Computers, computer games, active control and spatial visualization strategy.

摘要

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between active control of spatial information and strategies used for spatial visualization. Spatial visualization is an important factor for success in geometry, mathematics, and other academic fields. Flexibility of strategy choice is important for successful performance of spatial visualization tasks. In certain situations, active control based in manipulatives, computer games, and interactive computer environments facilitates improvements in spatial visualization. This study investigated how these improvements relate to strategy change. The study also investigated how high and low active control compare for learning spatial visualization skills. With the advent of interactive computer environments for teaching mathematics, and geometry, these are important questions.;Prior to the experiment, participants were given a standardized test of spatial visualization. The experiment used a pretest, treatment, posttest format. The pretest and posttest were comprised of static spatial visualization problems. The treatment comprised of two conditions, high and low active control. The high active control participants interactively solved the spatial problems in a computer game-like environment. The low active control participants observed passively on a yoked monitor. Pretest, treatment and posttest problems all used polyominos. Numerical analysis and think-aloud protocol analysis were used to investigate the differences in how participants subjected to high and low active control conditions compared on the subsequent static spatial visualization task.;Neither high nor low active control was uniformly better for learning the static spatial visualization task used in the pretest and posttest. Participants, already relatively skilled in spatial visualization, tended to benefit more from the low active control condition. Participants, less skilled, benefited from the high active control condition. The less spatially skilled participants who benefited from the high active control condition, apparently made their improvement through the inclusion of holistic mental rotation into their repertoire of spatial visualization strategies.