Breanne Litts

Breanne Litts, assistant professor in Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences, investigates how people learn by making, designing, and producing and develops technologies and learning environments to support these activities. Her scholarly interests combine identity, learning, design, and technology, particularly from a learning sciences perspective. She has conducted extensive research and evaluation in both formal and out-of-school contexts examining how to leverage new technologies, like mobile apps and games, to support learning. As part of this work, Dr. Litts co-founded the Mobile Learning Incubator (now Field Day Lab) at the UW-Madison. Her more recent work is situated within the maker movement in education, focusing on designing makerspaces and learning through making. Much of this research has been in collaboration with the Learning in the Making research lab with whom she conducted the first studies examining makerspaces as learning environments. Additionally, in partnership with the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Litts examines collaborative STEM learning through electronic crafts and textiles. She is working to integrate electronic crafting into the Exploring Computer Science curriculum across the country.

Furthermore, Dr. Litts is a graduate of the Digital Media program in the department of Curriculum & Instruction at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where she was a member of the Games+Learning+Society research group. She served as a project assistant for Dr. Erica Halverson on an NSF funded project studying the relationship between design and learning through ethnographic and design-based research in Makerspaces and informal learning environments. While completing her M.S. at the UW-Madison, Dr. Litts worked with Dr. Robert Enright to implemented forgiveness (peace) education in a range of contexts and spaces. Thus, as part of her research interests, she enjoys exploring the affordances and constraints of mobile learning spaces, specifically, in the context of civic education and social justice (e.g. in societies like Belfast, Northern Ireland). Dr. Litts also completed a B.A. in Psychology with a Diversity Education minor at the University of Washington-Seattle.