A single-subject multiple baseline and feminist intertextual deconstruction of gender differences among kindergartners in learning the alphabet using clay and a tactual/kinesthetic multiple intelligence and Montessori pedagogy

This multimethod study involved quantitative procedures to measure to what extent a tactual/kinesthetic art approach using day would help low achieving or developmentally delayed kindergarten students learn the alphabet (a pre-reading skill). Using a single-subject multiple baseline design, I collected data at each session, which ranged from 20 to 25 meetings per child over a period often weeks. Qualitative data collection and analysis revealed differences in participants' reactions to, preferences for, and processes with clay such as expressing their lives, dreams, stories, beliefs, and fears. Analysis of social interactions, student self-initiated practices, and variations of the interventions (i.e., clay play personifying letters, ABC book, songs, associations, images on cards, and artworks) suggested that gender differences occurred more strongly when clothing differentiated gender, and in the types of stories told, but not in the clay processes initiated.

I began the study with 18 participants, selected by their teachers, using the criterion that the student could not identify more then 17 alphabet letters. The findings are beised on the 10 remaining students who were not able to name more than 17 letters after five baseline sessions. The baseline sessions consisted of recording students' recognition of lower-case alphabet letters. If a child did not recognize a letter, I implemented the tactual/kmesthetic clay instmction, a multiple intelligences pedagogical approach mfluenced by Montessori methods. The intervention of forming with clay was unplemented at staggered times across groups of letters (three letters at a time) for each participant. The participant's recognition of the distinctive features of a letter demonstrated progress in learning a new letter. An intervention of a tactual/kinesthetic art approach using clay did improve all of the participant's abilities to recognize, learn, and remember letters. The findings support the theory that kinesthetic/tactile perception is a primary channel for early learning. In spite of the apparent importance of kinesthetic methods, multisensory learning, and manipulative materials, few programs that incorporate kinesthetic/tactile pedagogy. Interdisciplinary arts-based teaching addresses the multiple intelligences of individual children and their different learning styles.