TPCK in action!

This is a case of Cross Curricular Story Writing. At Terakki Foundation Schools (in Istanbul), a class worked on a writing project that involved not only the English department but also the art and ICT ones. The project consisted of “creating an audio-enabled talking book.” Children were asked to write a story based on two characters created by two of their mates; then, the ones that felt more confident when talking recorded it by using special software. After this, using another program, Adobe Creative Suite 5.5, the book was created and, finally, published as an e-book.

After this project, the class created a website that consists of different games in order “to help other children learn English.”

You can “read/listen” to this story via iBooks. Here goes the link https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bubble-and-pebble-story/id444909635?mt=8

And you can find these interactive games on http://www.bubbleandpebble.com/

In this case, we can see that TPCK is applied to the lessons. The teacher wanted to deal with common themes (content knowledge) through “fun-based activities” (pedagogical knowledge) and used different types of software to do so (technological knowledge). If we have a look at the SAMR Model, we'll see that the Redefinition level was achieved since this task could only be accomplished by the use of technology, and also because, probably, the teacher wouldn't have thought about it without technology.

This Cross Curricular Story Writing project is really interesting since students can see how different subjects are related. Technology, in this situation, was a tool that children not only used to learn but to help other children learn English. I think this is of great importance, because through this project of creating a website, students were asked to apply all their knowledge (TPCK!), be clear, creative and solidary. It is important to bear in mind that while we teach English in our lessons, we are giving our students different tools to exploit in different situations and we should lead them to be cooperative. Many times, technology can help us to do so… We only need to give it a try!