SUPPORTING STUDENTS’ SPATIAL ABILITYIN UNDERSTANDING THREE-DIMENSIONAL REPRESENTATIONS

Spatial ability is known as a key to develop students’ 3-dimensional (Abbreviated as 3D) geometry thinking. One of the types of 3D geometry thinking is understanding 3D representations which anchors the other types of geometry thinking. Therefore, to develop students’ understanding of 3D representations, we must develop their spatial ability. The present study aims to design a sequence of activities to develop students’ spatial ability in understanding 3D representations. To develop such activities, we combined spatial visualization tasks and spatial orientation tasks with the aspect of understanding 3D representations. These activities are identifying pictures, drawing and constructing objects of building blocks. The activities are also designed based on the characteristics of Realistic Mathematics Education (RME) and students’ learning style. In addition, this study also aims to contribute to local instruction theory of developing students’ spatial ability such as how the design works and how students’ learning goes. Consequently, design research is chosen as the research approach in order to develop both the learning materials and the instructional theory. The study involved six 3rd grade students of SD Laboratorium UNESA, Surabaya. The result showed that the activities support the development of students’ spatial ability in understanding 3D representations. During the implementation, these activities gave students chance and guided them to explore the views of 3D objects and their representations. Keywords: Spatial ability, spatial visualization, spatial orientation, understanding 3D representation