A Survey On Technological Pedagogical And Content Knowledge Of Normal Postgraduates Of English Majors

In 2005, on the basis of the Shulman’s theory of pedagogical content knowledge (PCK), American scholars Punya Mishra and Mattew J. Koehler at Michigan State University put forward the concept of Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge (It’s abbreviated as "TPCK", now renamed as "TPACK") for the first time. Since then, attentions and researches of TPACK at home and abroad have formed an upsurge. As the use of information technology becomes more and more widely in the English classroom teaching, English-major normal postgraduates should possess rich technological pedagogical and content knowledge if they want to achieve teaching effectiveness in their future field of English teacher education. However, at present, there are rare researches related to the combination of TPACK and English in China.TPACK framework expounds the knowledge that teacher should obtain to achieve teaching effectiveness by using technologies. It consists seven elements of content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge, technological knowledge as well as those four elements overlapped by the three aforementioned elements--- technological content knowledge, technological pedagogical knowledge, pedagogical content knowledge and technological pedagogical content knowledge. By studying Mishra and Koehler’s TPACK structure, the research formed a specialized, reliable and effective TPACK questionnaire on normal postgraduates of English majors. Taking postgraduates of subject teaching of English major (who belongs to two-year Education Master) and curriculum and teaching theory major (who belongs to three-year Education Master) from College of Foreign Studies in Guangxi Normal University as the research subjects, the research used the method of questionnaire investigation and individual interviews, to carry out an investigation into the TPACK status of normal postgraduates of English majors. Specifically, the research contents included:(1) understanding the general TPACK status of normal postgraduates of English majors; (2) analyzing differences or similarities of English-major normal postgraduates’ TPACK in terms of English levels; (3) analyzing differences or similarities of English-major normal postgraduates’ TPACK in terms of hometowns; (4) analyzing differences or similarities of English-major normal postgraduates’ TPACK in terms of grades and majors.The research results show that:(1) English-major normal postgraduates’ seven dimensions of TPACK show a fairly high confidence level; (2) English-major normal postgraduates lack confidence in the three aspects of technologies of applying hardwares, English comprehensive knowledge and designs of learning activities based on computer and network; (3) English levels have a significant role of English-major normal postgraduates’developments of TPACK; (4) hometowns have a significant role of English-major normal postgraduates’developments of TPACK; (5) grades and majors make no difference to their TPACK developments.Because of the limitation of condition, ability and other factors, this paper is mainly for a preliminary exploration on TPACK status of normal postgraduates of English majors from Guangxi Normal University. Some problems are found, and according to these findings, several corresponding suggestions are put forward on how to improve normal postgraduates of English majors’abilities of TPACK--- the government should continue attach importance to balance the basic education of the urban and the rural; universities should offer TPACK related curricula; college teachers need to keep up with the times to possess new educational ideas such as TPACK; English-major normal postgraduates ought to greatly strengthen the three basic knowledge of English content knowledge, pedagogical knowledge and technological knowledge.