Spatial Skills

When we think of children learning math in pre-school, it is predominantly about numbers. For a pre-school student, honing spatial skills is as important. Children do a lot of spatial-thinking activities like playing with blocks and puzzles. But we associate these more with "play" than learning.

Spatial Intelligence is one of the Multiple Intelligences

We move in a three-dimensional world and we constantly are moving about and perceiving objects from different perspectives. We also are continuously making decisions about arranging objects together for various purposes. It is because of this that even in pre-school, geometry is a part of math. Spatial skills & reasoning are closely integrated.

Spatial skills actually a combination of various skills.

Many parents have this idea that "spatial" skills come naturally to all children. This is true only to a certain extent. At home, the spatial experiences may be limited depending on the social, cultural, economic and physical factors. Hence all children must be given ample opportunities in preschool for developing spatial skills.

Dr Howard Gardener has advocated a theory that "intelligence" manifests itself in multiple ways (he lists 9 different aspects) and "spatial" intelligence is one of them. Spatial thinking gets honed by spatial intelligence. Great sculptors, painters & architects display an understanding of space & proportions which are examples of highly developed spatial intelligence.

What are the activities & skills that can be developed in the pre-school?

Activities to Build Spatial Skills

Concepts like distance, shape & size
1. Just playing in a variety of play equipment like swings, see-saws, jungle gym etc
2. Remembering the arrangement of objects in a room which has been visited several times
3. Remembering the directions to reach from one point to another by forming a mental picture
4. Copying a simple line drawing
5. Good handwriting
Coordinating body movements
1. Dancing to music & playing in the ground
2. Mass PT with students arranged in rows & columns
3. Great dancers & sportspersons display this ability. Just looking at a group of children dancing to rhythmic music will reveal the various levels of competence in this skill
Looking for patterns
1. Pairing, matching, sorting & classifying activities
2. Assembling a puzzle - jigsaw puzzles, tangrams can develop skills to visualise future moves & likely obstacles.
3. Board games. Great chess players can tell the strength of a player by just glancing at the placement of the pieces
Relations between 3D solids & 2D figures
1. Paper folding activities - origami, making airplanes. Following textual or diagrammatic instructions for paper folding is a difficult skill.
2. Remembering the shape of an object and the ability to visualise how it would look if it is rotated in any direction.
3. Correlating a map of a room or building and with the actual building
4. Mastery of a Rubik's cube formations
Stability & Balance
1. Building a stable structure with building blocks of various sizes & shapes
2. Cycling, skipping, throw ball, skating etc
Developing spatial vocabulary
1. Use appropriate words to describe spatial orientation and description - size, shape, specific features like colour etc and relative position.
2. Ability to use hand & body gestures to convey meaning
Proportional Reasoning
1. This is an important "thinking" skill we need to develop for any cognitive development.
2. A job which is done by 5 persons which get done earlier if more persons are deployed - this is an exercise in proportional thinking which has to develop by our life experiences & critical thinking

The spatial thinking activities done in preschool are the foundation for this skill.

Spatial Skills & Language Development

Latest neuroscience research seems to indicate that development of spatial skills also improves verbal thinking.

It is based on a concept known as the “mental model theory,” which posits that human verbal reasoning abilities arose from brain areas that primates use for understanding their spatial environment.

Spatial Vocabulary & Social Relations

It is an interesting fact that we use spatial metaphors to think of our social relations.

We are "close" to some people. We feel "nearer" to some. We talk of "giving space" and "setting boundaries". We feel "left out" of certain circles. We talk of people being "marginalized" or "oppressed".