Poster #115 - Gesture Timing During Math Instruction Impacts Learning for Hearing and Deaf Children

• In Event: 1-005 - Poster Session 01
  In Poster Session: PS 01 Section - Language, Communication

Integrative Statement

Gestures are hand movements that speakers spontaneously produce when they talk. Including gesture in instruction improves children’s math learning in both experimental (Church, Ayman-Nolley, & Mahootian, 2004; Flevares & Perry, 2001; Singer & Goldin-Meadow, 2005) and school settings. The gestures teachers produce during math instruction may provide spatial scaffolding and thus make abstract math concepts more accessible (Cook et al., 2013; Koumoutsakis et al., 2016). However, little is known about the effect of the timing of gesture in relation to the instruction it accompanies. In the current study, our first goal was to vary the timing of speech/ASL instruction and gesture (gesture occurs before, simultaneous to, or after speech/ASL) to determine whether timing has an impact on learning.

Our second goal was to investigate the nature of the benefit of gesture for math learners. Gesture could benefit learners because it conveys information in a different modality from speech, or because it uses a different representational format from speech. Comparing hearing learners to deaf learners provides an opportunity to test this question. Like hearing speakers, deaf signers also produce gestures; however, for signers gestures are articulated in the same modality as language (Goldin-Meadow, Shield, Lenzen, Herzig, & Padden, 2012). By comparing hearing math learners to deaf math learners who sign and gesture in the same modality, we can determine whether gesture improves learning by providing a second modality, or a second representational format for instruction. Moreover, because there are modality differences between speech and sign, the timing of gesture in relation to the language it accompanies may impact hearing and deaf math learners differently.

The current study thus addresses two questions: (1) Does the timing of gesture in relation to the language it accompanies have an impact on math learning? and (2) Does this effect differ for deaf and hearing children?

Procedure: Thirty-seven hearing children and thirty-three deaf children (ages 7-10) participated in a one-on-one pretest-instruction-posttest paradigm designed to teach children mathematical equivalence (i.e., 7+3+5=_+5). Participants were randomly assigned to watch one of four instructional videos: (1) Speech/ASL instruction with no gesture, (2) Simultaneous gesture and speech/ASL instruction, (3) Gesture occurring before speech/ASL instruction, or (4) Gesture occurring after speech/ASL instruction. Instruction was in English for hearing children, and in ASL for deaf children.

Results: Preliminary results showed that all children (deaf and hearing) benefited most when gesture occurred simultaneously with speech/ASL instruction. Gesture occurring before speech/ASL instruction also benefited hearing children, but not deaf children (see Figure 1).

Conclusions and Implications: Results indicate that the timing of gesture combined either with spoken or signed instruction is a critical factor in math learning. Deaf learners experience delays relative to hearing children in counting (Nunes & Moreno, 1998), word problems (Zevenbergen, Hyde & Power, 2001), fractions (Titus, 1995), and arithmetic comparison problems (Kelly, Lang, Mousley, & David, 2003). Our findings suggest that exploring how teachers use gesture along with language in classrooms with deaf and hearing students represents an important avenue for future research.

Authors

• Theodora Koumoutsakis, University of Chicago
  Presenting Author

• Jenny Lu, University of Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ryan Lepic, University of Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author

• Zena LEVAN, University of Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author

• MURIELLE STANDLEY, Northeastern Illinois University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Andrew Mistak, University of Iowa
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ruth Breckinridge Church, Northeastern Illinois University
  Non-Presenting Author

• Susan Goldin-Meadow, University of Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author