Using Brain Gym to Enhance Kindergarten Pupils’ Reading Abilities

摘要

This classroom-based action research explored the effects of Brain Gym movements on the Kindergarten pupils’ learning engagement and achievement in Reading. The study involved thirty-six (36) Kindergarten pupils in an exclusive girls’ school in a city in the National CapitalRegion, Philippines. The teaching intervention involved the integration of selected Brain gym movements in the daily English lessons for a period of two weeks. Data were collected from the results of the formative assessments of the pupils in Reading, peer observation checklist, peer narrativefeedback, teacher-researcher’s personal journal and video recordings of the daily 30-minute pupil–teacher encounter in the English classes. Findings in this study revealed significant differences on the pupils’ engagement before and during the intervention as culled fromthe class observations of the other Kindergarten teachers, which greatly affected the pupils’ high achievement in Reading, depicted by an overall mean score of 4.67. Results were suggestive that employing brain gym movements enabled the pupils to be more engaged in their learning. Increasein pupils’ achievement in Reading was likewise noted, providing evidence that using Brain Gym movements may enhance Kindergarten pupils’ Reading abilities.