How can the Multiple Intelligences be implemented in the classroom?

To implement Gardner’s theory in an educational setting, I organized my third grade classroom in Marysville, Washington, into seven learning centers, each dedicated to one of the seven intelligences. The students spend approximately two-thirds of each school day moving through the centers – 15 to 20 minutes at each center. Curriculum is thematic, and the centers provide seven different ways for the students to learn the subject matter.

Each day begins with a brief lecture and discussion explaining one aspect of the current theme. For example, during a unit on outer space, the morning’s lecture might focus on spiral galaxies. In a unit about the arts of Africa, one lecture might describe the Adinkra textile patterns of Ghana. After the morning lecture, a timer is set and students – in groups of three or four – start work at their centers, eventually rotating through all seven.

What kinds of learning activities take place at each center?

All students learn each day’s lesson in seven ways. They build models, dance, make collaborative decisions, create songs, solve deductive reasoning problems, read, write, and illustrate all in one school day. Some more specific examples of activities at each center follow:

§  In the Personal Work Center (Intrapersonal Intelligence), students explore the present area of study through research, reflection, or individual projects.

§  In the Working Together Center (Interpersonal Intelligence), they develop cooperative learning skills as they solve problems, answer questions, create learning games, brainstorm ideas and discuss that day’s topic collaboratively.

§  In the Music Center (Musical Intelligence), students compose and sing songs about the subject matter, make their own instruments, and learn in rhythmical ways.

§  In the Art Center (Spatial Intelligence), they explore a subject area using diverse art media, manipulables, puzzles, charts, and pictures.

§  In the Building Center (Kinesthetic Intelligence), they build models, dramatize events, and dance, all in ways that relate to the content of that day’s subject matter.

§  In the Reading Center (Verbal/Linguistic Intelligence), students read, write, and learn in many traditional modes. They analyze and organize information in written form.

§  In the Math & Science Center (Logical/ Mathematical Intelligence), they work with math games, manipulatives, mathematical concepts, science experiments, deductive reasoning, and problem solving.

Following their work at the centers, a few minutes are set aside for groups and individual students to share their work from the centers. Much of the remainder of the day is spent with students working on independent projects, either individually or in small groups where they apply the diverse skills developed at the centers. The daily work at the seven centers profoundly influences their ability to make informative, entertaining, multimodal presentations of their studies. Additionally, it is common for parents to comment on how much more expressive their children have become at home.

 http://www.context.org/iclib/ic27/campbell/

Strategies and techniques.


It is necessary to consider the students`s learning styles for applying some strategies, methods, and techniques.

The activities that teachers can apply in classroom must be taking into account how the students learn easier and what are the activities they most like. On the other hand, teachers must be creative at the time to apply the activities, and also try to involve the students in each one of them.

For example: If we teach kinesthetic students, we need to apply activities in which they can not only make movements, but also create things with their hands. An exampe of it can be:

Carry out a box with recycled material to the classroom; or ask the students for carrying out any recycled material. What we can teach with this? We can teach “jobs and occupations” in which they use this recicled material, and create something that identify the job that they have chosen. For example: if he/she is a taxi driver, the student can create a steering Wheel with the recycled material.

Learners Characteristics

There are some characteristics the students have which teachers must consider for teaching a second language, in this case English.

There are auditory learners:  Auditory learners must be able to hear what is being said in order to understand what is being teaching. They also use their listening and repeating skills to sort through the information that is sent to them.

Visual learners

Visual learners attend to information most effectively when they see      something, for example, pictures, diagrams, films and videos or demonstrations.

What do they prefer at the time to learn?

Remember what they see rather than what they hear Remember diagrams and pictures Prefer to read and write rather than listen Have trouble remembering verbal instructions Need an overall view and purpose before beginning a project Like art more than music Sometimes tune out when trying to pay attention. Kinesthetic learners. They enjoy school activities such as drawing, modeling, sculpting, drafting, shop, athletics, dance, and hands-on sciences. Bodily kinesthetic learners enjoy creating work with their hands, may have a lot of energy and need to move, and may be talented athletes

How to teach beginners?

This is a link about how to teach beginners.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_UiC2_UZlts

Teaching reading.

Reading is an interactive process that goes on between the reader and the text, resulting in comprehension. The text presents letters, words, sentences, and paragraphs that encode meaning. The reader uses knowledge, skills, and strategies to determine what that meaning is.




Both teacher and students need to know some rules and strategies at the time to read, if the teacher want to encourage his/her student to read; it is necessary to provide them readings about their likes, for example: novels, short stories, tongue twisters, poems, verses, magazines, and so on. Another strategy that can be used is to give the students a piece of paper with a word at the beginning of the class, in which they can give a little information about that or infer something from it. 

Teaching writing.

Cohesion and coherence are the most important points in any written text, being cohesive and coherent means that the writer has to give sense and clarity to a text joining sentences, words and ideas; by using synonyms, pronouns and transitional words.

Teachers must encourage the students to write because some of them do not like to write, so the activities that teacher should apply can be: compositions, writing stories and essays but if those activities seems to bored or difficult for them; they can write short texts about a real life situation, the idea is that they can feel free to write and in this way the teacher can check their mistakes. 

Teaching speaking.

Produce fluent speech at different rates of delivery...

What does it means? It means that it is necessary to speak, or to read something in a correct speed, no so slow and no so fast! being fluent does not means that we have to be as fast as we can... fluency in speech is related to speak in a normal way but taking into consideration the tone, rhythm, accent, intonation and stressed patterns and also use pauses when it is necessary. 

What teachers need to do is to involve the students in different situations, in which they can talk freely using their own words, for example: conversations, dialogues, role plays, and oral presentations about a theme they most like; in this way they can be more fluent and can correct and monitor themselves without worries. Besides if the activity is not evaluated it could be better because the students do not get nervous or afraid, and at the end the teacher can give them a feedback about how was his/her presentation and how they can improve it.