Elica Sharifnia

What I do

As a Senior Research Associate at the Marsico Institute for Early Learning, I support intervention studies supporting early STEM teaching and learning. My research interests broadly center around better understanding how to best promote high-quality STEM teaching and learning for young children, with the goal of informing educational practices in both the school and home context. I worked as an Education Researcher at SRI Education, primarily focused on a variety of early STEM evaluation projects (e.g., evaluation of math professional learning program for preschool teachers, evaluation of PBS shows/public media resources on children's computational thinking skills). Prior to joining SRI, I completed a postdoctoral research fellowship at the Marsico Institute for Early Learning in University of Denver working under the mentorship of Dr. Julie Sarama and Dr. Douglas Clements. I completed my doctorate in Developmental Psychology at the University of Miami working under the mentorship of Dr. Daryl Greenfield. Through my research experiences, I have contributed to a variety of early childhood STEM development, evaluation, and assessment projects and have extensive experience in project management, instrument development, data collection and analysis, curriculum and resource development, and developing and delivering professional development workshops to early childhood teachers.