Dr. Sarah Kavanagh is a leading expert in teacher education, instructional coaching, and professional development. A former middle and high school teacher, her work aims to make public the intricacies, complexities, and nuances of teachers’ practice and designs for teacher learning. She is at the forefront of efforts to reimagine infrastructures for teacher professional learning across the career span.

Professional Biography

Dr. Kavanagh is an associate professor of teacher education in the Learning, Teaching, and Literacies Division. She is also the Director of the Collaboratory for Teaching and Teacher Education and a Co-Principal Investigator of several large research grants investigating designs for K–12 teacher learning. Prior to joining Penn GSE, Dr. Kavanagh was a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford University’s Center to Support Excellence in Teaching and a research scientist at the University of Washington’s College of Education where she also received her Ph.D. She began her career as a middle and high school teacher, first in California’s Bay Area and then in the Baltimore area.

Her research has been funded by the Spencer Foundation, the James S. McDonnell Foundation, and Lucas Education Research, among other organizations, and she has served on the editorial boards of leading educational research journals including the American Educational Research Journal and Reading Research Quarterly. Among other notable academic journals, her research has appeared in the American Educational Research Journal, Educational Researcher, Cognition & Instruction, Teachers College Record, the Journal of Teacher Education, and Teaching and Teacher Education. She also co-authored the book Core Practices for Project-Based Learning: A Guide for Teachers and Leaders (Harvard Education Press, 2021).

Research Interests and Current Projects

Dr. Kavanagh’s current research centers on supporting teachers to translate their justice and equity beliefs and commitments into K–12 educational practices. Her current projects undertake this work in three ways: First, through research into justice-oriented teaching, she investigates the practices of teachers who meaningfully address issues of race, gender, and sexuality with K–12 students. Second, through research into inquiry-based and discourse-rich teaching, she studies how teachers position students as producers rather than consumers of knowledge. Third, through research into the practices of teacher educators, she explores the ways that teacher educators support K–12 teachers to attempt justice-oriented, inquiry-based, and discourse-rich teaching. These current projects are funded by several large, multi-year grants and involve in-depth partnerships with K–12 schools.

Publications

Featured

Core Practices for Project-Based Learning: A Guide for Teachers and Leaders

Selected Publications

Kavanagh, S. S., Gotwalt, E. S., & Farrow, J. (2023). Practice-based coaching for project-based teaching: Understanding relationships between coaching practice and teaching practice. Teaching and Teacher Education, 132, Article 104255. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2023.104255

Pupik Dean, C. G., Grossman, P., Enumah, L., Herrmann, Z., & Kavanagh, S. S. (2023). Core practices for project-based learning: Learning from experienced practitioners in the United States. Teaching and Teacher Education, 133, Article 104275. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2023.104275

Kavanagh, S. S., Feiman-Nemser, S., Hammerness, K., Matsko, K. K., & Wallace, J. (2023). Stepping in or stepping on: Mentor teachers’ preferences for mentoring inside and outside of interactive teaching. Journal of Teacher Education, 74(3), 274–287. https://doi.org/10.1177/00224871221142843

Kavanagh, S. S., & Bernhard, T. (2023, January 9). Managing tech integration in your classroom: It’s important for technology-influenced learning environments to encourage students to be active, collaborative, and engaged. Edutopia. https://www.edutopia.org/article/managing-tech-integration-classroom

Kavanagh, S. S., Danielson, K. A., & Schiavone Gotwalt, E. (2022). Preparing in advance to respond in-the-moment: Investigating parallel changes in planning and enactment in teacher professional development. Journal of Teacher Education. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/00224871221121767

Kavanagh, S. S., Resnick, A. F., Ghousseini, H., Gotwalt, E. S., Siy, E., Kazemi, E., & Dutro, E. (2022). Breaking the Fourth Wall in Collaborative Research: Beyond the Observer/Performer Binary in Research on Teacher Learning and Practice. Cognition & Instruction, 40(1), 126–147. https://doi.org/10.1080/07370008.2021.2010209

Herrmann, Z., & Kavanagh, S. S. (2021, October 19). Using classroom video to improve your teaching: Reflecting on and learning from captured moments in the classroom can be a powerful form of professional learning. Edutopia. https://www.edutopia.org/article/using-classroom-video-improve-your-teaching

Ghousseini, H., Kavanagh, S. S., Kazemi, E., & Dutro, E. (2021). The fourth wall of professional learning and cultures of collaboration. Educational Researcher, 51(3), 216–222. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X211058751

Kavanagh, S. S. (2021). Toward non-binary theories of practice in teacher education. Educational Researcher, 51(1), 66–71. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X211052058

Kavanagh, S.S. & Danielson, K. (2020). Practicing justice, justifying practice: Towards critical practice teacher education. American Educational Research Journal, 57(1), 69–105. https://doi.org/10.3102/0002831219848691

Kavanagh, S.S., Conrad, J., & Dagogo-Jack, S. (2020). From rote to reasoned: Examining the role of pedagogical reasoning in practice-based teacher education. Teaching and Teacher Education, 89, 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2019.102991

Farrow, J., Kavanagh, S. S., Samudra, P., (2022) Exploring relationships between professional development and teachers’ enactments of project-based learning. Education Sciences, 12(282), 1–17. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci12040282

Potvin, A, Miller, E., Kuck, R., Berland, L, Boardman, A G., Kavanagh, S. S., Clark, T., Cheng, B. (2022). Mapping enabling conditions for high-quality PBL: A collaboratory approach. Education Sciences, 12(222), 1–21. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci12030222

Rangu, S., Danielson, K., Kavanagh, S. S., Catanoso, L., Magee, L., & Castelo-Soccio, L. (2021). Effects of a pilot educational intervention on perceptions of visible skin diseases in the pediatric population. Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology, 85(5), 1329–1331. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaad.2020.10.068

Grossman P., Herrmann, Z., Kavanagh, S. S., & Pupik Dean, C. G. (2021). Core practices for project-based learning: A guide for teachers and leaders. Harvard Education Press.

Kavanagh, S. S., Metz, M., Hauser, M., Fogo, B., Carlson, J., & Taylor, M. (2020). Practicing responsiveness: Using approximations of teaching to build teachers’ instructional judgment. Journal of Teacher Education, 71(1), 94–107. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022487119841884

Metz, M., Kavanagh, S. S., & Hauser, M. (2020). Developing adaptive expertise in facilitating text-based discussions: Attending to generalities and novelty. English Education, 52(4), 310–334.

Kavanagh, S. S., Monte-Sano, C., Reisman, A., Fogo, B., McGrew, S., Cipparone, P., & Jay, L. (2019). Teaching content in practice: Investigating rehearsals of social studies discussions. Teaching and Teacher Education, 86, 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2019.06.017

Kavanagh, S. S. (2018). Practicing resistance: Teacher responses to intergroup aggression in the classroom. Equity & Excellence in Education, 51(2), 146–160. https://doi.org/10.1080/10665684.2018.1509748

Grossman, P., Kazemi, E., Kavanagh, S. S., Franke, M., & Dutro, E. (2019). Learning to Facilitate Discussions: Collaborations in Practice-Based Teacher Education. Teaching & Teacher Education, 81, 97–99. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2019.02.002

Grossman, P., Dean, C. P., Kavanagh, S. S. & Herrmann, Z. (2019). Preparing teachers for student-centered teaching: The core practices of project-based teaching. Phi Delta Kappan.

Reisman, A., Cipparone, P., Jay, L., Monte-Sano, C., Kavanagh, S. S., McGrew, S., & Fogo, B. (2019). Evidence of emergent practice: Teacher candidates facilitating historical discussions in their field placements. Teaching & Teacher Education. 80. 145–156. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tate.2018.12.014

Von Esch, K. & Kavanagh, S. S. (2018). Preparing mainstream classroom teachers of English language learner (EL) students: Grounding practice-based designs for teacher learning in theories of expertise development. Journal of Teacher Education, 69(3), 239–251. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022487117717467

Reisman, A., Kavanagh, S. S., Monte-Sano, C., Fogo, B., Simmons, E., & Cipparone, P. (2018). Facilitating whole-class discussions in history: A framework for preparing teacher candidates. Journal of Teacher Education, 69(3), 278–293. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022487117707463

Hauser, M., & Kavanagh, S. S. (2019). Practice-based teacher education. In G. W. Noblit (Ed.), Oxford research encyclopedia of education. Oxford University Press.

Grossman, P., Kavanagh, S. S. , & Dean, C. P. (2018). The turn to practice in teacher education. In P. Grossman (Ed.), Teaching core practices in teacher education. Harvard Education Press.

Danielson, K., Kavanagh, S. S. , & Kazemi, E. (2018). Learning together. In P. Grossman (Ed.), Teaching core practices in teacher education. Harvard Education Press.

Kavanagh, S. S., & Rainey, E. (2017). Learning to support adolescent literacy: Teacher educator pedagogy and novice teacher take up in secondary English language arts teacher preparation. American Educational Research Journal, 54(5), 904–937. https://doi.org/10.3102/0002831217710423

Kavanagh, S. S. (2017). Practicing social justice: Towards a practice-based approach to learning to teach for social justice. In R. Brandenburg, K. Glasswell, M. Jones, & J. Ryan (Eds.), Reflective theories in teacher education practice: Process, impact, and enactment. Springer.

Kavanagh, S. S. (2016). The promise of anonymity: Investigating the instructional practice of ELA teachers who teach LGBTQ content. Teachers College Record, 118(12), 1–36.

Kavanagh, S. S. (2016). From contagious to resilient and beyond: A periodization of educational research on LGBTQ issues from Stonewall to today. International Journal of Multicultural Education, 18(3), 95–113.

McDonald, M., Kazemi, E., & Kavanagh, S. S. (2013). Core practices and pedagogies of teacher education: A call for a common language and collective activity. Journal of Teacher Education, 64, 378–386.

Kavanagh, S. S. (2012). Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues in K-12 education. In J. A. Banks (Ed.), The encyclopedia of diversity in education. Sage.

Kavanagh, S. S. (2012). Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender students: Conceptual approaches in research literature. In J. A. Banks (Ed.), The encyclopedia of diversity in education. Sage.

McDonald, M., Brayko, K., & Kavanagh, S. S. (2012). Service-learning in teacher education. In J. A. Banks (Ed.), The encyclopedia of diversity in education. Sage.

Kavanagh, S. S. (2011). Haunting remains: Educating a new American citizenry at Indian Hill Cemetery. In C. E. Boyd, & C. Thrush (Eds.), Phantom past, Indigenous presence: Native ghosts in North American culture and history. University of Nebraska Press.

News & Media

Penn GSE News

Taking small steps towards project-based learning

In an op-ed in EdWeek, Penn GSE’s Dean Pam Grossman, Zachary Herrmann, and Sarah Schneider Kavanagh write that incorporating project-based learning is just like running: start a little at a time.

October 21, 2021

How school leaders can support project-based learning

Project-based learning could change the game for students this fall. Sarah Schneider Kavanagh and Zachary Herrmann have some thoughts on what school leaders need to do to support it.

July 29, 2021

How can project-based learning prepare students for the 21st century?

In a new book, Penn GSE Dean Pam Grossman and GSE’s Zachary Herrmann, Sarah Schneider Kavanagh, and Christopher Pupik Dean say the approach can empower students to be engaged citizens and take on modern challenges.

June 22, 2021

Awards & Honors

Sarah Schneider Kavanagh and a cross-institutional team of researchers have recently been awarded a $2.5 million grant from the James S. McDonnell Foundation to conduct a research study investigating how teachers learn to support disciplinary argumentation when facilitating classroom discussions. Focusing on understanding how instructional tools influence how teachers make sense of their practice as discussion facilitators, the study will be conducted across five years as a collaboration between researchers at four institutions: The University of Pennsylvania, the University of Wisconsin, The University of Colorado, and The University of Washington.

Posted on January 19, 2018

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