Abstract:

As Thailand is lacking digital courseware with content oriented toward better understand of local communities in particular and Thainess and Thai culture and society in general, it is deemed necessary that social studies teachers, who are responsible for directing the content to students, should be competent in the production of digital courseware holding content about local history and social and cultural aspects of local communities to meet users’ and learners’ needs. In addition, the courseware should be adjustable, renewable, and revisable in accordance with varying local contexts. It is also necessary that a curriculum, based on learning process approaches framework and technological pedagogical content knowledge approach (TPACK) Conceptual Framework, be developed to enhance social studies teachers’ competency in digital courseware production. This paper presents part of an on-going research, focusing on the use of TPACK concept in curriculum development.
This is a qualitative research, based on documentary review and interviews with experts using questionnaires to synthesize for competency in the production of digital courseware and the development of draft curriculum using TPACK as the major conceptual framework. The content of the curriculum is divided into four learning units, 30 learning hours (6 hours/unit for Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK), Technological Content Knowledge (TCK), and Technological Pedagogical Knowledge (TPK) and 12 hours for TPACK, 9 hours for theoretical part and 21 hours for practicum). The curriculum was then implemented with a group of 11 social studies teachers in Punpin District, Surat Thani, Southern Thailand, for five days. Data from curriculum implementation, interviews, observations, and experts were used to help develop the final version of curriculum. An evaluation of digital courseware produced by the teachers was done in order to review the social studies teachers’ competency in digital courseware production after they have learnt from the curriculum.
After the pilot test, it was found that the learning units of the curriculum should be properly adjusted to suit teachers’ former experiences. That is, learning hours for learning units on PCK, TCK, TPK, and TPACK should be adjusted to 4, 6, 8, and 12 hours respectively. In the curriculum implementation, contents on PCK, TCK, and TPK should not be separated from each other. It is recommended that the TCK and TPK contents should be added in the learning management of PCK in order for the teachers to see the overall picture of digital courseware and to guide and plan for the better self-production of digital courseware.

Keywords:

Competency, Curriculum Development, Social Studies Teacher, Teacher Training, TPACK.