CHARACTERIZING THE USE OF SPATIAL REASONING SKILLS IN INTRODUCTORY CHEMISTRY INSTRUCTOR’S MATERIALS

Abstract

Undergraduate chemistry students require spatial reasoning skills to interpret static images of molecular and electronic structure, particularly when encountering new molecular concepts. Prior literature has established that spatial reasoning is an important indicator for success in chemistry, yet these skills are not always explicitly addressed in curricula. This study examined how spatial reasoning is represented and reinforced in curricular materials for a first-semester undergraduate General Chemistry course. A full semester of instructional materials, including lecture slide decks and exams, from three instructors at an R1 institution in Colorado, as well as publisher-provided instructional materials, were analyzed. Materials were coded for instances of spatial reasoning using a deductive codebook adapted from a spatial reasoning framework originally developed for geosciences. In addition, instances where students were asked to use a spatial skill were coded for the cognitive level to characterize the demands placed on students. This work also served as a proof of concept to evaluate whether the adapted framework was appropriate for identifying and characterizing spatial reasoning skills in chemistry instructional materials. Results indicate that certain topics within the course require more frequent use of spatial reasoning and certain spatial skills are relevant to the entire course while others are more frequent in specific units. There is also a higher level of spatial reasoning in instructor slides and exams when analyzed implicitly compared to explicitly. These findings highlight a potential misalignment between the spatial reasoning demands of instructional materials, and how these skills are assessed, and they suggest opportunities to more explicitly support the development of spatial reasoning skills in undergraduate chemistry curricula.