Assessment And Improvement Countermeasures Based On GIS For Geospatial Reasoning Ability

The ability of geospatial reasoning is a component of geospatial thinking.It is the ability to infer unknown spatial information from known information.Geographical information technology is the method used to collect,analyze,and display geographic data.By using GIS technology to improve geospatial reasoning is also an important way to cultivate students’ core literacy.Based on theoretical deduction,the ability of geospatial reasoning is divided into three dimensions,namely spatial concept,spatial characteristics and spatial analysis.After sorting out the existing measurement scales for measuring geospatial reasoning ability and spatial thinking,the three ability levels of identification,comparison and reasoning were combined to finally select and compile a scale for measuring geospatial reasoning ability of secondary school students,with 21 questions.A total of 185 sample data were collected by using the measurement scale to select 3 classes in the first grade and 2 classes in the second grade in Hangzhou X High School.The analysis revealed that the overall level of geospatial reasoning ability of students in X middle school in Hangzhou was average,and the reasoning ability of spatial concepts and spatial characteristics was poor;the reasoning ability of spatial characteristics and spatial analysis varied widely among students;the spatial reasoning ability of lower grade students was significantly lower than that of higher grade students.Besides,the reasoning ability of spatial concepts of female students,the reasoning ability of spatial characteristics of students in lower class levels and the reasoning ability of students with low geographic knowledge level were all weaker.Based on the measurement results from three perspectives: aspects that can be practically improved by GIS technology,abilities currently lacked by student groups,and differences among different types of students,we propose five strategies,which are conducting GIS experiments to improve learning motivation,improving the logic of GIS experiments to improve spatial analysis ability,using buffer analysis to promote the understanding of spatial concepts among girls and low geography knowledge groups,using superposition analysis to enhance the spatial feature reasoning ability of students at lower class levels,and using topographic profiles and 3D terrain to enhance the spatial visualization ability of students at low geography knowledge levels.Taking into account students’ current living environment,geographic knowledge and computer skills,we designed two tasks,namely,the determination of topographic profiles in West Lake District and the selection of Starbucks store sites in West Lake District,for a total of four classes,and suggested using GIS software in the tasks to strengthen students’ geospatial reasoning skills.