Spatial reasoning plays a vital role in choice of and success in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) careers, yet the topic is scarce in grade school curricula. We conjecture that this absence may be due to limited knowledge of how spatial reasoning is discussed and engaged across STEM professions. This study aimed to address that gap by asking 19 professionals to comment on a video that documented children's progression through 5 days of building and programming robots. Their written opinions on the skills relevant to their careers demonstrated by the children revealed that spatial thinking and design thinking are central to what they see.
RÉSUMÉLe raisonnement spatial joue un rôle essentiel dans la décision d'entreprendre une carrière STEM et de réussir dans les domaines concernés. Pourtant, ces matières sont peu représentées dans les curriculums à l'école primaire. Nous supposons que cette absence puisse être due à un manque de connaissances quant à la façon dont le raisonnement spatial est traité dans l'ensemble des professions STEM. Cette étude vise à combler ce manque en demandant à 19 professionnels de commenter une vidéo qui documente la progression d'enfants qui construisent et programment des robots pendant 5 jours. Les commentaires écrits des répondants sur les habiletés pertinentes illustrées par les élèves montrent que la pensée spatiale et la pensée conceptuelle sont fondamentales dans leur profession.Spatial reasoning is of vital importance in today's world, especially in careers associated with sciences, technology, engineering, and mathematics (i.e., the STEM disciplines). This realization has particular relevance to educators, with mounting evidence that spatial reasoning competencies are correlated with achievement (Casey, Dearing, Vasilyeva, Ganley, & Tine, 2011;Wai, Lubinski, & Benbow, 2009) and are malleable (Sorby, 2009;Uttal et al., 2013) and that learning experiences in the early years are of extreme importance (Bruce & Hawes, 2015;Hawes, Tepylo, & Moss, 2015 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/./), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
K. FRANCIS ET AL.There is a growing recognition of the roles of spatial reasoning in early years and in STEM professions, alongside acknowledgment of its central place in learning and cognition (e.g., see the Spatial Intelligence and Learning Center [SILC] program at http://spatiallearning.org/index.php/research-and-other-linksof-interest and the Research in Spatial Cognition [RISC] lab at http://sites.temple.edu/risc/). However, the topic has a scarcely discernible presence in grade-school curricula (Davis, Okamoto, & Whiteley, 2015), and our suspicion is that the lack may be in part due to limited knowledge of how spatial reasoning is di...