TPACK Questions

After the last post about doing a science activity involving technology I now reflect on my experience and how I feel the activity achieves TPACK.

• What is the content you are focusing on in your science lesson?

The content I focused on was from Utah's state core curriculum for 2nd grade students. It was standard three which states "students will develop an understanding of their environment" and objective 1b, "investigate relationships between plants and animals and how living things change during their lives" by describing "the life cycle of local plants and animals using diagrams and pictures."

• What is the pedagogy you are using and why is it a good fit with the content?

The pedagogy I used was strategies that are important for teaching science. I thought that students would learn inquiry process skills such as observing, predicting, acquiring and processing data, describing relationships and analyzing data through this activity. This is a good fit with the content because the content wants students to investigate relationships of plants and how they change during their lives through describing the life cycle of local plants and animals using diagrams and pictures. Through this pedagogy of describing relationships students can see the relationships between each of the steps in the life cycle of plants.

• What is the technology you’ll be using and why is it a good fit with the content and pedagogy?

The technology I used to teach the content and pedagogy was Kidsperation. Kidsperation supplied a concept map that was able to be filled in and students could see visually how the life cycle of a plant progressed and what intermediate steps were involved. Students could predict what would happen next in the life cycle and they could describe relationships they see through the diagrams and pictures. Kidsperation also allowed students to explore the content of plants themselves by choosing which words to look up in the word finder and then which words or concepts to expand upon. Students would do most of the learning and exploration on their own and I feel like this affords them a great opportunity for self-growth and self-discovery. Since they are finding the information out for themselves it will be more pertinent to them rather than having a teacher stand at the front of the room and dictate information to them.

Tech Savvy Teacher Column

I have been recruited by my district to contribute an article to the monthly newsletter concerning technology in the elementary science classroom.  The column I am writing is entitled “The Tech Savvy Teacher. “  My newsletters will provide examples of how different technologies are used for specific science concepts.  I look forward to exploring these programs as well as implementing them in the classroom. 

The first science activity we did was based on this objective.  It is standard three, which says, “Students will develop an understanding of their environment.”  The objective is number one and it says, “Investigate relationships between plants and animals and how living things change during their lives.  The objective is 1b, which says, “Describe the life cycle of local plants and animals using diagrams and pictures.”  For this objective we used the program Kidspiration and used this technology to enhance our lesson.  We went into the science section of the program and selected the life cycles option. 

In this application we searched plants and a variety of species appeared. We began with the birth of a plant and typed in seed. Pictures of seeds appeared and we placed it in the concept map.  Then we added words that related to the beginning of a plant such as water and soil. We could use words or pictures to represent these items.  The students can choose whichever option they prefer.  We did this same process for the other steps of the life cycle. 

 

The writing guide is another tool we used for this project.  We wanted to know what other words related to reproduction.  When we typed in reproduction a series of definitions came up and synonyms along with them.  We learned that a similar word to reproduction is breed.  We then used that word in our concept map and continued with our learning.  After we completed the concept map with pictures and words we went to the writing view.  There was an icon for every picture and word with writing space for explanation and expansion.  This is a great tool to help kids connect their learning with their writing.

 

Word Guide Page

 Word Guide Definition

Writing View

 

Life Cycle Page

Life Cycles Concept Map in Progress

Kidspiration was an easy and fun tool to use for this objective.  It allowed me to easily and affectively incorporate technology into the classroom.  Kidspiration helped enhance students’ learning of the life cycle by analyzing each step individually.  The program supplied pictures to relate the items in each concept map.  The concept maps helped the students analyze the exact steps of the life cycle.  Kidspiration made this easy and fun as it provided visual learning tools. Another processing skill Kidspiration enhances is the ability to observe a scientific theory.  The picture concept map visually broke down the abstract concept of a life cycle to a second grader’s level.  Kids also used prediction skills as they hypothesized the outcomes in a specific part of the life cycle.