Computer programming could be seen as utilising a limited set of conventionalised instructions to control the inner actions of an electronic system. Computer programming education (CPE) is considered an important subject area in school systems across the globe. Hence, communicating through code have become part of a general computer literacy that society strives for. This study aims to explore verbal and gestural metaphors in CPE and poses the following questions: 1) How do teachers employ gestures when lecturing on programming? and 2) How do teachers’ gestures correspond to the concepts being communicated?

 The study is based on observations of three upper-secondary teachers, performing a lecture on programming. Analysis have – inspired by Pragglejaz Group (2007) and Cienki (2016) – been performed in three stages: Firstly, gestures and relevant verbal metaphors have been identified. Secondly, correspondence between gesture and utterance have been analysed. Finally, temporal relations between gestures and utterance have been measured. 

 Results show that– regardless of teachers’ education or vocational experiences – they utilise similar verbal and gestural metaphors when discussing basic programming concepts (‘data’ and ‘code’), whereas in cases when abstract computing concepts (‘loops’ and ‘functions’) are discussed, teachers’ metaphor performance tend to differ. Basic gestures and utterances generally display mappings relating to the handling of objects and experiences of objects in motion. Furthermore, the results reveal that teachers tend to gesture vertically when discussing code (verbo-spatial representations of the computer screen) and horizontally (representations of movement) when discussing the functions of a programme or the computer. In the second case, the teachers employ combinations of verbal and verbo-gestural metaphors in relation to computing concepts. Regarding temporal relations between gesture and speech, the study indicates that temporal relations between gesture and speech differ in relation to teachers’ metaphor use. However, differences are coincident among the teachers. Gestures related to basic concepts are performed in absolute synchronicity with speech, while gestures related to for instance ‘code’ display a lower degree of temporal proximity. More abstract concepts display even lower degree of temporal proximity. 

 In conclusion, we argue that combinations of gestures and verbal utterances reveal different degrees of abstraction present in CPE. Counterintuitively, abstract concepts such as ‘data’ – albeit their metaphoric nature – display a tangible nature, while conventionalized terms such as ‘loop’ seem to be highly metaphorical. This implies that gestures play a pivotal role in conceptualising technical terms, in the classroom and as an analytical tool for understanding education.

Cienki, A. (2016). Analysing metaphor in gesture: A set of metaphor identification guidelines for gesture (MIG-G). In The Routledge handbook of metaphor and language (pp. 149-165): Routledge.

Pragglejaz Group. (2007). MIP: A method for identifying metaphorically used words in discourse. Metaphor and Symbol, 22(1), 1-39.