Teaching multimodal literacies with digital technologies and augmented reality: a cluster analysis of Australian teachers’ TPACK

Despite the proliferation of augmented reality (AR) apps, Australian primary teachers have yet to use them widely for the teaching of multimodal literacies. Conceptualising teachers’ knowledge of using digital technologies to teach multimodal literacies as a form of technological pedagogical content knowledge or TPACK(ML), this study examined teacher differences through a cluster analysis of survey responses collected from a sample of 142 Australian primary school teachers. Two distinct clusters of teachers were derived. The first cluster with lower TPACK(ML) comprised teachers with lower self-reported confidence in facilitating new cultures of learning that are participatory and technology-driven in nature. In their open-ended survey responses, these teachers shared their unfamiliarity with AR, as well as concerns about their personal technical competency and how AR could be integrated into the curriculum. The second cluster of teachers rated themselves higher in TPACK(ML) and in how they used technology to support language learning pedagogies. They were able to propose different pedagogical strategies to engage students’ multimodal literacies meaningfully with AR in their open-ended survey responses. The implications of the study’s findings were discussed, and recommendations were proposed for designing and sustaining differentiated forms of teacher professional development for teaching multimodal literacies with emergent digital technologies.