Teacher's hand gestures as the way to reinforce verbal communication in EFL classrooms

Hand gesture has essential roles in English teaching. It is proven by the fact that hand gestures can enhance students in learning English. This research aims to investigate the types of hand gestures teachers used and how they used hand gestures in their teaching practices. This research used a qualitative design by doing classroom observation and interviewed three English teachers. The findings showed that all English teachers used four hand gestures types in their teaching practices, namely beat, deictic, iconic and metaphoric gesture. The ways on how they used hand gesture are different one teacher to other teachers. For example some teachers used beat gesture for opening the class, giving instructions and ensuring the students understanding of the materials. Another teacher used gesture for giving punishment. These findings implied that teachers can use hand gestures depending on the condition and learning purposes and teachers are the one who know how to use the hand gestures appropriately effectively for their students.