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Re: [Phys-l] WHY VALUE ADDED TESTING IS A BUST.




What's the difference between "subject knowledge" and "pedagogical content
knowledge"; particularly for a course that is not a pedagogy course?

Subject knowledge means the teacher understands the concepts, and can do
the specific types of things that are demanded of their field. So tennis
coaches can play tennis, physics teachers know the concepts and can do the
problems.

PCK is understanding what you need to do to get the students to learn. This
involves results from cognitive psychology, education research, as well as
subject knowledge. This is not taught at all to college professors, and is
usually only taught as lecture to pre-college teachers. PCK has been found
to be higher in foreign teachers than in US teachers.

Both of these are necessary for teaching, but unfortunately PCK is either
not taught at all or not well taught. They waved their hands at this when I
was a TA by having us attend a few lectures by a psychologist. But he did
not go into details specific to my subject. PCK is subject dependent, and
needs to be taught as such.

John M. Clement
Houston, TX