Susan Goldman

University of Illinois at Chicago

Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Liberal Arts & Sciences, Psychology, and Education; Co-Director Learning Sciences Research

Susan R. Goldman, (PhD., University of Pittsburgh) is Distinguished Professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Psychology, and Education and Co-Director of the Learning Sciences Research Institute at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She conducts research on subject matter learning, instruction, assessment, and roles for technology, especially in literacy and mathematics. A particular focus of her current research is on understanding the literacy demands in different disciplinary contexts and the implications of these demands for supporting learning. She is pursuing this work in the context of a recently funded major initiative of the Institute for Education Sciences, U. S. Department of Education, Reading for Understanding Across Grades 6 through 12: Evidence-Based Argumentation for Disciplinary Learning. As Principal Investigator for this grant, she is coordinating a research and development collaboration among 5 institutions (University of Illinois at Chicago, Northern Illinois University, Northwestern University, WestEd, and Inquirium LLC) and several school districts. They are researching the processes, instructional practices, and materials needed to support evidence-based argumentation from multiple sources in literature, history, and science across grades 6 to 12. In other work, Goldman is focusing on the language demands of ninth grade algebra. In the assessment area, she is developing web-based tools for measuring digital literacy skills, including selection, analysis, and synthesis of multiple information sources in the context of inquiry tasks. She is also examining the cognitive, psychometric, and instructional validity of embedded assessments in two standards based mathematics curriculum. She collaborates with educational practitioners to bridge research and practice, and has recently completed a project that focused on building capacity for high quality teaching and student learning in literacy in K – 8 schools. Goldman is widely published in discourse, psychology, and education. She is Executive Editor for Cognition & Instruction and Associate Editor for Journal of Educational Psychology. She is on the editorial board of Reading Research Quarterly, Journal of the Learning Sciences, andEducational Psychologist. Goldman is a board member and President of the International Society of the Learning Sciences (2011-2012).