Multiple intelligences in education do not solely apply to the corresponding intelligence when learning in that subject area. For example, learning in the literacy subject requiring only the linguistic intelligence or physical education only being body kinesthetic, but instead all the intelligences can be used effectively in every curriculum area to target all students and not just those with strengths in the particular intelligence. As Hopper and Hurry (2000, p.30) state, “so long as materials are taught and assessed in only one way, we will only reach a certain kind of child.” It is important to allow all children to have the same opportunity of success, and all learners can succeed given the time and support using the multiple intelligences to create diverse learning opportunities (Gouws, 2007).
Musical
People with strong music intelligences perceive the world through sound, rhythm and melody (Szpringer, Kopick & Formella, 2014). Musical intelligences allows the learner to work best when the theory can be presented in a way that can have a rhythm or tempo to best enable the content to sink in. With this intelligence, some learning strategies to enhance their enthusiasm would be to “listen to it, sing it, rap, it” (Gouws, 2007). Some real life examples of using the musical intelligence to relate to the curriculum areas would be:
Literacy - Creating a song or poem using the notes or information, could present information in a practical way by speaking it to other children
Numeracy - Using a rhythm or pattern to remember the formula or steps
The Arts - Drawing inspiration for art, dance or drama from pieces of music
Physical Education - Finding a rhythm in the movement
EOTC - Trips to watch people performing music, or school groups coming to perform (eg; drumming, singers)
Interpersonal
As Gouws (2007) states, the key question when planning for the multiple intelligences including interpersonal, would be “how can I engage learners in group work?” The interpersonal intelligence means that the learners work best when they are given the opportunities to work with others to collaborate and form ideas. Some of the potential ways to explore this intelligence in the curriculum could be:
Literacy - allowing group brainstorms when forming ideas
Numeracy - working with other students when solving own problems, and helping other children with their problems
The arts - collaborative group work where the children can use each other to bounce ideas and create work with each other
Physical education - team work in sport, creating drills or games together
Other areas* - working on projects in groups or having group planning
EOTC - any number of trips where the children have the opportunity to interact, discuss and work together. Or trips that allow the children to view or experience people working in environments like that, such as educators, politicians
Intrapersonal
With a person with a higher intrapersonal intelligence, “the world is perceived through the introspective and self reflective attitude” (Szpringer, Kopick & Formella, 2014). The intrapersonal intelligence allows the learner to be self motivated and goal driven, often enjoying time to work alone and reflect on their own efforts. When teaching children in the classroom, those with intrapersonal intelligences may enjoy time to work alone and self manage, some examples are:
Literacy - allowing work individually on topics, keeping own journals, individually presenting work
Numeracy - children working on activities individually, being responsible for own learning, setting own goals
The arts - investigating topic individually, creating work on their own
Physical education - individual games or activities, such as athletics or all vs all games,
EOTC - this could link to EOTC experiences where the children could set goals for what they want to get out of the trip and reflect on their individual learning
Body – kinesthetic
The body – kinesthetic intelligence means that these people often learn best by moving about. This intelligence allows the person to learn best through practical and hands on activities (Gouws, 2007). When teaching the curriculum to children there should be different dimensions to the learning and for these learners they would benefit from meaningful activities where they move about or can physically move about and represent concepts. Some curriculum examples for the body-kinesthetic learners would be:
Literacy - acting out stories before writing them, learning new vocab words by playing charades
Numeracy - using people to move and represent problems and how they could be solved, solving the problems through using materials
The arts - using lots of drama and acting things out, moving to create shapes
Physical education - learning through actually practicing the game or skill
EOTC - trips where the children can interact with the learning – te papa (museums), art galleries where the children have the opportunity to create own art
Logical – mathematical
People with a high logical mathematical intelligence learn best through logical progressions and clear outcomes. As Gouws (2007) states, learning strategies for logical mathematical people, would be to “think critically about it, conceptualise it and quantify it”. To allow for optimum learning for people with this as a high intelligence, it could be presented in some of the following ways:
Literacy - using a progression framework, look for patterns involved in the writing
Numeracy - showing clear steps and outcomes, opportunity to practice.
The arts - using patterns, repetition and structure in artwork
Physical education - seeing the rules and instructions as clear steps, working their way through a progression of learning.
EOTC - trips to see factories such as Cadbury factory could be good showing processes, progressions and machines involved in creating products
Linguistic
The linguistic intelligence is defined by the learner having the most valuable response to spoken or written words. The key features of this intelligence is “sensitivity to rhymes, meaning of words, and sounds, as well as ability to speak clearly and to present events logically” (Szpringer, Kopick & Formella, 2014). Through using written language and spoken activities in the curriculum, the linguistic learners will have more meaningful learning experiences, some of these ideas are:
Literacy - doing oral activities before writing, reading to get ideas
Numeracy - allow the children to have the opportunity to write the problems out as words, explain their thinking to other children
The arts - draw inspiration from descriptive sentences from books and stories
Physical education - reading about the rules of game and sport, creating own rules and instructions for new games
EOTC - any number of guest speakers – poets, authors etc
Spatial
People with high spatial intelligence learn best through the use of visual examples, diagrams and materials. As Gouws (2007) states, when planning with visual spatial intelligence learners in mind, as yourself “how can I use visual aids?” Visual aid helps these learners to best succeed and some scenarios that for visual spatial learners that would apply to the curriculum are:
Literacy - using diagrams to teach writing concepts, using pictures as prompts
Numeracy - use materials to demonstrate concepts, allow the children use diagrams to represent problems or help them solve them
The arts - draw ideas from pictures or videos to find inspiration
Physical education - see how the action looks in diagrams or with videos of demonstration
EOTC - art galleries where the children can see things visually represented, or trips where the children can see processes – such as factories, butcheries etc.
Naturalistic
The naturalistic intelligence can enhance the growth of the learner when activities involving nature are used. To the naturalistic learning, the world is perceived through the natural environment and their surrounding (Gouws, 2007). This intelligence can be developed through activities that the learner can explore features of nature and bring nature into their work, such as:
Literacy - use plants and natural processes as topics for writing, observe natural phenomena for writing preparation, research animals and habitats for writing essays
Numeracy - working in an environment outside, using problems that relate to the world around them
The arts - using life drawing or drawing real things, impersonating characters and feelings through dance and drama
Physical education - thinking about how particular environments could be used to their advantage in sport or games (wind, sun, mud)
EOTC - trips to botanic gardens, zoos, aquariums, Chinese gardens, rocky shore (anything with an outdoors or nature setting)
*Other curriculum areas such as technology, science, social sciences etc. were not labeled specifically because examples for those would have already been covered by other curriculum learning experiences, and it would become too repetitive.
Children will find greater success when learning if the teacher plans to use a variety of intelligences when the children are learning, practicing and presenting new information through an assortment of ways. Hopper and Hurry (2000) believe that multiple intelligences through out the curriculum is a “powerful tool that can help to achieve educational goals more effectively” because the learning is able to reach a much broader audience. Through teaching using the multiple itelligences framework, the children have the opportunity to succeed, and are able to learn in a way that best suits their strengths (Gouws, 2007). It is important to shift away from the standard system, and allow children to be intelligent in their own individual ways.
Musical
People with strong music intelligences perceive the world through sound, rhythm and melody (Szpringer, Kopick & Formella, 2014). Musical intelligences allows the learner to work best when the theory can be presented in a way that can have a rhythm or tempo to best enable the content to sink in. With this intelligence, some learning strategies to enhance their enthusiasm would be to “listen to it, sing it, rap, it” (Gouws, 2007). Some real life examples of using the musical intelligence to relate to the curriculum areas would be:
Literacy - Creating a song or poem using the notes or information, could present information in a practical way by speaking it to other children
Numeracy - Using a rhythm or pattern to remember the formula or steps
The Arts - Drawing inspiration for art, dance or drama from pieces of music
Physical Education - Finding a rhythm in the movement
EOTC - Trips to watch people performing music, or school groups coming to perform (eg; drumming, singers)
Interpersonal
As Gouws (2007) states, the key question when planning for the multiple intelligences including interpersonal, would be “how can I engage learners in group work?” The interpersonal intelligence means that the learners work best when they are given the opportunities to work with others to collaborate and form ideas. Some of the potential ways to explore this intelligence in the curriculum could be:
Literacy - allowing group brainstorms when forming ideas
Numeracy - working with other students when solving own problems, and helping other children with their problems
The arts - collaborative group work where the children can use each other to bounce ideas and create work with each other
Physical education - team work in sport, creating drills or games together
Other areas* - working on projects in groups or having group planning
EOTC - any number of trips where the children have the opportunity to interact, discuss and work together. Or trips that allow the children to view or experience people working in environments like that, such as educators, politicians
Intrapersonal
With a person with a higher intrapersonal intelligence, “the world is perceived through the introspective and self reflective attitude” (Szpringer, Kopick & Formella, 2014). The intrapersonal intelligence allows the learner to be self motivated and goal driven, often enjoying time to work alone and reflect on their own efforts. When teaching children in the classroom, those with intrapersonal intelligences may enjoy time to work alone and self manage, some examples are:
Literacy - allowing work individually on topics, keeping own journals, individually presenting work
Numeracy - children working on activities individually, being responsible for own learning, setting own goals
The arts - investigating topic individually, creating work on their own
Physical education - individual games or activities, such as athletics or all vs all games,
EOTC - this could link to EOTC experiences where the children could set goals for what they want to get out of the trip and reflect on their individual learning
Body – kinesthetic
The body – kinesthetic intelligence means that these people often learn best by moving about. This intelligence allows the person to learn best through practical and hands on activities (Gouws, 2007). When teaching the curriculum to children there should be different dimensions to the learning and for these learners they would benefit from meaningful activities where they move about or can physically move about and represent concepts. Some curriculum examples for the body-kinesthetic learners would be:
Literacy - acting out stories before writing them, learning new vocab words by playing charades
Numeracy - using people to move and represent problems and how they could be solved, solving the problems through using materials
The arts - using lots of drama and acting things out, moving to create shapes
Physical education - learning through actually practicing the game or skill
EOTC - trips where the children can interact with the learning – te papa (museums), art galleries where the children have the opportunity to create own art
Logical – mathematical
People with a high logical mathematical intelligence learn best through logical progressions and clear outcomes. As Gouws (2007) states, learning strategies for logical mathematical people, would be to “think critically about it, conceptualise it and quantify it”. To allow for optimum learning for people with this as a high intelligence, it could be presented in some of the following ways:
Literacy - using a progression framework, look for patterns involved in the writing
Numeracy - showing clear steps and outcomes, opportunity to practice.
The arts - using patterns, repetition and structure in artwork
Physical education - seeing the rules and instructions as clear steps, working their way through a progression of learning.
EOTC - trips to see factories such as Cadbury factory could be good showing processes, progressions and machines involved in creating products
Linguistic
The linguistic intelligence is defined by the learner having the most valuable response to spoken or written words. The key features of this intelligence is “sensitivity to rhymes, meaning of words, and sounds, as well as ability to speak clearly and to present events logically” (Szpringer, Kopick & Formella, 2014). Through using written language and spoken activities in the curriculum, the linguistic learners will have more meaningful learning experiences, some of these ideas are:
Literacy - doing oral activities before writing, reading to get ideas
Numeracy - allow the children to have the opportunity to write the problems out as words, explain their thinking to other children
The arts - draw inspiration from descriptive sentences from books and stories
Physical education - reading about the rules of game and sport, creating own rules and instructions for new games
EOTC - any number of guest speakers – poets, authors etc
Spatial
People with high spatial intelligence learn best through the use of visual examples, diagrams and materials. As Gouws (2007) states, when planning with visual spatial intelligence learners in mind, as yourself “how can I use visual aids?” Visual aid helps these learners to best succeed and some scenarios that for visual spatial learners that would apply to the curriculum are:
Literacy - using diagrams to teach writing concepts, using pictures as prompts
Numeracy - use materials to demonstrate concepts, allow the children use diagrams to represent problems or help them solve them
The arts - draw ideas from pictures or videos to find inspiration
Physical education - see how the action looks in diagrams or with videos of demonstration
EOTC - art galleries where the children can see things visually represented, or trips where the children can see processes – such as factories, butcheries etc.
Naturalistic
The naturalistic intelligence can enhance the growth of the learner when activities involving nature are used. To the naturalistic learning, the world is perceived through the natural environment and their surrounding (Gouws, 2007). This intelligence can be developed through activities that the learner can explore features of nature and bring nature into their work, such as:
Literacy - use plants and natural processes as topics for writing, observe natural phenomena for writing preparation, research animals and habitats for writing essays
Numeracy - working in an environment outside, using problems that relate to the world around them
The arts - using life drawing or drawing real things, impersonating characters and feelings through dance and drama
Physical education - thinking about how particular environments could be used to their advantage in sport or games (wind, sun, mud)
EOTC - trips to botanic gardens, zoos, aquariums, Chinese gardens, rocky shore (anything with an outdoors or nature setting)
*Other curriculum areas such as technology, science, social sciences etc. were not labeled specifically because examples for those would have already been covered by other curriculum learning experiences, and it would become too repetitive.
Children will find greater success when learning if the teacher plans to use a variety of intelligences when the children are learning, practicing and presenting new information through an assortment of ways. Hopper and Hurry (2000) believe that multiple intelligences through out the curriculum is a “powerful tool that can help to achieve educational goals more effectively” because the learning is able to reach a much broader audience. Through teaching using the multiple itelligences framework, the children have the opportunity to succeed, and are able to learn in a way that best suits their strengths (Gouws, 2007). It is important to shift away from the standard system, and allow children to be intelligent in their own individual ways.
