digital media literacy; social studies education; civic education; teacher education

Dr. Elizabeth Reynolds (she/her) is a Postdoctoral Associate in TLPL. She completed her Ph.D. in Teaching and Learning, Policy and Leadership with a specialization in Teacher Education and Professional Development at the University of Maryland, College Park in 2026. She studies digital media literacy and social studies education with a focus on how students can find social and political information they can trust online. A former middle school social studies and humanities teacher, Elizabeth earned her B.A. in Politics from Ursinus College and her M.S.Ed. in Teaching, Learning, and Leadership from the University of Pennsylvania.

McGrew, S. & Reynolds, E. C. (2026). Discussing credibility and corroboration: Differences in students’ reasoning about digital sources and claims. American Education Research Journal. https://doi.org/10.3102/00028312261426323

Reynolds, E. C.  (2025). Embedding online evaluations in social studies: A comparative case study of teachers’ goals and approaches. Theory and Research in Social Education. 1–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/00933104.2025.2472785

Reynolds, E. C. & McGrew, S. (2025) “From personal experience, it’s true!”: Students’ digital evaluations on relevant issues. Journal of the Learning Sciences. https://doi.org/10.1080/10508406.2025.2495214

Reynolds, E. C. & McGrew, S. (2025). Developing reliable epistemic processes for civic life: A response to “Beyond ‘yelling at them’: Exploring the impact of a political simulation in polarized times.” Democracy and Education. 

McGrew, S. & Reynolds E. C. (2025, June). Social studies teachers’ goals for teaching online evaluations. Proceedings of the International Society of the Learning Sciences. Helsinki, Finland.

Clark, C.H. & Reynolds, E. C. (2025). In AI we trust? In C. H. Clark & C. Van Kessel (eds.) AI in Social Studies Education: Tools for Thoughtful Practice with Generative Artificial Intelligence. Teachers College Press.

McGrew, S., Reynolds, E. C., & Glass, A. C. (2024). The problem with perspective: Students’ and teachers’ teasoning about credibility during discussions of online sources. Cognition and Instruction. https://doi.org/10.1080/07370008.2024.2340981

McGrew, S., Merroth, L., Zuspan, S., Buhrman, S., & Reynolds, E. (2022). Teaching Students to Evaluate Online Information Through Current Events. Social Education, 86(6), 386-391.

In progress:

Reynolds, E. C. & McGrew, S. (In press). Teaching who to trust: Preparing students to make decisions about credible digital sources. In C.H. Clark and C. Van Kessel (eds.) Teaching Democracy Now. Teachers College Press.

Reynolds, E. C., McGrew, S., Alton, J., Lombardi, D., & Butler, L.P. (Under review). Children’s digital source evaluations: Attempting to investigate but struggling to succeed.

Alton, J., Reynolds, E. C., McGrew, S., Butler, L., Lombardi, D. (Under review). Authentic online tasks reveal fragility in children’s credibility reasoning.

Maryland Democracy Initiative

Project Digital Civic Inquiry

TLPL686: Secondary Social Studies Pedagogy 

TLPL471: Curriculum, Teaching, and Assessment in Secondary Social Studies