Blog
The ASCD releases a publication through the Multiple Intelligences Network on a periodic basis that serves as an excellent resource for MI enthusiasts. Readers are kept up to date on new developments in MI, MI research, uses of MI in the classroom, and even the occasional guest post from Howard Gardner. If interested, contact editor Tom Hoerr at trhoeer@newcityschool.org or trhoerr@AOL.com.
To view this month's newsletter, click here.
Notes by Howard Gardner
French junior high school teacher Lucas Gruez reached out to my offices in November of 2015. He is an educator and MI trainer for the French Ministry of Education. In this capacity, he helps colleagues to develop projects using the principles of MI. In his words, MI is very useful for 'model thinking' to design pedagogical projects and to teach students that they can be smart in different ways.
To better share this information with his students and colleagues, he curates a site dedicated to education topics including MI. On this site, you can find a plethora of articles relating to MI and even some MI Oasis blog posts, too. I recommend following his posts, especially to stay up to date on MI work being done in France.
In a recent Huffington Post article, founding editor of Future Kerala Dipin Damodharan made the case for teachers to utilize Multiple Intelligences in the classroom. In "alternative" education, educators believe that the goals of education should be knowledge and growth. This view of education is in conflict with the idea that education is simply a means to land lucrative careers. As Mr. Damodharan states, MI can be used in "alternative" education settings as a tool to encourage students to gain a deeper understanding of the curriculum they're being taught and to become global citizens. By utilizing two key components from MI theory, individuation and pluralization, teachers can tailor make their modules to play to their students' strengths, improve upon their weaknesses, and keep their minds engaged.
Read the blog in its entirety here.
Tokyo Shoseki recently published an English textbook for 10th graders, Prominence: Communication English. Lesson three is entitled, "You are Smarter than You Think", and covers Howard Gardner and the theory of Multiple Intelligences. With MI theory featured in a prominent English text book, MI will be able to reach a wider audience and a new generation of students in Japan.
Notes by Howard Gardner
I recently read the Science Magazine discussion of Anil Ananthaswamy's "The Man Who Wasn't There". This spurred me to write the following response. The original article can be found here.
Of the various intelligences, intrapersonal intelligence—understanding of self—has always been the most difficult to describe, conceptualize, and measure. After all, who is qualified to judge how well a person understands himself or herself? I often quip that only Person X’s therapist can assess how well Person X understands Person X. But of course that assumes that the therapist has good INTER-personal intelligence. Anyway, this book is one of the first attempts of which I’m aware that provides neurological and psychological insights into the understanding of self. It does not answer any questions, but it raises some of the right ones.
