Article Preview
TopIntroduction
Effective integration of technology in classrooms demands that teachers understand and apply technology, pedagogy and content knowledge simultaneously in a certain context (Koehler & Mishra, 2009). In order to maximize effective learning outcomes towards technology integration in K-12, educators in higher education not only teach how to integrate technology in the teaching learning process but also model technology integration in their own teaching during the teacher training program (Foulger et al., 2015; Foulger et al., 2017, Tondeur et al., 2017).
Many educators in teacher training programs endeavor to understand how pre-service teachers could be able to integrate technology effectively in their future classrooms (Abbitt, 2011; Archambault & Barnett, 2010; Koehler & Mishra, 2009; Scherer et al., 2017). Therefore a question remains about pre-service teachers readiness to effectively integrate technology in their future classrooms. Another question is how can educators determine when pre-service teachers are confident enough to effectively utilize technology in their future teaching.
A large amount of research assessed pre-teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs and competencies in technology integration (Tokmak, 2015; Schmidt et al., 2009; Tokmak et al., 2013; Wu, 2013; Young, et al, 2013). To understand pre-service teachers’ self-efficacy beliefs in technology integration in K-12 classrooms, it is very important to design training strategies, provide learning experiences and field activates in teacher preparation programs.
Albeit there is a good amount of research about TPACK self-efficacy beliefs for pre-service teachers, there is very limited research that explains the context in which the courses were facilitated and activities in the course. This study will explore technology enhanced activities in one undergraduate instructional technology course that aimed to enhance pre-service teachers’ technology integration self-efficacy beliefs and competency. Therefore, the purpose of this study was twofold, first, to investigate the change in pre-service teachers’ TPACK self-efficacy beliefs at the end of a semester based instructional tecnology course in one mid-western teacher education university and secondly, to investigate the impacts of TK, CK, PK, PCK TCK, and TPK on TPACK.