Technological, Pedagogical, and Content Knowledge (TPACK) is a theoretical framework for examining the funds of knowledge which educators use in order to design and develop lessons infused with technology (see the figure below for a graphic representation of TPACK). The term was originated by Dr. Punya Mishra and Dr. Matt Koehler. According to these researchers, TPACK attempts to capture some of the essential qualities of knowledge required by educators for technology integration in their teaching practice, while addressing the complex, multifaceted and situated nature of teacher knowledge. At the heart of the TPACK framework, is the complex interrelationship that exist between the three primary forms of knowledge: Content (CK), Pedagogical (PK), and Technological (TK).

A visual representation of the TPACK Framework. TPACK Image (rights free). Click on the image to view a high resolution version that is Rights free. You are free to use and reproduce this version of the image in your own non-profit works, including dissertations. Please cite http://tpack.org/ as the source.

Mishra and Koehler (2006) address the challenges in developing a theory for educational technology because such a theory “requires a detailed understanding of complex relationships that are contextually bound. Moreover, it is difficult to study cause and effect when educators, classrooms, politics, and curriculum goals vary from case to case”(p. 1017).  Having an appreciation for the complex domain that teaching can be, Mishra and Koehler present TPACK as an avenue to help ‘‘develop a class of theories about both the process of learning and the means that are designed to support learning (Cobb et al., 2003). Having a framework goes beyond merely identifying problems with current approaches; it offers new ways of looking at and perceiving phenomena and offers information on which to base sound, pragmatic decision making”(p 1019). TPACK is not a new idea. TPACK  builds on Lee Shulman’s idea of Pedagogical Content Knowledge. Koehler (2011) notes, “A range of other scholars have argued that that knowledge about technology cannot be treated as context-free, and that good teaching requires an understanding of how technology relates to the pedagogy and content” (online). Further, Being Fluent with Information Technology (F.I.T) is one of the foundational resources from which TK has evolved.

For further reading please see: http://www.mendeley.com/groups/522011/tpack/as well as the sources below.

Sources

TPACK- Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge: http://www.tpck.org/

Mishra, P. & Koehler, M. J. (2006). Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge: A Framework for Teacher Knowledge. Teachers College Record 108(6), 1017–1054

There are three types of learning identified by a committee of colleges, led by Benjamin Bloom (1956):

• Cognitive: mental skills (Knowledge)
• Affective: growth in feelings or emotional areas (Attitude)
• Psychomotor: manual or physical skills (Skills)

The Bloom group worked out details on the Cognitive Domain which involves knowledge and the development of intellectual skills. As shown below, it is a continuum from Lower Order Thinking Skills (LOTS) to Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS). In this blog, bottom two categories are considered LOTS, and top four categories are HOTS.

ITaP provides Purdue instructors with a selected suite of instructional technology tools which could facilitate the assessment of students’ growth in intellectual skills. The goal is to provide opportunities to make students aware of their understanding of a subject and their abilities, inform instructors to teach accordingly, and improve student achievement.

LOTS:

HOTS:

For questions about learning technologies to assist with instruction, please email us tlt-consulting@purdue.edu.

References:

Bloom B. S. (1956). Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, Handbook I: The Cognitive Domain. New York: David McKay Co Inc.

In Blackboard Learn, it is possible to compare a set of assignments, tests, etc. and apply special rules to how the grade is calculated for these sets.  You can instruct the Grade Center to drop a specified number of highest grades, lowest grades, or even a combination of both.  In order to access these rules, it is first important to organize the grade columns into categories.

Applying Categories

In order to apply categories, first click on the Manage tab in the Grade Center and then click on Categories (as shown below).

Figure 1: Accessing Categories in Grade Center

Once inside the categories area, there will be many default categories already created such as Assignment, Test, and Discussion.  By default, Blackboard Learn will automatically apply these categories; however it is important to check to ensure that all grade columns are included that need to be.  As an example, Assignment 1 through Assignment 4 are included in the Assignment category (pictured below in Figure 2).

Figure 2: The Categories Page

Once  the appropriate categories have been created and/or reviewed, the next step is to apply the category to all the columns you would like to include (if they are not currently in the category).  As seen in figure 3 below, click the down arrow next to the column name, then click on “Edit Column Information.”

Figure 3: This image shows how to access the Edit Column information section.

While in Edit Column, go down to Category under the text editor.  There will be a list box for category where the different categories can be selected for the column (show in Figure 4 below).

Figure 4: Changing a column's category.

Using Categories in the Total Grade Column

Now that the categories have been created and applied, it is time to Edit Column information on the Total calculated column.  This is where the advanced rules of grading can be applied by individually adding the categories/ columns that need to be included in the calculation.

Figure 5: Applying categories to a calculated grade column (e.g. total)

First select the option “Selected Columns and Categories”.  A window will them drop down similar to the one shown in Figure 5 above.  Under the “Categories to Select” list, highlight the category that needs to be included, then click the arrow directly to the right.  In the image, it shows that the assignment category is included as a part of the grade calculation, as well as the individual column Test 1.  Under Category: Assignment, the advanced grading options appear.  The example above shows that the 2 lowest assignment grades will be dropped before calculating the grade.

The move to Blackboard Learn 9.1 from the current version of BlackboardVista 8 is not an update. It is instead a transition from one course management system (CMS) to another. Despite the sharing of the Blackboard name, the systems are very different. The current Blackboard Vista 8 represents the end of the WebCT era: the last update of the acquired software package. When Blackboard announced the acquisition of WebCT back in 2005, the intent was to design an CMS that took the best features and technologies of both the Blackboard and WebCT platforms to create a more robust CMS. The new CMS, under the project name Blackboard NG (next generation), would eventually be released in 2010 as Blackboard Learn 9.1.

The fact that Learn is different from Vista changes the scope of the project from both the technological and academic perspectives. ITaP continues to aggressively find solutions to the technical aspects of the move. The IDC is committed to assisting instructors with the challenges and opportunities on the academic side of the transition. As mentioned, Blackboard Learn is a different CMS. It is not a simple upgrade of Vista. As a result, courses are not easily transferred. After thorough testing, the migration tool provided by Blackboard proved ineffective and inefficient. Fortunately, files stored within Vista can be moved to Learn efficiently. However, the content and structure of courses will need to be rebuilt in Learn. While this may be initially seen as a failure, it does provide opportunities that may otherwise have been overlooked.

To quote Winston Churchill, “An optimist sees opportunity in every difficulty.” And there is opportunity in the Blackboard transition for the optimist (and others too). Even if a fast and efficient tool were available to recreate courses from Vista to Learn, the transition provides instructors with the opportunity to reexamine everything about their Blackboard courses. By taking an evaluative look at course materials, instructors and course designers can consider the tools and features unique to Blackboard Learn as they innovatively and creatively design instructional content. Tools such as wikis, journals, blogs, rubrics, and other improved or new features provide instructors the ability to reinvent instructional and supplemental material in Blackboard. It’s an opportunity worth seizing.

If you would like to explore the possibilities of Blackboard Learn as it relates to teaching and learning, contact the IDC team to schedule a consult.

It is important to make PDF documents and forms accessible to individuals with disabilities. To help, Adobe Acrobat Professional has two separate accessibility checks that it can perform. They are called the Quick Check and the Full Check. One of them should be avoided.

The Quick Check for accessibility in essence is only checking to see whether your PDF has tags. If tags are present, you’ll see the message “No accessibility problems were detected in this quick check.” There may be lots of accessibility problems with the document or form, but the Quick Check still says there are none because it only checks for the presence of tags.

Please don’t use Quick Check to decide whether your PDF document or form is accessible.

Instead, use Full Check. It is not going to find all issues, but it is better than Quick Check. It can identify when alt text is missing from a graphic and other basic issues. It also offers hints on how to repair some errors.

To launch a Full Check in Acrobat Pro versions 7 to 9:    Advanced menu > Accessibility > Full Check

To launch a Full Check in Acrobat Pro X: View menu > Tools > Accessibility > then in right sidebar Full Check

Acrobat Pro X menu

I am intensively involved in IMPACT project. Every week we have faculty workshop sessions for 75 minutes covering various topics such as learner characteristics, learning goals, learning objectives, Bloom’s Taxonomy, transformation models, assessment and so on. How could faculty put all these pieces together in a lesson which make sense to them and their students? I am proposing we use Gagné’s nine events of instruction as a framework to organize teaching and learning process:

With Purdue’s change from Blackboard Vista to Blackboard Learn underway, I thought it would be helpful to highlight some of most noticable changes between the two systems, and point out some things the new system lets users do that the old system could not.

No Build, Teach, or Student Tabs

There are no Build, Teach, or Student tabs in Blackboard Learn. These have been replaced with an Edit Mode On/Off button. With Edit Mode turned on, users can build and edit content in the course. Turning Edit Mode off lets users see what the course will appear like to students. If users wants to delve further into what the experience is like for students, a student view tool is available. Accessing the student view tool will virtually log in an instructor as a demo student and allow them to view content, complete assignments and assessments, and access all course materials as a student – exactly like the student tab in Blackboard Vista.

Improved Menu

Blackboard Learn provides users with a highly customizable course menu. Gone are the days of being tied to one type of content per menu item. Users can now customize their menu to best suit the needs of the course. Users can add a content area, tool link, or course link to their menu.

• I find it’s easiest to think of adding a content area to a menu as adding a folder. Within that folder, you can add files, assignments, assessments, YouTube videos, interactive tools, links to other items or places in your course, and all manner of other items. There is a lot of flexibility as to what you can add in a content area.
• A tool link is a direct link to a specific tool. So, if you wanted to add a menu item that would take students directly to all of your discussion boards for a course, for example, then a tool link would be the way to go.
• A course link is a link to an item that already exists in the course. Continuing the example from above, if you wanted a menu item to take students directly to discussion board #3 instead of a page with all of your discussions boards on it, then creating a course link would be the way to go.

Easier to add/modify files

Blackboard Learn offers users an improved content collection. Multiple files can be added at one time to a content collection through a simple drag and drop interface. Entire zipped folders worth of content can be easily unpackaged from within the Blackboard interface. By enabling versioning on a file and taking advantage of a webdav tool like Blackboard Drive or Web Folders , users can update files easier than ever before – without even opening Blackboard if desired.

You don’t have to wait until Fall to start exploring all of these new features. You can see for yourself now by requesting a master course. Master courses are courses an instructor can use for development. When a Banner generated section of a course is created, an instructor can easily link the contents of their master course to the Banner generated section.

ITaP is offering training throughout the rest of the semester and summer for anyone interested in learning how to use Blackboard Learn. Our next offerings are the week of April 9 with more offerings coming finals week and beyond.

For a more comprehensive list of what’s new in Blackboard Learn, check out this video and this comparison chart of the differences between Blackboard Vista and Learn.

David Goldman reports that the new Windows 8, due out later this year is a game changer.  It is essentially an attempt to combine the capabilities of a PC with the intuitive look and feel of a tablet.  It has touch screen input but can work with a mouse and keyboard as well.  The opening screen is in the Metro Interface (tile-based), from which you can access apps or a traditional Windows user interface.  It has its own app store, and these look and feel very much like those of the iPad.  At heart, though it is still a PC.

Goldman says:

“The iPad is the simplest entry point to what Apple calls the “post-PC” world, but PCs haven’t outlived their usefulness just yet. Most people still go to their PCs for tools like Microsoft Office and more complex content creation tasks

“That’s where Microsoft sees uncharted territory. It wants Windows 8 to power each user’s primary device, which can be as portable and intuitive as the iPad but also be able to perform all the intricate tasks that today’s tablet users flock to their PCs for.

“Microsoft does that by making the desktop itself into an app. The PC boots to the Metro interface, which serves as the “start screen” and main backdrop for Windows 8.

“Metro is ideal for everyday tasks like Web browsing, e-mail, photo sharing, social networking, and casual gaming. But when you need to manage files, edit a document, or do anything else you wouldn’t typically try on an iPad, a tap or click on the desktop app launches what looks and feels like the Windows 7 interface.”

Not everyone is so taken with Windows 8.  Preston Gralla writes that a backlash against it is building.  The main complaints seem to be that although those who have tried it on a tablet generally like it, on a PC it is difficult to use with a keyboard and mouse.  Another complaint is that trying to meld desktop and tablet OSs produces an unholy and tenuous alliance.  “Metro and the Desktop are essentially two different operating systems incompletely bolted together.”  He points out this humorous YouTube video of a writer filming his father trying out Windows 8 for the first time.  He gets out of Metro to the desktop but can’t get back!  The gentleman says “Who puts this out?”  On being told, “Microsoft,” he retorts “They trying to drive me to Mac?”!

Well, this is a preview version, so hopefully they will fix some of the problems.  It is easy to see why Microsoft is trying to put out a universal OS.  They only have to maintain one product rather than separate ones for tablets and PCs.  It would be easier for organizations (including universities) to maintain a mixed platform of desktop PCs and tablets if they all run the same OS.  App development would be simplified because the same apps would run on both.

We recently had a rather lively debate in my department on the merits of tablets vs. PCs.  On one side are the iPad supporters, who see its intuitive features as the future of computing, and the desktop/laptop people who point out that, try as you might, you still have to come back to a traditional workstation to do work requiring high-performance resources.  As for me, I’ll stick with my laptop for now.  True, it is a lot heavier and bulkier than an iPad, and the battery life is much less.  But I have a larger screen that doesn’t get mussed with fingerprints and I have office on it and plenty of power to do the things I need.  It’s a tradeoff I’m willing to live with.

To my mind, if Microsoft can come up with an operating system that can work on all types of devices, it would be great, provide that it works.  Goldman points out “Windows 8 meets Microsoft’s goal of producing a ‘fast and fluid’ operating system. It’s so lightweight, in fact, that even on a five-year-old, battered Dell laptop with a puny Intel Centrino processor, Windows 8 booted up in 16 seconds. By contrast, my iPhone 4S takes 27 seconds to start up.”  Windows 8 seems to have a very small footprint that would enable it to run on tablets and make PCs blazing fast.  Seems like they learned some lessons from Vista after all.

Anyway, we’d better get used to the idea, because it looks like Microsoft is redesigning the rest of its product line to take advantage of Windows 8 duality.  Matthew Shaer reports that the latest version of MS Office, officially titled Office 15, is now out in limited preview mode.  It has the Metro style interface and has touch editing features.  So it looks like Microsoft’s foray into the mixed-mode world is more than just some toe dipping.  It seems to be a major shift for the company.  You can’t blame them for wanting to stay relevant.

Group functions within Blackboard Learn now allow for collaboration between students using blogs, file exchange, discussion board, journals, tasks, and Wikis. Students within a group can participate in real-time lessons and problem solving exercises.  Groups may be set up manually, randomly automatic and by self-enrollment. Any number of groups or students to a group may be selected.  Tools are then assigned to the group.  Emails may be sent to students in a course by groups, as well as individual or all settings. Many of these tools allow students to communicate asynchronously outside of class on projects and assignments.

Blogs, when assigned to a group, allow the group to post and add comments to the blogs. When the blog is set up, grading may also be set up as an option with the blog, automatically creating a column in the Grade Center.  Rubrics, which is a grading form, give guidelines to students for the blog entries may also be created and assigned to the blog.

File exchange provides space for group members to share files.  Examples of use might be meeting notes, guidelines, checklists, rough drafts, and images.  Group members, as well as the instructor can add files.  All can delete files from the group or instructor.

Instructors may use a group discussion board to encourage discussions on course material or expanded course topics outside of the classroom.  One example might be review of professional journal articles and writing summaries of those articles. Group discussion boards are limited to only the group members, where they post thoughts and comment on others posts.  Grade columns may be set up with the discussion board, as well as rubrics.

In contrast to the discussion board, journals allow a student to share their thoughts with each other and communicate with the instructor. Journal entries may be set up to only be shared with group members and grading with rubrics may also be attached.  Group tasks are set up on a page that organizes projects or activities (tasks) by defining task priority and tracking task status.  This may be used to assist students in completing projects or preparing for presentations.

Wikis allow a web based collaborative space that can be set up by groups.  Group members may view, contribute and edit content that is posted.  All course members or just the group may view the Wiki, but editing us limited to just the group members. Grading allows for a Wiki group grade that automatically goes to each student in the group.

Recently I attended a presentation by Bob Beichner a Physics Professor from North Carolina State University, where he discussed how he transformed his class into the SCALE-UP (Student-Centered Active Learning Environment with Upside-down Pedagogies) learning environment. Dr. Beichner  is one of the main pioneers in developing this type of learning environment. The SCALE-UP model is designed to facilitate active, collaborative learning in a studio-like setting. The spaces are extremely important for this type of learning environment and are designed to facilitate multiple interactions between teams of students who work on short tasks.

The concept is that student groups are given something interesting to investigate. The teams work on “tangibles” (hands-on measurements or observations) and “ponderables” (interesting, complex problems), while the instructor is free to walk around the classroom asking questions, sending one team to help another, or asking comparative questions of the groups. No separate lab space is required for these SCALE-UP courses and the lectures actually become class-wide discussions. Beichner  discussed how the groups are carefully structured and how they give students many opportunities to interact. Three teams (labelled a, b, and c) sit at each 7′ round table and have white boards nearby if needed. Additionally each team has a laptop in case they need web access.

More information on the SCALE-UP classroom model and course redesign can be found through the links below.

Please let us know below what your opinions are of the SCALE-UP model.

Related Links:

• Student-Centered Active Learning Environment with Upside-down Pedagogies
• To Flip or Not to Flip: Musings on Flipping the Classroom
• IMPACT: Course redesign videos
• Course redesign? Yes. Student redesign? Definitely!