Supporting teachers' development of Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge: a whole school intervention

There is a general consensus that teachers and schools need to use technology in the classroom to support their teaching practice and increase students' engagement, and this drives schools to spend an appreciable part of their available budget on technological tools. Furthermore, empirical research suggests that educational technology(such as Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs)) and the use of blended learning improve students' outcomes in different subjects. Other studies, too, indicate that increasing teachers' mastery and use of educational technology may also help to enhance students' engagement. However, teachers vary widely in their competence in applying and managing these technologies, with some scholars positing that issues such as cost, teachers' beliefs and a lack of appropriate training of teachers seriously undermine the benefits and value added of using digital technologies. With a view to addressing these shortcomings, this small practitioner study explores a whole-school intervention to support teachers' better use of educational technology(i.e. the VLE). This intervention was conducted in three stages combining department-based and whole-school sessions. Each session was designed as a task on the platform and was delivered with the collaboration of three colleagues from different departments. With this in mind, a framework was designed based on Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (TPACK) and the so-called Conversational Framework(CF)which helps to refine this. The research data was gathered in three ways. Firstly, individual interviews were conducted with teachers and group interviews with students. Secondly, both teachers and students answered online questionnaires enquiring into teachers' technological knowledge. And thirdly in conversations with staff members, their relevant experiences were recorded in a researcher diary. The resulting findings suggest that, despite certain barriers to the adoption of digital technology, students perceived that teachers had made progress in their use of the VLE. Additionally, teachers valued the department-based approach, and the framework (combining TPACK and CF) appears to be a useful tool for developing teachers' expertise in the use of educational technology, whilst challenging some teachers' beliefs. However, there were some limitations in the area of students' engagement, and further research is required to determine the impact on students' outcomes.