Hands‐On: Investigating the role of physical manipulatives in spatial training

Abstract

Studies show that spatial interventions lead to improvements in mathematics. However, outcomes vary based on whether physical manipulatives (embodied action) are used during training. This study compares the effects of embodied and non‐embodied spatial interventions on spatial and mathematics outcomes. The study has a randomized, controlled, pre‐post, follow‐up, training design (N = 182; mean age 8 years; 49% female; 83.5% White). We show that both embodied and non‐embodied spatial training approaches improve spatial skills compared to control. However, we conclude that embodied spatial training using physical manipulatives leads to larger, more consistent gains in mathematics and greater depth of spatial processing than non‐embodied training. These findings highlight the potential of spatial activities, particularly those that use physical materials, for improving children's mathematics skills.

Registered Reports in Child Development: Introduction to the Special Section

“…The Special Section consists of eight articles that strikingly represent the breadth and depth of developmental research in substantive topic, methodological approach, and target population. The articles include experimental studies with young children (Fish et al, 2023;Stengelin et al, 2023) and chimpanzees (Engelmann et al, 2023), assessments of the efficacy of interventions with children and adolescents (Ceccon et al, 2023;Cipriano et al, 2023;Gilligan-Lee et al, 2023), work focused on underrepresented populations (Ceccon et al, 2023;Cimpian et al, 2023;Leer et al, 2023), a study consisting of national public data (Cimpian et al, 2023), a natural experiment (Leer et al, 2023), and a metaanalysis (Cipriano et al, 2023). A major goal of the Special Section was to demonstrate the broad applicability of RRs for developmental research-that they are not solely for laboratory experiments-and the eight articles collectively met that goal beyond what we could have hoped for.…”