About

Brandon Sherman is an education researcher, teacher educator, and educational theorist who specializes in sociocultural theory, dialogic teaching and learning, educational technology, non-linear theory, pedagogical coaching, qualitative methodology, teacher agency and identity, and transdisciplinary research. He employs qualitative and mixed methods research to investigate teacher professional learning and dialogic teaching and learning, with a focus on instructional coaching, educational technology, and family/school partnerships. His work emphasizes the development of theory to inform teacher practice and experience, with a particular interest in fostering agency among teachers, language learners, and researchers. Sherman works within frameworks of sociocultural, dialogic, and critical theories of learning, as well as non-linear theories such as post-humanism, complexity theory, and agential realism. He aims to develop models of professional learning that support transdisciplinary research. Currently, Sherman is an Assistant Research Professor of Applied Linguistics and serves as the Assistant Director of the Center for Language Acquisition at Penn State. His research interests include developing instructional coaching for English language teachers in international settings and exploring ethical and effective principles for the use of generative artificial intelligence in teaching and learning. With a background that includes ten years of teaching English as a Foreign Language in Ukraine and South Korea, as well as experience as a US Peace Corps volunteer and an English Language Programs Specialist, Sherman has contributed to the field through publications in prominent journals such as Teaching and Teacher Education, System, TESOL Quarterly, TESOL Journal, AERA Open, and Education Philosophy and Theory.

Research topics

• Sociology
• Pedagogy
• Psychology
• Mathematics education
• Computer science

Selected publications

• Families as School Citizens: Family Positioning in the Spheres of Participation in Schools

  SAGE Open · 2026-04-01

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Families have been recognized a key element of schools, and models have been developed to aid schools in involving them. Yet, families are not monolithic, and more needs to be understood about how different families position themselves relative to formal schooling. In this article, we explore this phenomenon by analyzing family and educator responses to an open-ended survey collected in a suburban school district. To make sense of these family’s perspectives, we draw on models of citizenship and democratic family engagement as well as positioning theory . We view families and schools through the lens of citizenship Analyzing family and educator comments, we construct three positions: Active participation, potential participation, and exclusion and explore nuances within these. We discuss dynamics of race and power differentials. Finally, we relate findings to a proposed Spheres of Participation model to better understand how families see themselves and are seen by educators in relation to schools. Informed by theory and research, this model supposes a position that did not appear in the comments: Transformative participation. We close with discussion of the implications and potential uses of the model.

  PublisherDOI

• Rethinking educational theory: Education as expanding dialogue, by Rupert Wegerif, Edward Elgar Publishing, 2025, 156 pp., USD105.50 (hardcover), ISBN: 978 1 80392 640 7

  Educational Philosophy and Theory · 2026-02-05

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Breaking Bloom’s: A diffractive iconoclastic bricolage of the cognitive taxonomy of educational objectives using complexity theory

  Educational Philosophy and Theory · 2026-04-11

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Speaking Up, Pushing Back, Closing the Door: Agency of Open and Covert Teacher Resistance in Dual-Language Bilingual Education

  AERA Open · 2025-01-01 · 6 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  The increasing prominence of dual-language bilingual education (DLBE) in the United States necessitates deeper understanding of institutional roles and professional identities of DLBE teachers, particularly when incongruent. We qualitatively analyzed teacher resistance in discordant situations as discussed in conferences between DLBE teachers and a bilingual instructional coach in two districts over 2 years. In these conversations, we found a distinction between nonconfrontational and open, direct resistance. We applied an agentive triad model of teacher identity, agency, and power to understand how DLBE teachers navigated discordant situations in their schools. Teachers acted from different identity positions, including agentive compliance, anagentive compliance (without agency), and nonconfrontational resistance. Findings and theorization demonstrate that DLBE programs present special considerations for teacher identity, role, and resistance. Moreover, context-specific characteristics, including program age, model, and administration, may impact teachers’ approach to resistance. Findings and theorization are relevant to successful DLBE program implementation and equity focused instructional coaching.

  PublisherDOI

• Cultivating Transdisciplinary Orientations in Science Education Research and Practice: Reflexivity, Pragmatism, and Dialogue

  Science & Education · 2025-05-05 · 2 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

• Teachers as the nexus of theory and practice with multilingual learners: A teacher's journey of becoming

  System · 2025-04-07 · 3 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  In the U.S., the growing population of multilingual learners of English requires that general education teachers develop specialized knowledge and practices to educate these students. However, research on developing rich and equity-minded practices among non-specialist teachers working with multilingual learners remains relatively limited. Even less is understood about how professional learning approaches can assist general education teachers in applying learning theories to benefit multilingual learners. Drawing on evidence from a broader five-year study of professional learning, this qualitative paper examines the dialogic relationship between research and practice across three programs: pedagogical coaching, English language specialist certification, and a nine-credit leadership academy for in-service elementary teachers. Explicitly grounded in critical sociocultural theoretical perspectives, the programs provided teachers with a theory-to-practice toolbox for creating affirming and inclusive classrooms for all/multilingual students. To study the research-practice nexus, we utilized narrative thematic analysis on a coaching conversation and two interviews recorded at three points during one teacher's participation in various professional learning activities. We present the narrative of her growth as a dramatic arc of development, portraying the teacher herself as the nexus of theory and practice, highlighting her transformation into a teacher of multilingual learners, advocate, and critical change agent. The findings illustrate language education research and practice conducted within a longitudinally reciprocal ecology of becoming.

  PublisherDOI

• Wicked Orientations in Teacher Preparation

  2025-09-22

  book-chapterSenior author

  Systemic racism is a wicked problem embedded in public health, the legal system, and education, manifesting through overlapping, interacting issues that persist across time and policy. Science teachers can put wicked problems thinking to work to oppose and dismantle systemic racism and inequity in education, but they need learning experiences that prepare them to do so. Teacher learning environments should foster dynamic, adaptable orientations, equipping educators with the tools to continually reorient their practice as manifestations of systemic racism shift over time. To this end, this chapter describes both pre-service and in-service teacher education projects and highlights how each afforded teachers space to practice developing the orientations of openness to new ideas, critical awareness, modest positionality, creativity and risk-taking, connectedness, and commitment to justice-oriented science teaching. The chapter advocates for designing learning environments that can provide teachers with opportunities to learn and evolve along with the wicked problems they must approach in their science classrooms.

  PublisherDOI

• What is dialogue, anyway? Practitioner Brief No. 4

  Open MIND · 2025-01-01

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  OA PDFDOI

• Coaching for Agency, Authority and Advocacy in Dual Language Bilingual Education

  Education Sciences · 2025-03-06 · 3 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  In education broadly, and in dual language bilingual education (DLBE) specifically, advocacy for marginalized student populations is recognized as a teacher’s responsibility. Yet, advocacy represents both an orientation and a skill set that teachers must develop. Therefore, there is a need to better understand how teachers can be supported in developing their capacity to advocate. Approaching advocacy in terms of teacher agency and authority, we look at one form of professional learning support, instructional coaching. In this comparative qualitative case study, we explore how one experienced instructional coach collaborated with four DLBE teachers to help them develop as agentive advocates for their students. We draw on the Vygotsky space theoretical model to understand the four cases and suggest augmentations to the model based on the findings and analysis. Though all teachers made progress in growing as agentive advocates, the constructivist Vygotsky space model highlights the differences in pace, scope, and action among them. The cases also suggest three points in the existing model where the coach appeared to influence teacher growth: Encounter, appropriation, and pre-publication. Insights into coaching, advocacy, and the Vygotsky space model have implications for supporting teachers in agentively advocating for marginalized students in their charge and beyond.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Tensions in school context and teacher praxis in equity-oriented professional learning

  Teaching and Teacher Education · 2024-01-13 · 4 citations

  articleSenior author
  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Annela Teemant

  University of Indianapolis

  34 shared

• Mari Haneda

  Pennsylvania State University

  10 shared

• Sophia Jeong

  The Ohio State University

  5 shared

• Kathryn Bateman

  University Hospitals Bristol and Weston NHS Foundation Trust

  4 shared

• Thomas A. Upton

  Indiana University Indianapolis

  4 shared

• Laura Anne Hudock

  3 shared

• Gina Borgioli Yoder

  Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis

  2 shared

• Cristina Santamaría Graff

  2 shared

Education

• PhD, Curriculum and Instruction

  Pennsylvania State University

  2016

• MA, Philosophy

  University of New England

  2012

• B.A. East Asian Studies, Chinese Language, East Asian Studies

  Minnesota State University Moorhead

  2005