My Journey in Education: PCK

As a teacher-researcher, I am particularly interested in teachers’ Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK). 

Briefly, PCK refers to a teacher’s understanding of how to help students understand specific subject matter. It is the combination of a teacher’s pedagogical knowledge (how students learn, teaching approaches, methods of assessment and knowledge of different theories about learning) and content knowledge (knowledge of the subject matter).

I believe that educative curriculum materials, by aiding teacher learning, can transform teacher’s knowledge simply from being either content specific, or pedagogically centered,  to a combination that allows deep learning of both the student and the teacher

The potential impact of one type of educative curricula material, PowerPoint presentations, could help to fill the gap between simple presentation of content and a teacher truly understanding what students are supposed to learn, as well as how they should learn themselves.

During the study I completed for my dissertation, I found that translating teacher’s manuals to digital presentations for easy digestion and delivery benefited both new and experienced teachers, just in different ways.  The presentations allowed less experienced teachers to transition into their new roles more easily,  while ensuring the required content was delivered with fidelity; and experienced teachers were able to refer to the presentations as needed and use them as a pacing guide.