[Source: Science Daily]

“The human brain is malleable and trainable,” said Anne Gold, lead author and director of CIRES Education & Outreach. “By providing spatial training to K-12 children, and providing spatially demanding toys before schooling starts, we can give them the opportunity to develop skills important in fields like science, technology, engineering and math.”

The team, who published their work today in Geosphere, surveyed hundreds of undergraduate students and found a huge spread in their spatial skills — students scored between 6 and 75 percent correct responses on a written, spatial-knowledge test. This poses a problem: It’s difficult to teach a college-level class with so much variability in skill level. Gold and her colleagues sought to explain this contrast because most geologists need strong spatial skills to be successful.

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