“Wormholes” in the Common Core: Spatial Reasoning, Literacy, and Mathematics Education.

Abstract

The last decades of the 20th century witnessed a revolution in brain research. Using new scanning technologies, researchers learned that human spatial reasoning uses a number of separate brain structures that work at least somewhat independently, often simultaneously. Moreover, these brain structures and networks develop at different rates in different children, leading to significant individual differences in classroom performance on spatial tasks, including reading and various kinds of geometric/mathematical reasoning. Using this research as a basis, we designed new educational materials to promote spatial reasoning. In this paper, we describe an example: an age-scaffolded sequence of geography lessons, including a primary-school study of simple maps of African animals, several middle-school climate activities, and a high-school lesson about strategies to combat malaria and other tropical diseases in a time of global climate change. Our geography lessons were used in several high-poverty neighborhoods in New York City. Students in those classes also had significant gains in performance on standardized reading and math tests. While we cannot claim to have “proved” a causal link, the possibilities are intriguing. In this context, it is very important to note that the new Common Core curriculum in the United States is based on outdated research. As a result, it might actually discourage school administrators from trying experimental lessons of the kind described in this paper.