TPACK Exploration

As I've mentioned before, I am pretty overwhelmed with amount of information I have access to through the internet. Although it is fraught with complications from human and technology error, the internet gives us ways to view resources that we could never have imagined several decades ago. As a teacher, this prospect is incredibly exciting. With limited funds and the practicality of numerous field trips, we are able to share things with our students in a much smaller time frame with much less planning. Recently, I've been exploring the world of virtual museums and the opportunities that they present for a classroom. These are websites that have been developed in conjunction with an actual museum that allows access to the information displayed in permanent exhibits, traveling displays, and from their research or records. The wonderful part about museums (in any form) is the wealth of information they make available to the public. The purpose of them is to share in the education process and to spread knowledge to as many people as possible.

The idea of TPACK is to integrate Technological, Pedagogical, and Content knowledge into interesting, and useful lessons with a classroom. The emphasis of this theory is that all three are very important but that these types of learning and knowledge can all interact really successfully, and sometimes better than when used on their own.

Two of the websites I explored were from the Smithsonian (http://www.si.edu/) and the Library of Congress (http://www.americaslibrary.gov/) From the technological knowledge standpoint, these sites are fairly easy to use. As long as one has computer and internet access, these websites are available. Although it is an advanced idea, and the sites themselves are complex, they are easy to navigate and search for both myself and potential students. These types of resources can employ aspects of my personal pedagogy because it can assist me in creating engaging lessons. Although I would love to take every single one of my students to the Smithsonian in person, realistically I will be unable to, so I want to be able to offer the next best thing. The content of these sites is geared mostly towards social studies classrooms. Because the SI is home to so much information, it can really be used across many disciplines - or possibly in some type of cross curriculum activites. The LoC site specifically deals more with American history and has a lot of interactive features that would be interesting to incorporate.