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Rebecca Silverman

Photo of Rebecca D. Silverman

Rebecca D. Silverman

Associate Professor

rdsilver@stanford.edu

- My Lab Website

Assistant: Leslie Dinan

Office: CERAS 137

Biography

Rebecca D. Silverman is an Associate Professor of Early Literacy at the Stanford Graduate School of Education. She began her career in education as an elementary school teacher in her hometown of New Orleans, Louisiana. Passionate about supporting children’s literacy development, she earned her master’s and doctoral degrees in language and literacy from the Harvard Graduate School of Education and is now a leading researcher and teacher educator in the field.

Dr. Silverman’s research focuses on language and literacy development in early childhood and elementary school. Her work has contributed to the research base on using read alouds, multimedia, cross-age peer learning, and small group dialogic instruction to support the vocabulary development and reading comprehension of diverse learners. Dr. Silverman leads the Language to Literacy Research Lab (https://langlitlab.stanford.edu/) and is engaged in research-practice partnerships in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Dr. Silverman’s teaching focuses on bridging research and practice. She has taught pre-service general and special education teachers at the undergraduate and graduate levels; she has led professional development on research-based practices for supporting language and literacy for in-service early childhood and elementary school educators; and she has mentored numerous doctoral students who will serve as the next generation of researchers and teacher educators. She has also taught internationally, having been a Fulbright Scholar in Myanmar.

Dr. Sillverman has been active in service to the field. She has been on the Editorial Board of such journals as Reading Research Quarterly and The Reading Teacher, and she currently serves as the Editor-in-Chief of the Elementary School Journal (https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/journals/esj/about). She also currently serves on the Board of Directors for the International Literacy Association (https://www.literacyworldwide.org/about-us/our-leadership). She is an advisor for such organizations as Sesame Workshop and the Public Broadcasting Service, and she participates in working groups for the California State Board of Education and the UCSF Dyslexia Center.

Other Titles

Associate Professor, Graduate School of Education

Program Affiliations

CTE
CTE: Elementary Education
CTE: Literacy, Language, and English Education
DAPS
Learning Sciences and Technology Design (LSTD)
(MA) STEP
Stanford Accelerator for Learning

Research Interests

Child Development | Early Childhood | Elementary Education | Literacy and Language | Parents and Family Issues | Teachers and Teaching | Technology and Education

See a full list of GSE Faculty research interests >

Recent Publications

Byrd, A. S., Oppenheimer, K., Silverman, R., & Edwards, J. (2024). Filling in the Blank: The Development of a Writing Screener for Elementary School Students Who Speak African American English. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 1–9.

Silverman, R. D., Keane, K., Hsieh, H., Southerton, E., Scott, R. C., & Brunskill, E. (2023). Texting and tutoring: Short-term K-3 reading interventions during the pandemic. JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH.

Crosson, A. C., & Silverman, R. D. (2021). Impact of COVID-19 on Early Literacy Instruction for Emergent Bilinguals. READING RESEARCH QUARTERLY.

Rebecca Silverman in the News & Media

Associate Professor Rebecca Silverman discusses how tutoring remotely can be successful for literacy development.
October 26, 2021
Photo of kids reading
December 19, 2019
Research Stories
Illustration of kids reading
May 13, 2019
Podcast
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