MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES

A potpourri of previously published articles and lectures, as well as chapters written specifically for this book—all explaining what the theory of multiple intelligences is and how it can be applied in today's schools. A decade ago, Gardner (Education/Harvard; The Unschooled Mind, 1991, etc.) put forward the idea that intelligence should be measured in more ways than through verbal and math tests that are standard for schools. He postulated seven basic ``intelligences,'' including language and logical-mathematical but also kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and spatial. Gardner gives all seven equal weight—but schools and testing institutions don't. Hence, children who are weak in language and math skills but strong in musical or interpersonal ``intelligence'' will suffer in the traditional classroom. Here, the author attempts to show how schools can address those differences so that students will be happier, more productive, and more able to cope with life. Except for a chapter on the Key School in Indianapolis, which has built its curriculum and method of teaching around multiple intelligences, teachers and administrators won't find a how-to on restructuring their classrooms here. Look to apprentice and museum programs and to the community for that, says Gardner (somewhat vaguely), leaving schools' options wide open. Strongest here are discussions of how to reframe testing and assessment methods and of how the limited view of intelligence can defeat both student and teacher. Research at Harvard's Project Zero (which Gardner directs) has developed new assessment materials, explained here, that help to measure all seven intelligences. Repetitious, thanks to its format; but even so a good introduction, along with Gardner's Frames of Mind (1983), to the theory of multiple intelligences.