Spatial Concept Perspectives

We have gathered ~300 excerpts from published works about fundamental spatial concept terms. These have been cross-referenced with the concept lexicon appearing on the left. Those terms were drawn from the U.S.National Science Education Standards (NSES 1996) for topic areas B - Physical Science, C - Life Science, D - Earth and Space Science, as well as from the 1994 U.S. Geography Teaching Standards for grades 9-12. Those standards can be browsed here.

spatial concept terms

disciplinary perspectives on "layer"

folding

Doubling, turning, or laying back of parts of a structure, stratum, layer, or membrane on itself. Folds produce anticlines and synclines in rock formations; plications are repeated sharp folds. Protein 'folding' describes the specific manner in which polypeptide chains form minimum energy configurations such as an alpha helix or beta sheet. Folds occur in systems that pack large amounts of surface into a given volume such brain tissue, grana in chloroplasts, stacks of pigment 'discs' in retinal rod cells, gill tissue in crustaceans, etc.

Science Education

Mathewson, J. H. (2005)

The visual core of science: definition and applications to education

layer

[OED]: 2a. A thickness of matter spread over a surface; esp. one of a series of such thicknesses; a stratum, course, or bed.

Linguistics

OED Online (2nd Ed.)

Oxford English Dictionary, Online Edition