MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES

ELISA L. GARCIA

Just as the concept of multiple strategies has improved understanding of children’s learning and influenced approaches to education, so, too, has the growing interest in multiple forms of intelligence. In his theory of multiple intelligence, Gardner(1983,1991) proposed the existence of seven relatively autonomous intelligences: linguistic, logical, musical, spatial, bodily kinesthetic, interpersonal, and intrapersonal. Recently Gardner(1997) proposed an eight intelligence, “naturalistic”. The first two intelligences are those typically tapped on tests and most valued in schools.

The theory of multiple intelligences was developed as a psychological theory, but it sparked a great deal of interest among educators, in this country and abroad, in its implications for teaching and learning. The experimental educational programs based on the theory have focused generally in two ways. Some educators believe that all children should have each intelligence nurtured; on this basis, they have devise curricula that address each intelligence directly. Other educators have focused on the development of specific intelligences, like the personal ones, because they believe these intelligences, receive short shrift Philippine education. These are strengths and weaknesses to each approach.

The application of multiple intelligences to education is a grass roots movement among teachers that is only just beginning. An interesting development is the attempt to modify traditional curricula: whether one is teaching history, science, or the arts, the theory of multiple intelligences offers a teacher a number of different approaches to the topic, several modes of representing key concepts, and a variety of ways.

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The author is SST I at San Vicente National High School, San Vicente, Lu bao