The use of non-verbal models in Italian as a foreign language grammar teaching : a critical multimodal case-study

Abstract

Whilst interacting with other persons, people are mostly focused on their own words and lose awareness of what signals are being sent by the body at the same time. Facial expressions, eyes, tone of voice, gestures, posture or movement, touch and sight are the most frequently used non-verbal communication channels (Rot, 1982). Such phenomenon is not absent from our classrooms. Indeed, “Nonverbal communication within the classroom is very important because the teacher and pupils often have more confidence in the nonverbal than in the verbal message” (McNeill, 1992). The ability to identify, understand and interpret non-verbal cues makes communication among people successful (Kožić, Žunac and Bakić-Tomić, 2013). In this study, special attention is paid to non-verbal communication in the classroom, with emphasis on the non-verbal behaviour of teachers. The aim is to detect forms of non-verbal behaviour that are used in grammar teaching situations by foreign language Italian teachers in the Maltese classrooms. The following channels of teachers’ non-verbal communication were observed in the study: eye communication, movements within a lecture, use of proxemics, facial expressions of teachers and teachers’ relationship with gesturing in class. The study, which was conducted in a church school, sheds light on the reality and on the future of nonverbal communication in our foreign language classroom.