What Is Pedagogical Content Knowledge

The wider community believe that teaching falls under a simple banner of ‘basic pedagogy’ that involves the giving of information by the teacher, who then tests their students’ knowledge through questioning, homework and exams. Many do not know the full range of pedagogical options that can be utilised by teachers to engage students in their education. There is nothing wrong with the activities that make up the ‘basic pedagogy’ and any of

To what extent can teachers’ discussion of key domain concepts provide insight as to their constructive vs. directive thinking about domain content, pedagogy, and technology integration?

content knowledge in science and math as I participated in training and teaching other teachers

Theorists such as Dewey, Gardner, Piaget, Bruner, Vygotsky and many others based their work around the constructivist theory that knowledge is constructed from the child being an active participant in the development of their learning. Over time many types of inquiry learning models have been developed, all placing the child as centre of the learning, giving children the opportunities to explore, question and management of their learning. The author’s own personal philosophy of teaching and learning collaborates this when affirming that ‘by creating a collaborative learning environment, children are able to grow and learn through exploring, experimenting and expressing and control their own

The role of content in the classroom is to assist teachers in providing students deep and rich experiences on the journey to academic excellence. Students need content background understanding to become capable students. I believe that students need content

At what point does a student, in all intents and purposes, experience something mathematical? Does it symbolise a student that can remember a formula, write down symbols, see a pattern or solve a problem? I believe in enriching and empowering students’ mathematical experiences that fundamentally stems from a Piagetian genetic epistemological constructivist model that allow students to scaffold their learning through cognitive processes that are facilitated by teaching in a resource rich and collaborative environment (Thompson, 1994, p.69).

Content area literacy, appropriate text, knowledge transformation and making connections are all intertwined to help students. I feel content area literacy is vital in a classroom setting. The goal of content area literacy is to help students with comprehension in all the content areas. These lessons require specific techniques and strategies that help students navigate through different types of texts. The benefit of content area literacy is that it’s used in all subjects, so students can transfer their knowledge from one subject to the next. After our discussion on appropriate text, I realized that it has quite a few factors behind it. Personally, I think it’s important to choose appropriate text for students. If the text doesn’t match

It is clear that according to the academic literature the more you connect knowledge for a pupil the better they learn. This mode enables learners to perceive new relationships, new models and create new systems and structures in their thinking. If pupil’s capacity for critical inquiry is to be furthered, topics being studied must be located in a broader societal context, and this would be better supported by cross-curricular activities. It is unleashing the creative potential of the

In the practice of teaching, it is the responsibility of a teacher not only to teach students subject matter, but to teach students in order to enable them to grow and develop as a person. While it is essential for students to have an understanding of academic material, it is also equally as important that when students finish their education they have skills to use in

Traditional content area literacy, in which each teacher is the master of his or her domain, frequently dismisses the idea of an integrated approach to the teaching and learning of academic content (Damico, Baildon, Exter, & Guo, 2010). This age-old construct of compartmentalized instruction perpetuates the idea of instructional silos, and missed opportunities to make explicit and meaningful connections among the disciplines. However, disciplinary literacy, which goes beyond mere student recitation of content learned, invites and encourages students to practice the lexicon of the discipline while learning the content (2010).

First, the article identifies the importance of students’ prior knowledge to enable them to build on their prior knowledge to increase critical thinking in their understanding of the content as well as engagement within the classroom. It references Bartlett’s concept regarding the brain’s capability to connect past information as a reference point to a new concept, which can enable this knowledge to be stored in long term. This completes their statements about schemas that create a “blueprint” of the new information in regards to how it connects to the new information being delivered. This helps them to organize the information that is being presented so they can follow along with more ease. Once the basic principle concepts are established then students are able to have a reference point of understanding when trying to expand on that given topic. (P.73, 76)

Many students struggle through their mathematics subject from elementary up to secondary. This is why many professionals and educators tend to cure these struggle experienced by many students. According to the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM, 2000), Principles and Standards for School Mathematics (PSSM) urge teachers and students to use multiple representations during mathematics discussion. The PSSM clearly stated that students should “ create and use representation to organize, record and communicate mathematical ideas , select, apply and translate among mathematical representations to solve problems and use representations to model and interpret physical, social, and mathematical phenomena. This leads to the usage of the so called “mathematics manipulative”.

In today’s society mathematics is a vital part of day-to-day life. No matter what a person is doing at home or at the workplace, he/she is constantly using different mathematics skills to simply function. Then what does this mean for mathematics education? When someone needs to utilize a skill every day then he/she needs a strong background in the skill. Therefore, today’s students need more than a just a working knowledge of mathematics or enough knowledge to pass a test. Today’s students need to understand how mathematics works and how to utilize mathematics skills in the best way possible.

B( Both modes of education mentioned in the previous section, describe the students as experiencing beings, and not just vessels in which we can insert information. In the education system today, there are students who graduate school with no real understanding of the material that they learned. Oftentimes, teachers will simply relay information that the student must memorize for an exam. However, the student might not question the information he is receiving or understand it.

Another strand is to have a pedagogy which is theoretically sophisticated. For this to be the case, teachers and lectures must have an understanding of learning processes and factors which affect them, Ireson (2000). This means that the tried and tested learning theories research, if carefully executed, the gap between the teachers and learners can be bridged, and hence more learning.