TCK, then, is an understanding of the manner in which technology and content influence and constrain one another. Teachers need to master more than the subject matter they teach; they must also have a deep understanding of the manner in which the subject matter (or the kinds of representations that can be constructed) can be changed by the application of particular technologies. Teachers need to understand which specific technologies are best suited for addressing subject-matter learning in their domains and how the content dictates or perhaps even changes the technology—or vice versa.

Technology and content knowledge have a deep historical relationship.

Specifically, according to Shulman (1986), this transformation occurs as the teacher interprets the subject matter, finds multiple ways to represent it, and adapts and tailors the instructional materials to alternative conceptions and students’ prior knowledge. PCK covers the core business of teaching, learning, curriculum, assessment and reporting, such as the conditions that promote learning and the links among curriculum, assessment, and pedagogy.

This generic form of knowledge applies to understanding how students learn, general classroom management skills, lesson planning, and student assessment. It includes knowledge about techniques or methods used in the classroom; the nature of the target audience; and strategies for evaluating student understanding. A teacher with deep pedagogical knowledge understands how students construct knowledge and acquire skills and how they develop habits of mind and positive dispositions toward learning. As such, pedagogical knowledge requires an understanding of cognitive, social, and developmental theories of learning and how they apply to students in the classroom.

this knowledge would include knowledge of concepts, theories, ideas, organizational frameworks, knowledge of evidence and proof, as well as established practices and approaches toward developing such knowledge

Knowledge of content is of critical importance for teachers.

Honoring the idea that teaching with technology is a complex, ill-structured task, we propose that understanding approaches to successful technology integration requires educators to develop new ways of comprehending and accommodating this complexity.

Teachers often have inadequate (or inappropriate) experience with using digital technologies for teaching and learning. Many teachers earned degrees at a time when educational technology was at a very different stage of development than it is today. It is, thus, not surprising that they do not consider themselves sufficiently prepared to use technology in the classroom and often do not appreciate its value or relevance to teaching and learning. Acquiring a new knowledge base and skill set can be challenging, particularly if it is a time-intensive activity that must fit into a busy schedule.

Understanding how these affordances and constraints of specific technologies influence what teachers do in their classrooms is not straightforward and may require rethinking teacher education and teacher professional development.

Digital technologies—such as computers, handheld devices, and software applications—by contrast, are protean (usable in many different ways; Papert, 1980); unstable (rapidly changing); and opaque (the inner workings are hidden from users; Turkle, 1995).

Teaching with technology is complicated further considering the challenges newer technologies present to teachers.

knowledge of student thinking and learning, knowledge of subject matter, and increasingly, knowledge of technology.

Teachers practice their craft in highly complex, dynamic classroom contexts (Leinhardt & Greeno, 1986) that require them constantly to shift and evolve their understanding.

Instead, TPACK is the basis of effective teaching with technology, requiring an understanding of the representation of concepts using technologies; pedagogical techniques that use technologies in constructive ways to teach content; knowledge of what makes concepts difficult or easy to learn and how technology can help redress some of the problems that students face; knowledge of students’ prior knowledge and theories of epistemology; and knowledge of how technologies can be used to build on existing knowledge to develop new epistemologies or strengthen old ones.

FITness goes beyond traditional notions of computer literacy to require that persons understand information technology broadly enough to apply it productively at work and in their everyday lives, to recognize when information technology can assist or impede the achievement of a goal, and to continually adapt to changes in information technology. FITness, therefore, requires a deeper, more essential understanding and mastery of information technology for information processing, communication, and problem solving than does the traditional definition of computer literacy. Acquiring TK in this manner enables a person to accomplish a variety of different tasks using information technology and to develop different ways of accomplishing a given task. This conceptualization of TK does not posit an “end state,” but rather sees it developmentally, as evolving over a lifetime of generative, open-ended interaction with technology.

At the heart of good teaching with technology are three core components: content, pedagogy, and technology, plus the relationships among and between them. The interactions between and among the three components, playing out differently across diverse contexts, account for the wide variations seen in the extent and quality of educational technology integration.

Many teachers earned degrees at a time when educational technology was at a very different stage of development than it is today.

integration efforts should be creatively designed or structured for particular subject matter ideas in specific classroom contexts.

Many approaches to teachers’ professional development offer a one-size-fits-all approach to technology integration when, in fact, teachers operate in diverse contexts of teaching and learning.

The introduction of the Internet, for example – particularly the rise of online learning – is an example of the arrival of a technology that forced educators to think about core pedagogical issues, such as how to represent content on the Web and how to connect students with subject matter and with one another (Peruski & Mishra, 2004).

Instead, TPACK is the basis of effective teaching with technology, requiring an understanding of the representation of concepts using technologies; pedagogical techniques that use technologies in constructive ways to teach content; knowledge of what makes concepts difficult or easy to learn and how technology can help redress some of the problems that students face; knowledge of students’ prior knowledge and theories of epistemology; and knowledge of how technologies can be used to build on existing knowledge to develop new epistemologies or strengthen old ones.

An understanding of the affordances of technology and how they can be leveraged differently according to changes in context and purposes is an important part of understanding TPK.

Understanding the impact of technology on the practices and knowledge of a given discipline is critical to developing appropriate technological tools for educational purposes.

They argue that FITness goes beyond traditional notions of computer literacy to require that persons understand information technology broadly enough to apply it productively at work and in their everyday lives, to recognize when information technology can assist or impede the achievement of a goal, and to continually adapt to changes in information technology

Pedagogical knowledge (PK) is teachers’ deep knowledge about the processes and practices or methods of teaching and learning.

The cost of not having a comprehensive base of content knowledge can be prohibitive; for example, students can receive incorrect information and develop misconceptions about the content area (National Research Council, 2000; Pfundt, & Duit, 2000). Yet content knowledge, in and of itself, is an ill-structured domain, and as the culture wars (Zimmerman, 2002), the Great Books controversies (Bloom, 1987; Casement, 1997; Levine, 1996), and court battles over the teaching of evolution (Pennock, 2001) demonstrate, issues relating to curriculum content can be areas of significant contention and disagreement.

Content knowledge (CK) is teachers’ knowledge about the subject matter to be learned or taught.

The TPACK framework builds on Shulman’s (1987, 1986) descriptions of PCK to describe how teachers’ understanding of educational technologies and PCK interact with one another to produce effective teaching with technology.

content, pedagogy, and technology,

There is no “one best way” to integrate technology into curriculum. Rather, integration efforts should be creatively designed or structured for particular subject matter ideas in specific classroom contexts.

Many approaches to teachers’ professional development offer a one-size-fits-all approach to technology integration when, in fact, teachers operate in diverse contexts of teaching and learning.

It is, thus, not surprising that they do not consider themselves sufficiently prepared to use technology in the classroom and often do not appreciate its value or relevance to teaching and learning.

Also complicating teaching with technology is an understanding that technologies are neither neutral nor unbiased

By their very nature, newer digital technologies, which are protean, unstable, and opaque, present new challenges to teachers who are struggling to use more technology in their teaching.

The latter, however, is qualitatively different in that its functioning is more opaque to teachers and offers fundamentally less stability than more traditional technologies.

Digital technologies—such as computers, handheld devices, and software applications—by contrast, are protean (usable in many different ways; Papert, 1980); unstable (rapidly changing); and opaque (the inner workings are hidden from users; Turkle, 1995).

As a matter of practical significance, however, most of the technologies under consideration in current literature are newer and digital and have some inherent properties that make applying them in straightforward ways difficult.

n this way, teaching is an example of an ill-structured discipline, requiring teachers to apply complex knowledge structures across different cases and contexts

Lee Shulman’s construct of pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) to include technology knowledge. The development of TPACK by teachers is critical to effective teaching with technology.

socially embedded, interest-driven, and oriented toward educational, economic, or political opportunity. Connected learning is realized when a young person is able to pursue a personal interest or passion with the support of friends and caring adults, and is in turn able to link this learning and interest to academic achievement, career success or civic engagement.

Rather than see technology as a means toward more efficient and automated forms of education, connected learning puts progressive, experiential, and learner-centered approaches at the center of technology-enhanced learning.

Connected learning is when someone is pursuing a personal interest with the support of peers, mentors and caring adults, and in ways that open up opportunities for them

While wealthy families are embracing the potential of new technologies for learning, and investing more and more in out-of-school and connected learning, less privileged kids are being left behind. Access to specialized, interest-driven and personalized learning used to be difficult and scarce. But in today’s networked world, there’s no reason why all children should not have the opportunity to pursue connected learning.

Traditional education is failing to engage many students as they enter their middle school, high school, and college years. The culture clash between formal education and interest-driven, out-of-school learning is escalating in today’s world where social communication and interactive content is always at our fingertips. We need to harness these new technologies for learning rather than distraction.

beyond the formal educational pipeline.

We need to harness these new technologies for learning rather than distraction.  

Young people learn best when actively engaged, creating, and solving problems they care about, and supported by peers who appreciate and recognize their accomplishments.

Connected learning is when someone is pursuing a personal interest with the support of peers, mentors and caring adults, and in ways that open up opportunities for them.

While wealthy families are embracing the potential of new technologies for learning, and investing more and more in out-of-school and connected learning, less privileged kids are being left behind. Access to specialized, interest-driven and personalized learning used to be difficult and scarce. But in today’s networked world, there’s no reason why all children should not have the opportunity to pursue connected learning.

We need to harness these new technologies for learning rather than distraction.

beyond the formal educational pipeline.

connected learning puts progressive, experiential, and learner-centered approaches at the center of technology-enhanced learning.

does not require technology, new digital and networked technologies expand opportunities

Connected learning is when someone is pursuing a personal interest with the support of peers, mentors and caring adults, and in ways that open up opportunities for them

Connected learning isn’t a burden that one organization shoulders on its own, and is about building connections across different sites of learning

Traditional education is failing to engage many students as they enter their middle school, high school, and college years.

Every English class starts with a moment of quiet after which students are asked to share their energy and stress levels.

In math, four times a year, each student is given a set of values or codes to substitute in the equations so that even though the students are working together, they have to focus on the mathematical process and not just the “right answer.” In English, the discussions are open-ended, allowing for multiple right answers.

In math classes, students frequently take group tests and can consult with one another on the answers, but the teacher chooses only one test at random to grade for the group. Because the group work is intentionally more difficult, this process keeps individual students accountable for full participation in group work. To measure how well the groups work together, the teacher also gives out a group-collaboration grade for each unit, which is worth 10 percent of a student’s grade. While students participate in the group discussions around the Harkness table in English, the teacher selects one student to be the moderator and another to be the discussion tracker who records the flow of the conversations. The moderator can look at the discussion tracker’s notes and see which students he should invite to chime in.

Starting with a good toolkit is essential for designing learning experiences that reach the Modification and Transformation level of the SAMAR model.

eachers in the substitution and augmentation phase can use technology to accomplish traditional tasks,  but the real learning gains result from engaging students in learning experiences that could not be accomplished without technology. At the Modification and Redefinition level, the task changes and extends the walls of the classroom.

  Image created by Dr. Ruben Puentedura, Ph.D. http://www.hippasus.com/rrpweblog/

"What our collaborative learning style empowers and enables is a student's resilience -- how do you look to your neighbor as a resource, how do you test your own theories, how do you understand if you're on the right track or the wrong track?" says Monique DeVane, College Prep's head of school. "It teaches them that it's not just about content; it's about cultivating habits of mind that are the underpinnings of deeper scholarship."

Clusters of 21st Century Cognitive Competencies

Connected learning posits that by connecting and translating between in-school and out-of-school learning, we can guide more young people to engaging, resilient, and useful learning that will help them become effective contributors and participants in adult society. We also believe that networked and digital technologies have an important role to play in building these sites of connection and translation

1. Formal education is often disconnected and lacking in relevanceClassroom ethnographers have documented how school learning is often disconnected from the contexts where young people find meaning and social connection. School subjects are often thought to impart knowledge and skills that will be useful, or will “transfer to” everyday life and future work, but these connections have proven elu-sive to learning researchers and students alike. In fact, a recent report by the National Academies concluded that “Over a century of research on transfer has yielded little evidence that teaching can develop general cognitive competencies that are trans-ferable to any new discipline, problem or context, in or out of school” (National Research Council, 2012).

To “learn from experience” is to make a backward and forward connection between what we do to things and what we enjoy or suffer from things in consequence. Under such conditions, doing becomes a trying; an experiment with the world to find out what it is like; the undergoing becomes instruction—discovery of the connection of things.

Today’s American youth are entering a labor market strikingly different from earlier generations. Over the last decade, global economic integration and the collapse of the Soviet Union have led to what economist Richard Freeman (2008) has called a “dou-bling” of the global labor market, from a pool of 1.46 to 2.93 billion. This has created a chronic shortage of jobs relative to those who seek them. The economic downturn that resulted from the 2007 financial panic has worsened this shortfall (see Figures 1 and 2).2

Despite its power to advance learning, many parents, educators, and policymak-ers perceive new media as a distraction from academic learning, civic engagement,

onnected learning is realized when a young person is able to pursue a personal interest or passion with the support of friends and caring adults, and is in turn able to link this learning and interest to academic achievement, career success or civic engagement.

S

T

“Chicago in particular probably highlights the digital divide that’s across the country,” Patrick said. “Some schools may have access to one-to-one pilots, and other schools have old infrastructure that is barely functional, so that kids don’t have access to the computers.”

The surprising truth about what motivates us

Will Richardson

Specifically, these skills are described as:

To help people become good citizens of the web, Mozilla focuses on the following goals: 1) develop more educators, advocates, and community leaders who can leverage and advance the web as an open and public resource, and 2) impact policies and practices to ensure the web remains a healthy open and public resource for all.

Knowing how to read, write, and participate in the digital world has become the 4th basic foundational skill next to the three Rs—reading, writing, and arithmetic—in a rapidly evolving, networked world.

Having these skills on the web expands access and opportunity for more people to learn anytime, anywhere, at any pace.

Specifically, these skills are described as

read, write, and participate

Collaboration was central to the project. Students formed teams of three or four and began planning what tasks they would do and how they would work together.

In this Edutopia video, we get a good overview of how PBL is different from the kind of instruction most of us are used to.

lStudents will understand their own eating patterns and ways in which these patterns may be improved.Using these standards as the starting point, I need to decide what enduring understanding I want my students to take away from the unit. Although I've never deliberately thought about enduring knowledge, per se, I like the concept and think that it will help me focus my teaching and limited class time on the truly important aspects of this unit.

The teacher as designer is similarly constrained. We are not free to teach any topic we choose. Rather, we are guided by national, state, district, or institutional standards that specify what students should know and be able to do. These standards provide a framework to help us identify teaching and learning priorities and guide our design of curriculum and assessments

In addition to external standards, we also consider the needs of our students when designing learning experiences. For example, student interests, developmental levels, and previous achievements influence our designs

We focus on a particular topic (e.g., racial prejudice), use a particular resource (e.g., To Kill a Mockingbird), and choose specific instructional methods (e.g., Socratic seminar to discuss the book and cooperative groups to analyze stereotypical images in films and on television) to cause learning to meet a given standard (e.g., the student will understand the nature of prejudice, and the difference between generalizations and stereotypes).

When he read the Web address, http://pubweb.northwestern.edu/~abutz/di/intro.html, he assumed that the domain name “northwestern.edu” automatically meant it was a credible source. He did not understand that the “~” character, inserted after the domain name, should be read as a personal Web page and not an official document of the university.

When he read the Web address, http://pubweb.northwestern.edu/~abutz/di/intro.html, he assumed that the domain name “northwestern.edu” automatically meant it was a credible source. He did not understand that the “~” character, inserted after the domain name, should be read as a personal Web page and not an official document of the university.

Teaching for transfer means that learners are given opportuni-ties to apply their learning to new situ-ations and receive timely feedback on their performance to help them improve.

Teaching for understanding requires that students be given numerous opportunities to draw inferences and make generaliza-tions for themselves (with teacher sup-port).

The UbD framework promotes not only acquisition, but also the student’s ability to know why the knowl-edge and skills are important, and how to apply or transfer them in meaningful, professional, and socially important ways

Can apply by effectively using and adapting what they know in new and complex contexts.• Demonstrate perspective by seeing the big picture and recognizing differ-ent points of view.• Display empathy by perceiving sensitively and walking in someone else’s shoes.• Have self-knowledge by showing meta-cognitive awareness, using productive habits of mind, and reflect-ing on the meaning of the learning and experience.

When someone truly under-stands, they• Can explain concepts, principles, and processes by putting it their own words, teaching it to others, justifying their answers, and showing their reasoning.• Can interpret by making sense of data, text, and experience through images, analogies, stories, and models.

Stage 1 focuses on “transfer of learning.”

Learning priorities are established by long-term performance goals—what it is we want students, in the end, to be able to do with what they have learned. The bottom-line goal of education is transfer. The point of school is not to simply excel in each class, but to be able to use one’s learning in other settings.

Furthermore, the format of the test causes many educators to erroneously believe that the state test or provincial exam only assesses low-level knowledge and skill. This, too, is false. Indeed, the data from released national tests show conclusively that the students have the most difficulty with those items that require understanding and transfer, not recall or recognition.

he Three Stages of Backward DesignThe UbD framework offers a three-stage backward design process for curriculum planning, and includes a template and set of design tools that embody the process. A key concept in UbD framework is align-ment (i.e., all three stages must clearly align not only to standards, but also to one another). In other words, the Stage 1 con-tent and understanding must be what is assessed in Stage 2 and taught in Stage 3.

Teachers are coaches of understanding, not mere purveyors of content knowl-edge, skill, or activity. They focus on ensuring that learning happens, not just teaching (and assuming that what was taught was learned); they always aim and check for successful meaning making and transfer by the learner.

Six facets of under-standing—the capacity to explain, interpret, apply, shift perspective, empa-thize, and self-assess—can serve as indicators of understanding.

According to Maslow, individuals must meet the needs at the lower levels of the pyramid before they can successfully be motivated to tackle the next levels.

eople become actualized to accomplish higher motives only after they have fulfi lled certain basic needs

Backwarddesignmaybethoughtof,inotherwords,aspurposefultaskanalysis:Givenaworthytasktobeaccomplished,howdowebestgeteveryoneequipped?Orwemightthinkofitasbuildingawiseitinerary,usingamap:Givenadestination,what'sthemosteffectiveandefficientroute?Orwemightthinkofitasplanningforcoaching:Whatmustlearnersmasteriftheyaretoeffectivelyperform?Whatwillcountasevidenceonthefield,notmerelyindrills,thattheyreallygetitandarereadytoperformwithunderstanding,knowledge,andskillontheirown?

or example, teaching digital skills would include showing students how to download images from the Internet and insert them into PowerPoint slides or webpages. Digital literacy would focus on helping students choose appropriate images, recognize copyright licensing, and cite or get permissions, in addition to reminding students to use alternative text for images to support those with visual disabilities.

Unfortunately, many focus on skills rather than literacies. Digital skills focus on what and how. Digital literacy focuses on why, when, who, and for whom.

When is it best to do a Google search versus ask a question on Twitter? Why would students tweet to a particular hashtag or person versus another? When they tweet to people from another country in another time zone, what kind of context do they need to consider? What should they add, remove, or modify in order to communicate better?

Digital skills focus on what and how. Digital literacy focuses on why, when, who, and for whom.

Doug Belshaw’s eight elements of digital literacies, I have just mentioned the civic, critical, creative, and communicative. The other four are cultural, cognitive, constructive, and confidence.

Garth is an adolescent male attending high school in the northeast of the United States. You can review his work on his YouTube channel.

Yet, as early adopters, history’s first generation of “always connected” individuals do not have the knowledge and skills to critically explore, build, and connect online. Simply stated, students are often not provided with opportunities in school to practice the web literacies necessary to read, write, and participate on the web.

One of my favorite tools to use in doing this is the CRAAP test developed by the University of California at Chico. This method requires students to evaluate a source based on its Currency, Relevance, Authority, Accuracy, and Purpose. In fact, this method could easily be applied to “traditional” sources as well.

People are tuning in to communications technologies at an ever-expanding level. Some recent indicators:

social and cultural technologies

My responses all focus on exploring and celebrating your child’s interests.

videos and podcasts

"entry event"

A classroom filled with student posters may suggest that students have engaged in meaningful learning. But it is the process of students' learning and the depth of their cognitive engagement— rather than the resulting product—that distinguishes projects from busywork.

5 Keys to Rigorous Project-Based Learning

Risks of Problem-Based Learning

“It’s gotta be fun. The more fun the project is, the more interested they’ll be, the more they’ll learn,” he said. “In fact, I have parents say, ‘I’m really concerned. My kids really like school. My kid’s having too much fun.’

. Projects, as a means to make schooling more useful and readily applied to the world, first became popular in the early part of the century within the United States

Why Project Based Learning (PBL)?

PBL is the ongoing act of learning about different subjects simultaneously. This is achieved by guiding students to identify, through research, a real-world problem (local to global) developing its solution using evidence to support the claim, and presenting the solution through a multimedia approach based in a set of 21st-century tools.

PBL is the ongoing act of learning about different subjects simultaneously. This is achieved by guiding students to identify, through research, a real-world problem (local to global) developing its solution using evidence to support the claim, and presenting the solution through a multimedia approach based in a set of 21st-century tools

With project based learning, the content is baked inside of a long-term projec