Svilena Balabanova – Space in Non-verbal Pedagogical Communication in Primary School

Abstract:The article presents the specifics of nonverbal communication in the classroom in terms of the proxemicsrevealing the characteristics of spatial location in the teacher-student interaction.The article presents the basic components of the proxemics: territoriality, personal space and orientation and their impact on teacher communicationand some features of communication in a multicultural environment.Special attention is paid to the role of privacy when communicating with children from different ethnic groups.Itclarifies the influence of the interior and the physical environment of the classroom, the orderliness of the seatings, the presence of the teacher, most of them properly selected among students, etc. It is proposed that the different ways of arrangement of the classroom have a distinct impact on the  teacher-student interaction.

Keywords: nonverbal communication, proxemics, territoriality, personal space, orientation, interior, physical environment, multicultural communication, teacher communication.

Rhetoric and Communications E-journal, Issue 2, December 2011,  http://rhetoric.bg/, ISSN 1314-4464

Read the original of the article (in Bulgarian)