SILC is organized into working groups. Each working group is organized around particular topics based on the questions raised by the strategic goals. The relationship between the working groups and the strategic goals is illustrated in Figure 1 on p. 16. SILC currently consists of 8 working groups:
Representations and Processes: Investigate the presumably species-universal underpinnings of
spatial skills and spatial learning.
Spatial Language: Investigate how these spatial skills and spatial learning can be further
enhanced through the species-specific symbolic skill of language.
Maps & Diagrams: Investigate how these spatial skills and spatial learning can be further
enhanced through non-linguistic symbolic skills, notably maps and diagrams.
Analogy: Investigate the roles that mapping and comparison plays both in fundamental processing and in symbolic extensions of it, and how comparison can be used to foster spatial learning.
Gesture: Investigate how gesture interacts with spatial thinking and learning, including the
representational and communicative roles it plays, and how it can be used to enhance spatial
learning.
Sketching: Investigate the fundamental processes, representations and symbol systems involved
in sketch understanding, via cognitive simulation, and create a platform for sketch-based
educational software.
Early Education: Investigate the foundations of spatial learning and how it can be effectively
enhanced in home and school, focusing on infancy through elementary school.
Geoscience Education: Investigate how spatial learning is involved in STEM teaching, using
geoscience and earth science as a testbed, focusing on middle school through college.
Almost every SILC investigator participates in more than one working group, which provides an organic mechanism for communication between them. Projects are managed on a day-to-day basis within working groups.
NEW RELEASE: CogSketch v1.19 (3/10/2010) (download here)
Read our latest updates and incoming news below or for SILC in the press go to our Press Room (click on PRESS ROOM icon above).
3/4/2010 Please, welcome our new Spatial Network Members: Hilary Barth, Sue Becker, Nathan Greenauer, Toru Ishikawa, Shaun P. Vecera, Tom verguts and Christoph Weidemann.
3/1/2010 Our March Showcase is on-line: The Role of Parent Gesture In Children's Spatial Language Development [Erica Cartmill, Shannon M. Pruden Dick, Susan C. Levine, Susan Goldin-Meadow].
2/18/2010 Please, welcome our new Spatial Network Member: Kevin Mulqueeny.
2/12/2010 Job opening for a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Spatial Intelligence and Learning Center, University of Chicago.
2/12/2010 New publication by our SILC Members: Jee, B. D., Uttal, D. H., Gentner, D., Manduca, C., Shipley, T., Sageman, B., Ormand, C. J., & Tikoff, B. (2010). Analogical thinking in geoscience education.
2/10/2010 Note: Full paper submission deadline [in Calls section on Meetings page] for Spatial Cognition 2010 has been changed to: February 21, 2010.
2/9/2010 Please, welcome our new Spatial Network Members: Ed Golob and Kelly McCormick.
2/5/2010 Please, note that we will soon be implementing a database for the Bibliography page. Due to this we are only up-dating the database.
2/5/2010 Please, welcome our new Spatial Network Member: Michael Brown.
2/1/2010 Our February Showcase is on-line: Playful Learning: Exploring the Role of Dialogic Inquiry and Exploration in Children's Developing Shape Concepts [Kelly R. Fisher, Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, and Nora Newcombe].
1/27/2010 Read the current Press on SILC-generated research: Female teachers' math anxiety affects girls' math achievement by Sian L. Beilock, Elizabeth A. Gunderson, Gerardo Ramirez and Susan C. Levine.
1/7/2010 Please, welcome our new Spatial Network Member: Roy Ruddle.
1/6/2010 The January SILC Showcase is now on-line: Facilitation of spatial skills necessary in performing geologic transformations [Ilyse Resnick, Temple University; Thomas Shipley, Temple University; Cathryn Manduca, Carleton College; and Nora Newcombe, Temple University].
12/21/2009 Links were fixed under the sketch inquiry, Help Us Gather Sketches, on our homepage. Please, note that if you ever encounter a link that does not work, please send it to the attention of Jenn Stedillie, webmaster for this site:
12/21/2009 Please, welcome our new Spatial Network Members: Elena Andonova, Kirsten Butcher, Liz Chrastil, Lisa Douglas & Ian Fogarty.
12/02/2009 The December SILC Showcase is now on-line: Spatial categories across languages [Naveen Khetarpal, University of Chicago; Asifa Majid, Max-Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen; Terry Regier, University of California, Berkeley].
