GIS learning and college students’ acquisition and understanding of spatial concepts

Abstract

Empirical evidence is insufficient on the specific roles GIS learning plays in developing students’ understanding various spatial concepts. The present study aims to draw attention to common struggles of learning some spatial concepts in geography and offer directions for future research on GIS learning and the development of student spatial concept lexicon. Three types of technical terms – neutral, helpful associations, and hindering associations – by Glessmer and Brose (2014) provided an excellent framework to explain why some concepts are more or less difficult for students to grasp. Our findings suggest that learning map scale and map projection are relatively easy because they are neutral and introduced as a new vocabulary. Overlay and density are terms provoking helpful associations because they carry a similar meaning in everyday language, so most students had no problems understanding the meaning of these concepts. Spatial association seemed to elicit unhelpful association because everyday use of the term, association, is not precise enough to define spatial association, resulting in students confused with other terms. Future research must be done in the context of GIS requiring students to be able to not only know spatial concepts but clearly articulate these concepts regarding various GIS applications.

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