Leveraging the development of English TPCK within the deictic nature of literacy

English teachers, perhaps more than teachers of any other subject teach a wide variety of topics: from journalism and film/media studies to Shakespeare and remedial reading.  At the same time English teachers experience rapid changes in technology with many new forms of literacy being created.  English teachers need to become “teacher researchers” (p. 94) to develop E-TPCK. This idea relates perfectly to my goal as a special educator and a teacher of many subjects, to develop TPCK by being a resourceful researcher.

Some of the problems regarding teachers and technology include: teachers who struggle to learn technology integration but give up too soon; veteran teachers who lack intrinsic interest in technology; and a lack of enough opportunities at this time in history for pre-service and practicing teachers to practice using technology in their instruction with proper feedback from those knowledgeable with technology and the content area.

As noted in other chapters, technology integration in education is also affected by the complex and quickly changing nature of technology as well as variations within schools, among students and the capabilities of teachers. 

A trend is taking place to prepare teachers to use technology within the context of their content areas (such as the example of this class) rather than in separate, general technology skills courses.  Other trending developments include: cohorts or content area communities where ideas can be shared; weekly face-to-face meetings; models for guidance and support; and helping teachers develop a meta-cognitive awareness of “their nascent knowledge and its impact on lesson preparation and student learning” (p.94).  I have the opportunity to develop “critical technological literacy” (p.102) because of this class.  This will benefit the children I work with especially because I have found children with special needs to be very attracted to technology.  This opportunity is a gift. There are many teachers who are not developing content technology literacy for the reasons mentioned in this paper.