Elizabeth Fennema

Elizabeth Fennema (1928–2021) was an American mathematics education researcher and Emerita Professor of Curriculum and Instruction at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where she also served as a Senior Scientist at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research. Her work focused on the teaching and learning of mathematics, with particular influence in research on gender and mathematics, including the development of the widely used Fennema–Sherman Mathematics Attitudes Scales. She earned a BS in psychology from Kansas State University in 1950, an MA in education from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1952, and a PhD in education from the same institution in 1969.

Fennema was a leading figure in the development of Cognitively Guided Instruction (CGI), an innovative, research-based approach to teaching mathematics that emphasizes understanding children’s intuitive mathematical thinking. She coauthored Children’s Mathematics: Cognitively Guided Instruction and its later editions with Thomas P. Carpenter, Megan Loef Franke, Linda Levi, and Susan B. Empson, a highly cited work that has shaped both research and classroom practice in elementary mathematics. Over her career, she received multiple honors for her contributions to research on women and mathematics education and published more than 60 peer-reviewed works.