Research On "Modern Educational Technology" Common Course Design Within TPACK Framework

The improvement of teachers’ educational technology competence isindispensable to the continuous development of basic education informatization. Asone common and important approach to cultivate preservice teachers’ educationaltechnology competence, the "Modern Educational Technology" common course alsois faced with many challenges. However, there exist some problems in the course,which make the course have little effect on developing future teachers’ ed ucationaltechnology competence. Such as the course objectives are broad and vague, the coursecontent is little related to student teachers’ professional development, the courseactivities concern little about student teachers’ self-development and the courseassessment doesn’t pay enough attention to standards and developments, and so on.TPACK(Technologic Pedagogical Content Knowledge), a framework for teacherknowledge for effective technology integration into teaching, which emphasizes thetechnology integration and the reflection on the interactions among the threeknowledge bases T(Technology), P(Pedagogy) and C(Content). By providing aconcise perspective on integrating technology for preservice teachers, TPACK makesimportant guiding significance on improving the "Modern Educational Technology"common course.This study first reviews the current situations of China’s Modern EducationalTechnology common course teaching and setting. Within the analysis of TPACKframework and preservice teachers’ course requirements, it further explores theguiding role of TPACK framework in the objectives, content, activities and evaluationof the ModernEducational Technology commoncourse.(1) The course objectives should be positioned in optimizing instructional designwith technology;(2) The course content can use TPACK elements with technology as structureand TPACK related publications as body, which may enhance the overall grasp ofcourse learning for preservice teachers and meet their needs like teaching practice,subject contact, content updates, etc;(3) The course activities should highlight the reflection on the integrationsamong the three knowledge bases T (Technology), P (Pedagogy) and C (Content).(4) The course evaluation can take the assessment of TPACK related elements asa reference. According to the actual situation of a normal university, the study finally designsa preliminary Modern Educational Technology common course program withinTPACK framework, which may benefit student teachers’ continuous development inthe application of educational technology.