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Research Areas

The Faculty of Education has a vibrant research community focusing on a number of key areas including pedagogy, education, technology, health and wellness, social justice, and leadership. We invite you to explore the specific research areas listed below to find out more about our labs, grants, key researchers, and selected publications.

 

Key Areas of Focus
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Blended and flipped learning environments
  • Coding and K-12 education
  • Critical digital literacies
  • Digital technologies, accessibility and inclusivity 
  • Information and communication technologies and application to K-12 and postsecondary settings
  • Instructional design
  • Maker pedagogies 
  • Use and impact of technology in K-12 and higher education classrooms
  • Video podcasts and instruction in K-12 and higher dducation
Labs
Grants
  • Canadian Council on Learning ($75,000). Evaluating the Impact of Learning Objects on Classroom Learning
  • SSHRC Partnership Development Grant – Computational Thinking in Mathematics Education ($199,380) 
  • SSHRC StrategicResearch Grant ($70,000).  Exploring the Use of Learning Objects in Math & Science Classroom
Faculty
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Key Areas of Focus
  • App development and use in education and training
  • Design, quality and effectiveness of video podcasts and online learning tools
  • Mobile apps and learning
  • Mobile technologies
  • Instructional design
  • Social networking media 
Labs
Grants

Ontario Research Fund ($1,175,000). There’s an App for That: Designing, Developing, Researching Educational Apps

Faculty
Select Publications
Key Areas of Focus 
  • Advancing EDI through social media
  • At-risk youth
  • Bullying
  • Design Justice through Technology
  • Developing resilience
  • Digital technologies, accessibility and inclusivity 
  • Equity and access to mathematics for typically underserved populations of learners
  • Equitable access to higher education
  • Gender differences in the use of technology
  • Inclusive mathematics education (at-risk students, English language learners, culturally responsive pedagogy)
  • Indigenous ways of knowing and issues
  • Women and non-dominant groups in STEM/STEAM education
Labs
Grants
  • SSHRC Insight Development Grant ($70,799). A multidisciplinary approach to developing and evaluating a mobile technology-supported, culturally responsive vocabulary intervention for Aboriginal students
  • SSHRC Insight Development Grant ($100,000). Increasing Literacies Through Supported Education and Policies of Inclusion
  • SSHRC Insight Grant. Adolescents, Identity and Digital Literacies
  • SSHRC Partnership Development Grant ($135,000). Diversities of Resilience: Understanding the Strategies for Success used by Underrepresented Students in Canadian Universities
Faculty
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Key Areas of Focus
  • Bullying and safe schools
  • Mental health education for teachers
  • Mental health & digital technology
  • Psychological empowerment for at-risk populations
  • Rethinking physical education
  • Simulation research in areas of health promotion and education
  • Youth suicide
Labs
Faculty
Select Publications
Key Areas of Focus

Language literacy researchers have focussed on the following key areas:

  • Bilingualism/multilingualism in families, schools and communities
  • Digital Literacies
  • English language education
  • Indigenous language learning
  • Online language learning
  • Language and literacy development and assessment for linguistically diverse learners
  • Secondary school English pedagogy
  • Teaching English as a second language across curriculum and bilingual education
  • Technology-assisted language and literacy acquisition
Faculty
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Key Areas of Focus
  • Effective leadership in the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR)
  • E-Leadership as Enabling Function for Technology-Enriched Learning
  • Digital privacy
  • Higher education leadership and policy studies
  • Information and communication technologies and application to K-12 and post-secondary settings
  • Leadership decision making leveraging big data and critical thinking in organizations
  • VUCA and VUCA Prime in Leadership
Labs
Faculty
Select Publications
Key Areas of Focus
  • Higher education
  • K-12 mathematics education
  • Social Justice and mathematics
  • Task design theory and implemenation
  • Technology and mathematic education
Labs
Faculty
Publications
Key Areas of Focus
  • Evaluating the Quality of Online Learning
  • Fully Online Learning Community (FOLC) Model
  • Online learning curriculum development
  • Problem-based learning (PBL) in online environments
  • Virtual classrooms
  • Virtual environment creation
Labs
Faculty
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Key Areas of Focus 
  • Affect and cognition in mathematics
  • Children’s literature and mathematics
  • Growth and pathways of mathematical understanding
  • Elementary mathematics education
  • Interventions and innovative practice in mathematics
  • Learning mathematics through problem-solving scenarios
  • Mathematical thinking and reasoning of learners
  • STEAM education
  • STEAM teacher development (pre-service and in-service)
  • Women in STEM
Grants
  • Ontario Ministry of Education ($413,891). Programming, Remediation and Intervention for Students At-Risk in Mathematics
  • Ontario Ministry of Education ($1,204,000). Science 3d: Discovery, Design & Development Through Makerspaces
  • Ontario Research Fund ($1,175,000). There’s an App for That: Designing, Developing, Researching Educational Apps
  • SSHRC Insight Development Grant ($57,800). Using mathematical models to disrupt probabilistic misconceptions about social issues.
  • SSHRC Insight Grant ($246,000). Making Minds: Digital Maker Education for Literacies Learning With Marginalized Youth
Lab
Faculty
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Key Areas of Focus
  • Cultural competency for future teachers 
  • Early childhood education
  • Examining the use of technology in pre-service teacher education
  • Evidence-based teaching
  • Teacher Education in Ontario
  • Pre-service teachers identity and development
  • STEAM teacher development (pre-service and in-service)
  • Tensions between theory and practice
Grants
  • SSHRC Insight and Development Grant ($69,000). Exploring Teacher Knowledge of Mathematics in Issues of Social Justice.
  • SSHRC Insight and Development Grant ($74,900). The (Un) Making of the Teacher
  • SSHRC Partnership Development Grant ($150,000).  Improving our Schools
Faculty
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