly exclusive of each other when used in the classroom, but actively work together in ways that benefit students without them even noticing these functions. I feel though, that if I am aware of these models, I can subtly affect my students' ability to learn without making such a radical change in teaching styles.

The idea that practice, practice, practice and repeat are related to behaviorism heralds back to the days of my undergraduate piano study (only 6 months ago). I would usually spend my day training my body to do the same thing over and over again until it wasn't a series of cognitive functions, but as a singular brain map functioning in one process at great speed. The idea that we can use our learning experience  to shape the mind of our students and use repetition and mimicking as a way to achieve curriculum outcomes is very helpful, particularly for procedural knowledge. This is also the same as students practicing the same mathematic function again and again until they can do it without thinking.  

Cognitivism, I believe is a theory that explains how we learn from a very very young age, and therefore don't realise that we are using it. The idea that sensory memory interacts with long term and thinking memory is a very good one: I still remember places I've been simply from their smell. The way these memory banks interact is second nature to all of us but the theory explains very well how our brains work from day to day, and this is a very effective model for unintentional learning, or accidental learning experiences.

Social Constructivism is a somewhat very much focussed on body of work. In a world connected more and more everyday, from a world scale to a social group scale, the way we interact with the people around us is having more and more influence on the way we see things, and in effect how we perceive certain knowledge before we internalise it for application in life. This model makes us more aware of how social perceptions affect our learning, and I intend to make sure of the situations in my classrooms before presenting materials, so that students can achieve in a way that reflects curriculum goals.

Of course, these teaching models work in some way with ICT's in the classroom. However, while these theories can somehow relate to the world we live in today, the idea of Connectivism is more applicable, though some debate occurs as to whether this is a valid learning theory. I believe it is the the most viable learning theory we have in our 21st century world today. Read my reflection on Connectivism here.

Please add your insights in the comments, the more ideas I have the better educator I can become!

Reflection on Connectivism

Siemens (2004) states "Learning (defined as actionable knowledge) can reside outside of ourselves (within an organization or a database), is focused on connecting specialized information sets, and the connections that enable us to learn more are more important than our current state of knowing." In a world full of ICT’s, specifically the internet, knowing and internalising information are not necessarily the most essential facet of learning, rather, the way we connect to the information being the essential tool to our learning.

Previous learning theories, such as constructivism, discuss how information is processed and internalised by learners, not how the information is presented to them. This may be a fact of geography, presented to a student of a social status that makes them interpret and internalise the information differently and therefore have an alternate impact on their knowledge, one that may be the complete opposite to what the learning experience intended.

Connectivism presents itself as a process where the information and its interpretation is non-essential, rather how the information is accessed, through multiple sources and how to interpret that information as worthy as such is the most significant tool a learner can have.

I agree that focus should be on Connectivism rather than other models due to the rapid change in the world throughout the 21^st century. ICT’s and information is being updated quicker and quicker each year, month and day and teaching information today is becoming more and more irrelevant – students learning physics are taught theories in class that become obsolete by the end of term exams. Using Connectivism, we can empower our students to find the most up to date, viable and correct information possible, whilst connecting them globally to whomever they need to become the most skilled persons in their study, even before they interpret and internalise data.

Siemens theory can be found in more detail here.

References

Siemens, G. (2004). Connectivism: A learning theory for the digital age. Retrieved from http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/connectivism.htm

Personal Learning Style

My learning style is predominately Sequential. Sequential learners tend to gain understanding in linear steps, with each step following logically from the previous one. They tend to follow logical stepwise paths in finding solutions rather than focus on the overall picture and make leaps to conclusions.

Sequential learners are disadvantaged if the course content is illogical and focusing on big pictures and conclusions.

For me, if lecturers are vague and focussed on solving problems without addressing the intricacies of the issue, I feel disorientated and unable to learn. Teachers that do this are usually poorly organised or focussed on Global learning styles (the opposite of Sequential learning).

ICT implications for sequential learning would include using step-by-step processes including PowerPoint presentations and other activities where the user controls the speed and amount of learning taking place at each moment, before moving on. 

I believe this test accurately reflects my learning style and is a correct identification of my habitual learning. I would recommend this test to students I teach as a way of early profiling.

A description of the learning styles put forward by Felder and Soloman can be found here.

The learning styles questionnaire can be done here.