Assessment of Spatial Visualization Skills in Freshman Seminar

This paper presents an initiative taken at the University of South Alabama to assess and improve the spatial visualization skills of the first year freshman engineering students. The University of South Alabama is currently listed as a team member of the NSF funded ENGAGE (Engaging Students in Engineering) program. In an effort to implement one of the three strategies of ENGAGE to improve student retention, a spatial visualization component was introduced in the Freshman Seminar/Introduction to Engineering course in the Fall of 2012. The objective of incorporating spatial visualization into Freshman Seminar was to provide the incoming engineering students the prerequisite spatial skills required to become successful in their subsequent engineering courses. The Purdue Spatial Visualization Test: Rotations (PSVT:R) was administered as a pre-test to assess the spatial visualization ability of the students in the beginning of the semester. Following the pre-test, a series of brief lectures along with a set of computer based exercises was used to improve the spatial visualization skills of the students. A post-test and a survey were used at the end of the semester to assess the effectiveness of the initiative. An observation of the mean pre- and post-test scores indicated an overall improvement in student's spatial visualization skills. This improvement appeared more pronounced in female students than their male counterparts. There was an 11.8% increase in the mean score of the female students, whereas there was a 6.9% increase in the mean score of the male students. A statistical analysis of the pre-and post-test scores also demonstrated a statistically significant gain in average sores of the students. In addition to test results, student's response to the assessment survey indicated that this initiative was effective in raising awareness in the students that spatial visualization skill is very useful to become successful in engineering studies.