Understanding my thought processes in unravelling a framework that works!

I have been struggling to find ways to be more innovative with my chosen M.I.T inquiry.  My focus moved away from ensuring students at our school blogged innovatively, to getting the teachers on board and blogging.  I wanted to have a purpose for engaging students and staff in blogging, and essentially it was to help students improve their writing skills.  The connecting of all the aspects has proven more difficult then I envisioned, so I decided to brainstorm the old fashioned way - writing it down.  I will share my thought processes with you, to help understand how I got to a framework that I feel has hit the jackpot!!

I started by thinking about what I wanted to blog about and number 1 was to talk about some cool sites that teachers could use when trying to get them motivated and keen to blog.  Sites that were informative, helpful and interesting for staff but also basic and easy to understand.

This led me to thinking about blogging for students at number 2, which would be innovative ways to use blogs for student learning that could incorporate writing and strategies that address the gaps identified during their e-asttle tests.  I wanted to connect these through blogs that students would share and gain collaborative feedback from.  The two subject areas that would enable this to happen would be english and social studies.

Through a cross-curricula approach, we could discuss and decide how to implement the writing strategies that will allow students to achieve through the subject areas identified.

I felt that the boxes just weren't allowing me the connections I needed to make - they looked too much like a family tree where you would start with top, and end at the bottom.  What I was looking for was something more circular (something continuous and not ending) and I thought I would try a venn diagram model to see if I could find the connections between the ideas better.  Then I remembered a framework that a very good teacher colleague of mine had described once as the 'pinnacle to connecting all the key components of innovative teaching and learning - the TPACK model' (here is the TPACK model for those who have not seen it before).

I then googled 'TPACK' and found a couple of really informative sites and videos that helped to refresh my understanding of TPACK and the more I learnt, the easier it was to understand how much this framework fit what I've been struggling to get to grips with - connecting all the aspects of my inquiry together.  What TPACK could help me do is to ensure that the 'what', the 'how' and the technological knowledge we use in our 21st century classroom can be connected in a more succinct way that made sense in essence to find that 'sweet spot'!  My next goal is to take the TPACK model and it adapt to my inquiry!  I am looking forward to the challenge!