How Elementary Students Use Gesture to Enhance Verbal Meaning-Making in Procedural Mathematics Explanations

• In Event: 42.043 - Promoting and Measuring STEM Learning

Abstract

Under new standards and assessment systems, students are required to demonstrate their mathematical understanding through oral explanatory discourse, which can be challenging for some students. In some educational contexts (e.g., face-to-face interactions), however, it can be appropriate for students to use gesture to help communicate meaning. The current study explores whether and how 3rd and 5th grade students’ (n=29) gestures contribute to their verbal meaning-making during mathematical explanations. Our findings suggest that most students rarely use gesture to disambiguate potentially confusing referents in their verbal explanations, but some rely on gesture to make meaning. Additional qualitative analyses examine the contexts in which each gesture occurred and identify which types of gesture most frequently enhance students’ verbal meaning.

Authors

• Anne Blackstock-Bernstein, University of California - Los Angeles

• Alison L. Bailey, University of California - Los Angeles