School Teachers’ Perspective on Technology-pedagogy Content Knowledge

Abstract

The unprecedented times forced institutions to adopt online teaching-learning and evaluation mechanisms. All stakeholders, right from top-level ministers, planners, administrators, faculty members, and students, were unprepared for the said changes (Kapasia et al., 2020) and struggled at various fronts through it. Undeniably the sudden shift to remote learning has been challenging and has opened up many avenues and opportunities. To Understand and explore the opportunities, several online studies have been conducted in this short span comprehending the effectiveness and impact of online teaching (Shenoy et al., 2020; Ariawan and Malang, 2020). Many studies are supportive of the pedagogical shift and vouch for its potential. This pedagogical shift cannot be justified as most students, faculty members, and institutional administration lacked prior experience effectively handling online teaching-learning. This paper shall analyze schoolteachers’ views on the pedagogical shift during COVID-19. It shall explore their challenges in acceptance of this ‘pedagogical shift.’ Their response to the shift being effective, i.e., ‘online teaching-learning situation. Rick Marks, said in 1990 that PCK “represents a class of knowledge that is central to teachers’ work and that would not typically be held by non-teaching subject matter experts or by teachers who know little of that subject.” As teachers, we know PCK is required to simplify a subject and teach it effectively. Technological Content Knowledge (TCK) is how technology influences content. Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPCK) area acknowledges that all three of these sets of knowledge influence each other, that each is important, and that to have an effective learning environment, we need to consider all three. Mishra and Koehler paraphrase Marks’ comment about PCK to apply the idea to TPACK, “TPACK represents a class of knowledge that is central to teachers’ work with technology. This knowledge would not typically be held by technologically proficient subject matter experts, or by technologists who know little of the subject or pedagogy, or by teachers who know little of that subject or about technology.” In addition to these new knowledge overlap areas, Mishra and Koehler quickly point out that all of this knowledge lies in specific contexts. The teacher forms part of the context, while his/her students and the environment also contribute to the context. With each situation, the context changes slightly and the teacher’s set of knowledge shifts to create the learning environment. Though the success of effective technology-mediated teaching-learning in education depends on several factors, including resource allocation, competencies of the stakeholders, availability of affordable digital technologies, this study intends to survey proficient usage of technology integrated pedagogy explored by schoolteachers during pandemic times.