What is TPACK and How is it Useful for Educators?

TPACK is a 3-part framework for understanding how to merge technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge into a cohesive school that will impact students’ education for the better. The technology would consist of laptops, scanners, programs, websites, applications, iPods, phones, and more. On the other hand, content would be what the teacher taught while pedagogy would be how they teach that content. Through these three components are overlaps where the framework intertwines within itself.

The easiest connection to understand would be content and pedagogy. There is a clear distinction between what is taught and how it is taught; this is why a mastery of both components is required to be a good teacher. An individual who only has mastery of content in science, for example, may be a really good scientist, but if he hasn’t also mastered pedagogy, he would be
poor at explaining the science to anyone outside his field (i.e. students). Conversely, an individual who only has a mastery of pedagogy in communications, for example, may be a really good communicator and keep the interest of his audience, but if he hasn’t also mastered content, he would explaining a whole lot of tantalizing nothing (an experiment was done with this in mind where a really good talker taught a class without any degree or significant knowledge in the subject he was teaching;  however, the students said in reviews that he was very good at explaining the subject to them even though the smooth talker did not know what he was talking about; they were completely oblivious that the talker actually had no real content knowledge in the given subject). Clearly, both content knowledge and pedagogy are required as a cohesive whole in order for a teacher to teach a subject properly. Therefore, all teachers should be familiar with both fields and how they connect to each other as opposed to studying them in isolation.

Two harder connections to understand would be when you infuse technology and content, and technology and pedagogy. For technology and content, the combination would enable teachers to use technology such as computers and websites in conjunction with one another to provide a wealth of information and illustrations (i.e. content) that would otherwise not be available. This would be a demonstration of a mastery of technology and content. However, not all teachers have infused technology with their content. For example, an elementary school teacher who uses computers at home may refuse to use computers in her classroom in fear of making her young students “addicted to computers”, thereby depriving her students of basic computer knowledge and how to access online information. Such an unfortunate situation would disparage the value of the teaching that the students would be receiving. Therefore, it would be better for the students’ sake that technology is incorporated in the classroom in meaningful and pragmatic ways so that the content learned is enriched, enhanced, and expounded upon.

For technology and pedagogy, the connection is more readily apparent for those used to classes in higher education. The use of technology such as slideshows and projectors would aid the pedagogical methods of the teacher – that is, lecturing, in this example – in order to help the students to better understand the material being taught. Students would be able to visualize the information and read off notes in ways that would not be possible without the technology. If the teacher did not use these technological aides, it would be more difficult for the students to fall along with the teaching. Therefore, the infusing of technology with pedagogy is necessary as it creates new, more efficient pathways for information to travel from the teacher to the student.

While all the previous connections discussed surely are useful, the “sweet spot” would be incorporating all three of them together. Infusing technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge would create the best learning experience. Pedagogy and content would be connected to provide a understandable avenue of teaching. Meanwhile, technology would infuse itself with pedagogy to create advanced learning aides, and it would also infuse itself with content to increase the wealth of information that can be accessed and understood. Using these components as a framework rather than isolated fields creates a fluid system of learning for the students and a fluid system of teaching for the teachers. It’s not easy to combine all these components into a holistic apparatus, but when they are combined, students learn better and teachers teach better. Easy to learn but hard to master, TPACK is not without its difficulties, but the benefits it provides for both students and teachers is crucial in our ever-changing world of technology.

----> Think you know TPACK? Try out this fun Kahoot! and see how you stack up to the competition.