Nonverbal supports for word learning: Prekindergarten teachers’ gesturing practices during shared book reading

Abstract

Children learn words through recruiting cues from verbal and nonverbal input, yet research in early childhood classrooms has focused almost exclusively on linguistic input. Nonverbal input, such as gestures, supports word learning for young children, particularly those with less linguistic knowledge, through capturing children's attention and enhancing semantic input. The present study investigates Head Start teachers’ gesturing practices as a means for bolstering children's word-learning during shared book reading sessions. Teachers used an evidence-based curriculum supported by professional development. Using multimodal analysis of thirty-three videos of shared book reading, we coded five types of gestures: iconic, beat, representational, deictic, and behavioral. Our analyses controlled for children's nonverbal intelligence and linguistic input from the teacher and the text read aloud. Results from multi-level models indicate teachers gesture frequently, and that total gestures and meaning-focused gestures are related to children's end-of-year receptive vocabulary scores as measured by the PPVT. Teachers are providing additional support and scaffolding for word learning and meaning-making through nonverbal means above and beyond the provided linguistic input. Our results indicate a need to further utilize multimodal analysis to study the role of nonverbal supports during shared book reading to better support young word learners.