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Sam Wineburg

Biography

Sam Wineburg is the Margaret Jacks Professor of Education and, by courtesy, of History & American Studies, Emeritus, at Stanford University. Educated at Brown and Berkeley, he holds a doctorate in Psychological Studies in Education from Stanford and an honorary doctorate from Sweden's Umeå University. In 2002, Wineburg founded the Stanford History Education Group (inquirygroup.org), whose curriculum and assessments have been downloaded over 16 million times, making it one of the largest providers of free curriculum in the world. Since 2016 his research has focused on how people judge the credibility of digital content, research that has been reported in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, NPR, Time Magazine, BBC, and Die Zeit, and translated into dozens of languages. His articles and commentaries have appeared in such diverse outlets as Cognitive Science, Journal of American History, Smithsonian Magazine, The New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today and the Los Angeles Times. In 2002 his book, "Historical Thinking and Other Unnatural Acts: Charting the Future of Teaching the Past" won the Frederic W. Ness Award from the Association of American Colleges and Universities for work that makes the most important contribution to the "improvement of Liberal Education and understanding the Liberal Arts." In 2013, he was named the Obama-Nehru Distinguished Chair by the US-India Fulbright Commission and spent four months crisscrossing India giving lectures about his work, and in 2020, his work on digital literacy was honored by UNESCO's "Global Media and Information" award. His latest book, with co-author Mike Caulfield, is "Verified: How to Think Straight, Get Duped Less, and Make Better Decisions About What to Believe Online" (University of Chicago Press, 2023).

Other Titles

Emeritus Faculty, Acad Council, Graduate School of Education

Program Affiliations

CTE: History/Social Science Education
DAPS
Education and Jewish Studies

Research Interests

Assessment, Testing and Measurement | Civic Education | Curriculum and Instruction | History | Teachers and Teaching | Technology and Education

See a full list of GSE Faculty research interests >

Recent Publications

Kozyreva, A., Wineburg, S., Lewandowsky, S., & Hertwig, R. (2023). Critical Ignoring as a Core Competence for Digital Citizens. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 32(1), 81–88.

Caulfield, M., & Wineburg, S. (2023). Verified: How to Think Straight, Get Duped Less, and Make Better Decisions about What to Believe Online. University of Chicago Press.

Wineburg, S., Breakstone, J., McGrew, S., Smith, M. D., & Ortega, T. (2022). Lateral Reading on the Open Internet: A District-Wide Field Study in High School Government Classes. JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY.

Sam Wineburg in the News & Media

Students in a classroom in Salinas, CA
February 27, 2024
Research Stories
Students sitting in front of a laptop
December 1, 2023
Research Stories
Professor Sam Wineburg discusses the Stanford History Education Group’s work to improve digital literacy among young people.
April 13, 2021
An op-ed about the fight against misinformation cites the influence of research by Professor Sam Wineburg and the Stanford History Education Group.
February 18, 2021
Image of student on laptop reading social media
November 9, 2020
Podcast
Professor Sam Wineburg gives advice on how to fact-check news about the coronavirus.
March 16, 2020
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