Samia Khan builds novel educational technologies and also studies them. Her latest simulation for learning science incorporates multiple representations of it with animated analogies. Collaborative research has revealed that interactions with this kind of simulation helps students to understand difficult topics. This digital technology has also been associated with significant gains for historically lower achieving students. A recently published paper investigates how to teach with the latest open access simulations, New Pedagogies for Teaching with Computer Simulations (2010), using the T-GEM method and some of the possible pitfalls and misperceptions by students who use such technology (Explorations of Digital Representations, 2011). Dr. Khan was invited to showcase this educational technology research to scientists at this year’s American Chemical Society in Denver.
 
Dr. Khan is also exploring epistemology on the Internet. Her research on knowledge and the commodification and mobilization of it on digital networks has been the subject of a recently awarded grant and a special keynote presentation at an international Mobile Technologies Conference (Tamoco) in Spain. Enrolled as a student at Oxford, Dr. Khan is exploring how philosophy can help us to better understand implications for knowledge production and consumption among teachers.
 
Dr. Khan seeks ways to bridge communities with teacher education and is currently working with inner-city organizations to support students and their families in a co-education effort with teachers. She has launched two innovative tech courses this year that encourage the development of intentional safe havens and more than symbolic connections with parents, communities, and teachers. Dr. Khan, in collaboration with colleagues, is conducting in-depth research on how such courses impact future  teachers. The research results will be revealed in the Spring at AERA, our largest educational conference.