The state using of spatial ability of eight-garade students' in 3-dimensional geometry

To investigate whether students make use of their spatial abilities when they are engaged in 3-dimensional geometry activities and if they do so, in what way they do it and in what way their spatial abilities and 3-dimensional geometry knowledge intereact with each other are the purposes of this study. The research was conducted with 7 eight grade students. The data was collected through interview technique and the questions were developed by the researcher in accordance with the research problem. The data were analyzed by the techniques of the grounded theory including open, axial and selective coding. Analysis results indicate that students generally can overcome the spatial difficulties related to the frequently encountered geometric objects easily. Therefore, it was concluded that their knowledge on 3-dimensional geometry and experience in 3-dimensional geometry activities affected their spatial abilities. In addition, it was sometimes seen that students could find solution ways of the 3-dimensional geometry activities in 2-dimension; that is to say, they sometimes did not use their spatial abilities. For instance, without using any spatial operation, they were able to determine whether or not a net could fold up to make a solid. For this reason, it was recommended the educators to pay more attention to prepare the activities to be challenging in order to provide an opportunity to the students to use their spatial abilities. Key Words: Spatial ability, 3-dimensional geometry, 3-dimensional geometry skills.