DEVELOPING A SPATIAL THINKING ABILITY TEST

Abstract

This study aimed to develop a test to explore preservice teachers’ spatial thinking ability. The sample consisted of 442 preservice teachers studying at the departments of geography teaching, social studies teaching, and geography. The following steps were followed during the test development; defining the purpose of the test, identifying properties that the test measures, formulating test items, reviewing items preparing the draft form and piloting, and designing the final test and conducting statistical analyses. According to the results of statistical analysis, the mean difficulty index of the test is 0.51 and the mean discrimination index is 0.38. The test was found to have moderate difficulty and discrimination. The results of the item analysis based on the upper and lower groups showed that each item in the test is significantly discriminant. The computed double-consistency index showed that the test has classification-sorting validity. The results obtained through the test-retest reliability method showed that the test has a consistent construct. The Kuder-Richardson 20 coefficient (KR-20) calculated to determine the reliability of the test is 0.71. The final version of the test consists of 23 items. These results provided evidence that the test is a valid and reliable test to measure preservice geography and social teachers' spatial thinking ability. The validity and reliability of the test can be investigated with different samples in future studies.