Vander Heyden Karin M, Huizinga Mariette, Jolles Jelle
Department of Educational Neuroscience, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.
Dev Psychol. 2017 Feb;53(2):290-305. doi: 10.1037/dev0000224. Epub 2016 Nov 10.
Children practice their spatial skills when playing with spatial toys, such as construction materials, board games, and puzzles. Sex and SES differences are observed in the engagement in such spatial play activities at home, which relate to individual differences in spatial performance. The current study investigated the effects of explicitly providing spatial play activities in the school setting on different types of spatial ability. We presented 8- to 10-year-old children with a short and easy-to-adopt classroom intervention comprising a set of different spatial play materials. The design involved a pretest-posttest comparison between the intervention group (n = 70) and a control group without intervention (n = 70). Effects were examined on object transformation ability (i.e., a paper-and-pencil mental rotation and paper folding task) and viewer transformation ability (i.e., a hands-on 3D spatial perspective-taking task). Results showed specific effects: there were no differences between the intervention and control group in progress on the two object transformation tasks. Substantial improvements were found for the intervention group compared to the control group on the viewer transformation task. Training progress was not related to sex and socioeconomic background of the child. These findings support the value of spatial play in the classroom for the spatial development of children between 8 and 10 years of age. (PsycINFO Database Record
儿童在玩空间类玩具（如建筑材料、棋盘游戏和拼图）时会锻炼他们的空间技能。在家中参与此类空间游戏活动时会观察到性别和社会经济地位的差异，这与空间表现的个体差异有关。本研究调查了在学校环境中明确提供空间游戏活动对不同类型空间能力的影响。我们为8至10岁的儿童提供了一种简短且易于采用的课堂干预，其中包括一组不同的空间游戏材料。该设计涉及干预组（n = 70）和无干预对照组（n = 70）之间的前测-后测比较。研究考察了对物体变换能力（即纸笔形式的心理旋转和折纸任务）和观察者变换能力（即动手的3D空间视角采择任务）的影响。结果显示了特定的效果：在两项物体变换任务的进展上，干预组和对照组之间没有差异。与对照组相比，干预组在观察者变换任务上有显著改善。训练进展与儿童的性别和社会经济背景无关。这些发现支持了课堂上空间游戏对8至10岁儿童空间发展的价值。（PsycINFO数据库记录
