SESP Faculty

Jennifer (Jen) Richards , Ph.D.

Faculty Profile

My research focuses on two interconnected strands, primarily within the context of science education:

• Designing and studying ways of cultivating increasingly responsive classroom and professional learning environments — spaces within K-12 school systems that are responsive to learners’ ideas, experiences, motivations, and directions
• Understanding the multifaceted dynamics of teacher practice and learning across contexts and timescales, drawing on situative perspectives, discourse analysis techniques, and teachers’ emic perspectives

I intentionally engage in this work in partnership with teachers, school district partners, and students.

Read more about a current collaborative project that aims to expand understanding of mechanisms through which teachers learn from video!

Teacher learning; responsive learning environments; science education; research-practice partnerships

Richards, J. (2023). Exploring resources for responsiveness to student thinking in practice. Journal of Teacher Education. (Link to accepted manuscript version.)

Larison, S., Richards, J., & Sherin, M. G. (2022). Tools for supporting teacher noticing about classroom video in online professional development. Journal of Mathematics Teacher Education.

Richards, J. (2022). Exploring focused responsiveness as an approach to facilitation in professional learning. In C. Chinn, E. Tan, C. Chan, & Y. Kali (Eds.), Proceedings of the 16th International Conference of the Learning Sciences – ICLS 2022 (pp. 985-988). Hiroshima, Japan: International Society of the Learning Sciences.

Sherin, M. G., Richards, J., & Altshuler, M. (2021). Learning from recording video of your own classroom. Phi Delta Kappan, 103(2).

Richards, J., Sherin, B. L., & Altshuler, M. (2021). Teachers’ aesthetic judgments of classroom events. In E. de Vries, Y. Hod, & J. Ahn (Eds.), Proceedings of the 15th International Conference of the Learning Sciences – ICLS 2021 (pp. 43-50). Bochum, Germany: International Society of the Learning Sciences.

Richards, J., Altshuler, M., Sherin, B. L., Sherin, M. G., & Leatherwood, C. J. (2021). Complexities and opportunities in teachers’ generation of videos from their own classrooms. Learning, Culture, and Social Interaction, 28(4), 100490.

Richards, J., Elby, A., Luna, M. J., Robertson, A. D., Levin, D. M., & Nyeggen, C. G. (2020). Reframing the responsiveness challenge: A framing-anchored explanatory framework to account for irregularity in novice teachers’ attention and responsiveness to student thinking. Cognition and Instruction, 38(2), 116-152.

Thompson, J., Richards, J., Shim, S-Y., Lohwasser, K., Von Esch, K., Chew, C., Sjoberg, B., & Morris, A. (2019). Launching networked PLCs: Footholds into creating and improving knowledge of ambitious and equitable teaching practices in an RPP. AERA Open, 5(3), 1-23.

Robertson, A. D., & Richards, J. (2017). Teacher sense-making about being responsive to students’ science ideas: A case study. European Journal of Science and Mathematics Education, 5(4): 314-342.

Richards, J., Masse, O. D., Cherbow, K., & Tekkumru-Kisa, M. (2022). Experienced teachers’ thinking about NGSS classroom assessment: Resources, coherences with instruction, and shifts through co-design. Paper presented at the 2022 NARST Annual International Conference, Vancouver, BC.

Richards, J. (2020). Exploring integrative, dynamic approaches to understanding teacher practice and learning. Talk given at the Learning Sciences Research Institute Speaker Series, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL.

Richards, J., & Thompson, J. (2018). “Choose your own adventure”: Responsive curricular choices in elementary science. Talk given at the 13th International Conference of the Learning Sciences (ICLS), London, UK.

Richards, J. (2016). Exploring job-embedded professional learning through Studio Days. Plenary given at the Foundations and Frontiers of Physics Education Research: Puget Sound Conference, Diablo, WA.