What the teacher's hands tell the student's mind about math.

Does nonverbal behavior contribute to cognitive as well as affective components of teaching? We examine here one type of nonverbal behavior: spontaneous gestures that accompany talk. Eight teachers were asked to instruct 49 children individually on mathematical equivalence as it applies to addition. All teachers used gesture to convey problem-solving strategies. The gestured strategies either reinforced (matched) or differed from (mismatched) strategies conveyed in speech. Children were more likely to reiterate teacher speech if it was accompanied by matching gesture than by no gesture at all and less likely to reiterate teacher speech if it was accompanied by mismatching gesture than by no gesture at all. Moreover, children were able to glean problem-solving strategies from the teachers' gestures and recast them into their own speech. Not only do teachers produce gestures that express task-relevant information, but their students take notice.