Punya Mishra and Matthew J. Koehler’s 2006 TPACK framework, which focuses on technological knowledge (TK), pedagogical knowledge (PK), and content knowledge (CK), offers a productive approach to many of the dilemmas that teachers face in implementing educational technology (edtech) in their classrooms.

SAMR and TPACK models

Impacts of TPACK:Impact on the Teacher: It is important for the teacher to be completely up to date and knowledgeable with the curriculum and the components of TPCK to effectively incorporate it into their lessons.Impacts on the Students: Students of the millennium work better through technology and quite often find the content and direct teaching quite stale. Therefore by adding the technology component to the already existing PCK model the students become more engaged in their learning.

TPACK is an essential part of the education system today as it incorporates the growing demand on the use of technology in the classroom as well as continuing the focus on the content and how we teach it. Therefore it sets up education for the future as well as setting up the students for their future.

The SAMR model considers four levels of integration: substitution, augmentation, modification, and redefinition. The TPACK model addresses the interaction of technological, pedagogical, and content knowledge and how they relate to teaching in a technology-enhanced learning environment.

Filtering instructional planning through the TPACK model should serve to eliminate frivolous or irrelevant use of technology, and inspire teachers to make deeper connections to all aspects of effective instruction.

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. By simultaneously integrating knowledge of technology, pedagogy and content, expert teachers bring TPACK into play any time they teach. Each situation presented to teachers is a unique combination of these three factors, and accordingly, there is no single technological solution that applies for every teacher, every course, or every view of teaching. Rather, solutions lie in the ability of a teacher to flexibly navigate the spaces defined by the three elements of content, pedagogy, and technology and the complex interactions among these elements in specific contexts.

TPACK is an emergent form of knowledge that goes beyond all three “core” components (content, pedagogy, and technology). Technological pedagogical content knowledge is an understanding that emerges from interactions among content, pedagogy, and technology knowledge.

Thus, TPK requires a forward-looking, creative, and open-minded seeking of technology use, not for its own sake but for the sake of advancing student learning and understanding.

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.

TPK is an understanding of how teaching and learning can change when particular technologies are used in particular ways. This includes knowing the pedagogical affordances and constraints of a range of technological tools as they relate to disciplinarily and developmentally appropriate pedagogical designs and strategies. To build TPK, a deeper understanding of the constraints and affordances of technologies and the disciplinary contexts within which they function is needed.

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.

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

PCK is consistent with and similar to Shulman’s idea of knowledge of pedagogy that is applicable to the teaching of specific content. Central to Shulman’s conceptualization of PCK is the notion of the transformation of the subject matter for teaching. 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.

Pedagogical knowledge (PK) is teachers’ deep knowledge about the processes and practices or methods of teaching and learning. They encompass, among other things, overall educational purposes, values, and aims. 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.

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

Equally important to the model are the interactions between and among these bodies of knowledge, represented as PCK, TCK (technological content knowledge), TPK (technological pedagogicalknowledge), and TPACK. Figure 1. The TPACK framework and its knowledge components.

At the heart of good teaching with technology are three core components: content, pedagogy, and technology, plus the relationships among and between them.

Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College

by your student learning objectives, as well as your own technological, pedagogical, and content area knowledge (TPACK) and objectives

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. Other authors have discussed similar ideas, though often using different labeling schemes. The conception of TPACK described here has developed over time and through a series of publications, with the most complete descriptions of the framework found in Mishra and Koehler (2006) and Koehler and Mishra (2008).

TPACK Lesson

Technological pedagogical content knowledge is an understanding that emerges from interactions among content, pedagogy, and technology knowledge.

three key components of teacher knowledge: understanding of content, understanding of teaching, and understanding of technology.

a complex interaction among three bodies of knowledge: Content, pedagogy, and technology. The interaction of these bodies of knowledge, both theoretically and in practice, produces the types of flexible knowledge needed to successfully integrate technology use into teaching.

The development of TPACK by teachers is critical to effective teaching with technology.

TPACK, or technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge).

Social and contextual factors also complicate the relationships between teaching and technology. Social and institutional contexts are often unsupportive of teachers’ efforts to integrate technology use into their work. 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 should also be noted that Internet Inquiry Projects are not only appropriate but also vital for use in classrooms from Pre-K up through higher ed. It is the responsibility of educators in all grades and content areas to modify as needed for learners.

The SAMR model truly covers the entire spectrum of tech integration

technological tools can provide a greater degree of flexibility in navigating across these representations.

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.

PCK is the notion of the transformation of the subject matter for teaching

Pedagogical knowledge (PK) is teachers’ deep knowledge about the processes and practices or methods of teaching and learning. They encompass, among other things, overall educational purposes, values, and aims.

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

there are three main components of teachers’ knowledge: content, pedagogy, and technology. Equally important to the model are the interactions between and among these bodies of knowledge,

this knowledge is unlikely to be used unless teachers can conceive of technology uses that are consistent with their existing pedagogical beliefs

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.

This paper describes a framework for teacher knowledge for technology integration called technological pedagogical content knowledge (originally TPCK, now known as TPACK, or technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge)

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.