The Development of Visual-Spatial Gnosis in Children of Primary School Age with Mild Mental Retardation (Formative Experiment)
Mental retardation is one of the main reasons for the disability of the population. In the work of visual-spatial gnosis, violations of the strategies of optical-spatial activity, coordinate, metric and structural-topological representations are manifested. The reduced level of development of visual-spatial representations has a negative impact on the manifestations of emotional and adaptive-behavioral reactions, communication, cognitive functions, motor activity, decreased motivation for learning activity, lack of need for self-improvement, lack of interest in the environment, manifestations of motor passivity, the presence of difficulties in mastering the program of an educational institution. The aim of the study is to study the dynamics of the development of visual-spatial gnosis in children of primary school age with mental retardation through a formative experiment. The methods used were: categorical-conceptual, methodical analyzes of scientific research, neuropsychological tests. A categorical-conceptual, methodological analysis of modern publications on the phenomenon of visual-spatial gnosis has been carried out. A formative experiment has been implemented, which includes the following stages: ascertaining, formative, control. At the stage of the ascertaining experiment, a study of the level of formation of indicators of visual-spatial gnosis in children of primary school age with normal development and children with a mild degree of mental retardation was carried out using neuropsychological tests. Visual - spatial gnosis in children with mental retardation is characterized by: primitiveness of subject drawings, lack of integral images of objects, excessive poverty of details, distortion of the structure of objects and their shape, violation of the proportion and spatial relationship of parts, lack of plot images. At the stage of the formative experiment, a correctional and developmental program was implemented. At the stage of the control experiment, the presence of positive results was revealed. The complexity of the subject drawings, the integrity of the image, the completeness in the structure of objects, the accuracy of the shape of the images, an increase in the quality of the formation of spatial representations.