Technical use analysis

After waiting several days for feedback on my technical use analysis, I have now been able to meet with my chair and make some revisions. I have linked it here, if you're interested. A lot of it is composed of quotes from other sources, not all of which are cited completely at this point, so you're welcome to skip that part. I would love feedback on my commentary and conclusions, though. The point of the technical use analysis is simply to describe how the terms are currently being used in the literature to give us a place to start from. So, here it is. I've also linked to a summary version that just has my definitions, the essential features, and remaining questions for each construct. Enjoy!

Writing the technical use analysis

My husband and kids went to Idaho without me this weekend so that I could work - fun for me! I have been able to get quite a bit done, though, and seem to be on track thus far. On Friday night (technically Saturday morning) I completed a 52-page table listing the definitions of each of the constructs as described in the existing literature. One of the most interesting things I found when doing this was that there were 13 definitions of TCK and 10 definitions of TPK in these resources while there were 89 definitions of TPCK in the same sources. This shows that, while the educational technology community at large has embraced the idea of TPCK, they have not closely examined its composition.

So, I have spent today (Saturday) analyzing and writing up what I have found and feel like the concepts are starting to be more clear in my mind.

Another really nice result of this technical use analysis has been that I have also been able to find model cases described in the literature to use later in the dissertation. This technical use analysis has given me a very nice foundation from which to work for the rest of the time.

My next steps are to (1) finish the technical use analysis, (2) finish all of the revisions to my prospectus - I need to specifically look at what Dr. Rich said on his electronic copy, though I've done all of the revisions that my committee required, (3) write up the model cases that I found in the literature, and (4) schedule the interviews with the TPCK experts - I've already heard back from Dr. Mishra and Dr. Lee.

Wish me luck and feel free to comment!

My TPCK dissertation

Welcome to anyone who happens to venture here. This blog will chronicle my efforts to complete a conceptual analysis of technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPCK - pronounced T-PACK - visit http://www.tpck.org for more information) for my dissertation at Brigham Young University. It will be my place to muse and vent and query and all of the wonderful stuff that comes with writing a dissertation. You can keep track of my progress by watching the calendar and I promise to post pictures of my defense and graduation!