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Using LEGO to test children's ability to visualize and rotate 3D shapes in space:
Researchers at the University of California San Diego have developed a test that uses children’s ability to assemble LEGO pieces to assess their spatial visualization ability. Spatial visualization is the ability to visualize 3D shapes in one’s mind, which is tied to increased GPAs and graduation rates in STEM college students.
At the college level, a widely used assessment is the Purdue Spatial Visualization Test: Rotations, or PSVT:R, which is a 20-minute timed test consisting of a series of multiple-choice questions that are geared towards students 13 and older. Van Den Einde and Delson wanted to develop an assessment that would be more suitable and engaging for students at lower grade levels. They turned to LEGO, which was designed with that younger age range in mind and is familiar to many children. To pass the test, students have to assemble a set of LEGO pieces into a specific shape, such as a whale or a small plane, while only being given a picture of the final shape but no step-by-step instructions. The time it takes students to build the correct solution is the metric used for assessment.
[...] In order to validate the test, the researchers had students in two freshman engineering graphics courses take both the LEGO assembly test and the PSVT:R. Students took the tests both at the beginning and end of the quarter. During the course, they were trained with the Spatial Viz app. Test results show a statistically significant correlation between outcomes on the LEGO test and the PSVT:R.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 21 2020, @02:08PM (5 children)
>> They turned to LEGO, which was designed with that younger age range in mind and is familiar to many children.
Poor children (BIPOC overrepresented) are less likely to have access to overpriced LEGO sets in childhood, so they won't have a chance to practice for these exams. As a result, fewer BIPOC students get into engineering. Systemic racism at its worst, but no surprise since the study is from UCSD. Since Californian universities have committed to reinstate affirmative action the workaround will be to redo this study replacing LEGO with more familiar 3D childrens toys like crack vials and dead rats.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 21 2020, @02:11PM
BIPOC children get dead rats to play with now? Spoiled rotten... when I was a child, we had to kill our own rats or we went without.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 21 2020, @03:39PM (2 children)
Dude, LEGO was always on the more expensive side. That's the price to pay for having the precision and that the thing holds together. (Compare to cheap chinese clones). As a kid, I remember saving money for that one specific set for couple of months and then getting it. The joy was in the chase, in getting it, in playing with it and also in the quality. Not quantity. We're talking post-soviet block european country. Taught me planning, saving money, value of money and focus. I say LEGO is doing it right!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 22 2020, @06:02PM
They were, a large part of why is that the precision on them was much better than on the knock offs. Take bricks from pretty much any set back to the earliest plastic ones and they all fit together. The colors are probably still just as good as they were. The sets I have going back to the '80s are more or less just as good as they were when new and show no signs of discoloration or deterioration.
Interestingly, as they've automated more and more of the process, the prices seem to have largely stagnated, meaning that you're paying more or less the same amount now that you were decades ago. The main thing that's changed, is that the upper limit on the number of pieces in a set is much higher than it used to be. Some of those sets have thousands of pieces.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday June 22 2020, @08:06PM
In Soviet Russia, bloc blocks YOU!!!
Account abandoned.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 21 2020, @06:24PM
And yet they will still have overpriced smartphones.