A Study On The Novice,Proficient And Expert English Teachers’ TPACK In Senior High School

In Shanghai,the digital transformation of education is progressing,on which teachers have an important impact since they are playing a central role in implementing education policies through their teaching practice.Under the influence of COVID-19 in the past three years,the blending of online and off-line teaching has become an indispensable part of primary and secondary education at present.In this context,the high school English teaching will be influenced by teachers’ technological pedagogical and content knowledge(TPACK),which contains technological knowledge(TK),subject content knowledge(CK),pedagogical knowledge(PK),technological pedagogical knowledge(TPK),technological content knowledge(TCK),pedagogical and content knowledge(PCK)and technological pedagogical and content knowledge(TPACK).Among them,the first three elements are the core elements and the last four are the composite elements.Since the new English Curriculum Standards for High School was released in 2018,it has repeatedly emphasized the importance of deep integration of technology and English teaching,which in turn requires teachers to integrate English subject content knowledge(CK),pedagogical knowledge(PK)and technological knowledge(TK).This study aims to investigate TPACK level of three groups of high school English teachers,i.e.,novice,experienced and expert teachers,and the differences/similarities in the TPACK levels among them.Special attention will also be paid to the ways in which high school English teachers apply information technology in their class(E-TPCK)and possible differences/similarities between the three groups of teachers.The factors that influence the level of TPACK among the three groups of high school English teachers will be explored,too.To do so,this study adopts questionnaire survey,interview and classroom observation as the main research methods.303 high school English teachers in Shanghai took part in the questionnaire survey;seven teachers at different stages of professional development were selected for interviews and eight were selected to participate in classroom observations.Analysis of the data reveals that firstly,high school English teachers’ TPACK knowledge is at an intermediate level.More specifically,subject content knowledge(CK)has the highest mean score while technological content knowledge(TCK)has the lowest mean score.Secondly,novice teachers’ TPACK level is slightly higher than that of expert teachers,while proficient teachers’ TPACK level is the lowerst.Novice and experienced teachers use technology as an alternative and as an extension to enrich students’ learning resources more frequently,while expert teachers are able to apply technology transformatively to change the learning content and assessment methods.Finally,the level of TPACK among high school English teachers is influenced by multiple factors in micro,meso and macro levels,among which individual teacher factors,school factors and teacher training are three most influential factors.More specifically,a teacher’s learning motivation,his/her teaching schedules arranged by his/her school and teacher training activities she/he takes part in will influence his/her TPACK level most.Based on the findings of the study,the author makes relevant suggestions to improve high school English teachers’ TPACK level.