The Power of Meaningful Gestures in Teaching and Learning Literacy in Early Childhood Education Centres in the Cape Coast Metropolis

Abstract

Children come to school with emergent literacy which teachers need to build on to enhance early literacy acquisition in both the first language (L1) and the target language (L2) which in the case of Ghana is English Language. One of the supporting systems used to enhance effective teaching and learning is meaningful gestures such as iconic, metaphoric, deictic, and beat. The aim of the study is to find out how teachers use meaningful gestures to enhance effective teaching and learning of literacy in early childhood centres. Ten early childhood centres in the Cape Coast Metropolis in the Central Region of Ghana, consisting of 5 public and 5 private schools were selected. Observation and interviews were used for the data collection and analysed. The result indicated that most teachers use meaningful gestures only when they are teaching recitation. Little attention is paid to the use of gestures in other literacy lessons such as storytelling, reading, listening and speaking, and community circle time. Based on the findings, it has been recommended that early childhood education teachers should be educated on the use of meaningful gestures alongside speech in promoting early literacy acquisition.