Case studies in spatial inferential reasoning (Years 3 to 12) in the Technologies/Engineering curriculum

Milorad’s thesis examined the ability of students to develop and share their solutions to hands-on Technologies problems of varying complexity. Technologies teachers are at the forefront of building students’ capabilities to think and act as creators and innovators. However, little is known of how these capabilities can be effectively developed. By using three hands-on engineering tasks of varying complexity, and purpose-designed assessment tools, he was able to provide a comparative measure of students’ spatial abilities, which highlighted the need for regular exposure to tactile hands-on tasks, the development of students’ technical vocabulary, and explicit teaching of how students work collaboratively.