Message from the Editor - Imagineering

Let’s engineer our imagination. This semester my students at Purdue University started using an IdeaBook in one of my classes. It is a sketchbook of ideas for projects and graphical interpretations of reading materials. They have been reading chapters in their textbooks or listening to lectures and drawing mind maps of the content. They are learning to make their thoughts visible. Galileo used graphic diagrams and sketches of perspective to revolutionize science, while all the other scientists described their thoughts verbally and in algebraic terms. Creativity intensified substantially during the Renaissance when ideas began to be documented through drawing and sketching. Get the relationship? Hmmm.   Do you notice how computer graphics professors still play with toys? I see those Legos in your classrooms. I see Buzz Lightyear sitting up against my window, and I see that giant transformer on your desk. Why is this? To be childlike is to be in good company. Albert Einstein was childlike his entire life by playing games with numbers. Creative thinkers are constantly combining and recombining ideas into something innovative.   I remember when I was on a team of academics assigned to work collaboratively on a virtual project that another university presented to us. I had more questions than answers. I could not get my hands around exactly what they wanted no matter how many questions were asked. I found out later they did not know what they wanted. The project was a failure. It did not get past the research phase of comparing competitive products. I realized that failing was a good thing. I learned so much about what not to do. So the first step to creative thinking is understanding that failure is an important part of success. Failure forces us to explore the unanticipated or walk the unexpected path. It forces us to grow. It gives us creative opportunity. As teacher-scholars, it invites us to continue to approach teaching with creativity and innovation, and to bring that out in our students.   In this Winter Issue, we have four great articles focusing on creative and innovative approaches to studying spatial ability and learning styles. Using innovative tools, such as alternative view screen and physical model rotator, Brad L. Kinsey and Erick Towle of the University of New Hampshire, and Richard M. Onyancha of Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, experimented with the eff ectiveness of spatial ability targeted training tools. Retention and achievement in engineering, mathematics, technology and science disciplines is positively related to spatial ability. More research is underway.   James L. Mohler and Craig L. Miller of Purdue University discuss improving spatial ability with a creative approach to sketching. Their qualitative research uncovered evidence that a teaching technique called mentored sketching is effective for teaching visualization skills to freshman engineering students.   In the article Students’ Preferred Learning Styles in Graphic Communications, Jeremy V. Ernst and Aaron C. Clark of North Carolina State University studied the changes in dominant preferred learning styles of university students. Instructional presentation of course content was found not to influence change in learning style. The article had actually been accepted for publication in the Journal before it was presented at the EDGD MidYear Conference in Virginia Beach. It subsequently was recognized with the Oppenheimer Award.   In the article Spatial Visualization by Realistic 3D Views, Jianping Yue of Essex County College tested a modified version of the Purdue Spatial Visualization Test-Visualization by Rotation on four groups of students. The findings indicated enhanced performance on the special visualization test with realistic 3D views.   So there you have it. Great research. Great writing. Great ideas. And happy imagineering!   I leave you with this thought:   Thomas Edison inspires me, and so does Leonardo daVinci and Albert Einstein.   Pessimists are often right, but optimists are more productive.    -- La Verne Abe Harri