Fostering Preschoolers’ Problem-Solving With Gears Through Gestural and Verbal Modeling

• In Event: Science Learning Experiences of Students in K–12 Classrooms

Abstract

Fostering preschoolers’ problem-solving skills and science content knowledge is an important objective of early engineering education. Children might acquire problem-solving skills and content knowledge by observing a teacher solving relevant tasks (i.e., modeling). The teacher can verbalize crucial steps of the solution process and/or demonstrate it gesturally. In an experimental pre-posttest-design, we investigated the effectiveness of verbal-gestural modeling, purely verbal modeling, and purely gestural modeling for 5- to 6-year-olds’ problem-solving and learning of content knowledge in the domain of gears. Results indicate that problem-solving improved with pure gestural modeling, but not with verbal-gestural modeling or pure verbal modeling. Moreover, our findings suggest that children did not acquire content knowledge. We discuss the findings and outline future research.

Authors

• Timo Reuter, RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau

• Jonas Schäfer, RPTU Kaiserslautern-Landau

• Miriam Leuchter, University of Kaiserslautern-Landau