Enhancing High School Students’ Spatial Reasoning Through Geometry Transformation Instruction in Ghana

Spatial reasoning is a critical skill for learning mathematics, yet efforts to improve high school students' spatial reasoning skills within mathematics classrooms are limited or absent in Ghana. This study aimed to investigate the impact of using dynamic and static visualization approaches within the Experience-Language-Pictorial-Symbolic-Application (ELPSA) pedagogical framework to teach geometry transformation concepts and enhance students’ spatial reasoning skills and geometry transformation knowledge during a four-week intervention. Due to the mixed results regarding the type of visualizations, the study also aimed to compare the effects of dynamic versus static visualization. The study used a one group pretest-post-test design to compare the effects of dynamic versus static visualization instruction. Seventy-seven (77) students from a single school participated in the study and were purposively assigned to either the dynamic (n = 35) or static (n = 42) group. The intervention lasted for four weeks (16 hours), and the dynamic group received dynamic visualization instruction, while the static group received static visualization instruction. The students' spatial reasoning skills and geometry transformation knowledge were assessed using a spatial reasoning instruction and geometry transformation achievement test before and after the intervention. Although there were no significant differences between the groups, both visualization approaches significantly improved students' spatial reasoning skills, including mental rotation, spatial orientation, and spatial visualization, as well as their geometry transformation knowledge. Additionally, the study found a positive relationship between students' geometry transformation scores and their spatial reasoning scores, suggesting that an ELPSA pedagogical approach to visualization instructions can enhance students' spatial reasoning skills within the context of geometry transformation. Overall, these findings have important implications for mathematics educators and curriculum developers, as the findings provide conclusive evidence that targeted geometry transformation instruction within ELPSA pedagogical framework can enhance students' spatial reasoning skills, regardless of the type of visualization used to teach geometry transformation.