INTERAÇÃO NÃO-VERBAL E O ENVOLVIMENTO VISUAL DOS ESTUDANTES NAS AULAS DE MATEMÁTICA: UM ESTUDO DA ORGANIZAÇÃO DO ESPAÇO NA COMUNICAÇÃO LINGUÍSTICA

This study aims to examine where in the classroom and at what specific distance students are more or less visually engaged with the teacher and to what extent the instructions given by teachers, through gestures of pointing, affect students’ engagement in class of math. 50 students (25 boys and 25 girls) were randomly selected, put a mini camera that was mounted on an eyeglass in their mathematics and English lessons. Approximately 75 hours of video recording were made from these cameras (the first person’s perspectives) to analyze and compare the nonverbal interaction in mathematics lessons. Results show that students are more visually engaged in their teachers’ instruction at a particular distance in the classroom (from 120 cm to 370 cm). Furthermore, we report differences between boys and girls and how they are visually engaged in their mathematics classrooms. Finally, we report how teachers pointing gestures can serve as a tool to recapture student’s visual attention in mathematics classrooms.