The role of the body in learning literacy skills

Abstract

There are a variety of voices and conceptions present in the daily routines of a classroom which may also reveal the reasons underlying the pedagogical orientation of teachers and behaviors of learners. Among the many beliefs related to learning, this paper discusses the role of the human body in the learning process, more specifically in the development of literacy skills. The research focuses on the language used by a group of elementary school children, between 7 and 10 years old, when asked about the role of their body in the learning process. The linguistic material analyzed comes from the opinions of these elementary school children with special difficulties in the development of their reading and writing skills. The data are interpreted and discussed in a Discourse Analysis perspective, as presented in Brazil by Orlandi, and in France by the theoretical contributions of Pecheux. The notion of a human being using the language in an ideological and historical perspective is central in the discussion of the data. The analysis reveals learners subjected to beliefs about learning as being conditioned by a set of mechanical gestures in which the notions of discourse, interaction and the construction of meaning are absent. The implications of such views are discussed in terms of the learning difficulties of the group of students who hold such beliefs about learning.

Key words: the human body and the classroom, language, pedagogical practices.