From Chimera to Prometheus: An Application of Multiple Intelligences in Greece

BY Vasileios Zagkotas

Throughout my career in Greek Primary Education, I have encountered many students who struggled significantly with schoolwork. As a result, I would informally label these students as “weak” and try to help them adapt to the classroom teaching framework. I focused the main problem on their inability to respond to the language lessons, as I found that they could not read well and, therefore, were unable to understand texts and explanations. Although I tried to comfort their parents by telling them that “this type of school is not effective for these students because they think differently”, this was something I didn't really believe. I felt like I was chasing the chimera, that just as it was impossible for anyone to locate this mythological creature, so it was also impossible for me to effectively help these students.

The Chimera on a red-red-figure Apulian plate, c. 350–340 BC (Musée du Louvre)
By Lampas Group - Jastrow (2006), Public Domain

When I came across MI Theory, my perspective changed. The Greek educational system’s curricula and textbooks are focused on Linguistic and Logical-Mathematical Intelligence. Therefore, students who perceive the world in different ways tend to fail. MI theory convinced me to change my teaching practices. The first area I tried to help students was homework. I asked them to find musical pieces to accompany a linguistic or a history text, to dramatize a dialogue between historical figures, or to write a diary of emotions of a fictional character. The result was not exactly spectacular, but I gradually saw in these students a new willingness to participate in schoolwork.

A new role of Educational Counselor helped me move to undertake research on the applicability of the MI Theory. At a postdoctoral research level in the Department of Philology at the University of Ioannina, Greece, I designed a research project to apply MI Theory in secondary school homework practices.

I chose the field of homework assignments. I designed the research with a simple idea: teachers should make homework assignments based on MI Theory; students should work on them; teachers should record the students' responses, their comments and progress. Finally, the researcher should record his own reactions.

A significant issue was the relative unfamiliarity of many educators with MI Theory. I, therefore, created a tool that can be roughly translated as a “Toolbox of homework for the cultivation of Multiple Intelligences”. It consisted of eight tables—one for each type of intelligence—which provided educators with suggestions for assigning homework, such as “ask students to write an alternative ending to the story” or “to demonstrate a living picture” or “instruct students to organize a debate”, etc. The Toolbox was used in several educational settings. I identified willing volunteers and trained them informally.

I created a case study. All that was needed now was to train the volunteers, which I did myself by visiting the schools. I decided not to use any initial screening test for the “strong” and “weak” types of intelligence for the students. I was almost certain that the parents would be hesitant. Instead, I decided to use the tasks themselves as a means of assessment. I observed the students' behavior and performance during the activities, and I also collected their work samples. This allowed me to get a more holistic view of their strengths and weaknesses.

In the first phase, students completed a 15-item self-report questionnaire about homework. The results showed that students see homework as a way to understand what they learned in class and to prepare for the next lesson. They also believe that doing their homework makes them more acceptable to their teachers and helps them get good grades. However, they did not agree with the view that homework gives them opportunities to work with classmates, learn from them, and—to a lesser extent—cultivate character in their studies, such as self-discipline or systematic study. The same questionnaire was given after the completion of the research in order to investigate whether exposure to MI Theory changed their views on homework.

The teachers then used the “Toolkit” to get ideas and create worksheets for chapters of their choice. Some teachers chose Ancient Greek History, others Modern Greek Literature, and others Language (Ancient or Modern Greek). In the worksheets, they included tasks for each type of Intelligence. They then asked the students to work on no fewer than four tasks of their choice. I should note here that there were quite a few teachers who asked for my help—which I was pleased to provide.

A few sample assignments:

One teacher introduced “A Night at the Museum”. The students were given the following scenario: “The ancient Greek statues of the Kouros of Anavyssos and the Kore of Phrasikleia are placed opposite each other in a room of the archaeological museum. In a magical way, they can perceive what is happening around them but they cannot speak when there are visitors to the museum”. The students were asked to write a short diary of thoughts for each of the statues for a period of one week. The assignment was made available to the students, with the option of oral or written presentation and in pairs of boys and girls or individually. Additionally, the students could dramatize a dialogue between the statues when the museum is empty of visitors, in order for the representation of the statues' stances to help them understand the need for support of the statue (forward proposal of the foot). With this assignment, the students were asked to put themselves in the shoes of the statues and, through the interpretation of the statues' thoughts and feelings, to come into contact with their own feelings. Therefore, this particular assignment incorporated elements of Intrapersonal and Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence.

Dinos vase. Photo by Jastrow - Public Domain

Another assignment, drawing on Naturalistic and Spatial intelligences, asked students to paint a geometric and an archaic vessel (preferably an amphora, a pithos, or a hydria due to their large size) with scenes from Greek flora and fauna. Subsequently, they could create a small painting exhibition in the classroom. With this homework activity, the students had the opportunity to express their interest in the environment in a creative way. At the same time, they needed to research the characteristics and techniques of ancient pottery, adopting the shapes and patterns of the era. For this reason, this specific activity had a complex character, as students had to first consider the techniques and colors and then the theme of decorating the vessel. In my view students made meritorious creations. Some made videos: here’s one a: http://1gym-ioann.ioa.sch.gr/autosch/joomla15/draseis/502-zografizontas-to-mathima- tis-istorias.

The students' response to this and similar assignments was quite similar: at first they expressed confusion about the new type of homework, then they identified potential difficulties and finally they responded successfully, stating that they enjoyed it and that they would continue to choose such assignments. From interviews, we learned that teachers were able to detect some of the students' inclinations through their preferences. They found the “Toolbox” we created quite useful, but they also expressed the opinion that the new type of assignments does not favor the evaluation of students as it is done now, i.e. with grades in written exams. That point conceded, this research suggests that such a change is feasible and ought to be contemplated for the Greek educational system.

Such interventions continued for three months. The teachers concluded that the students improved their performance as they became familiar with the new type of tasks. The most important thing: several teachers emphasized that these tasks aroused the students' interest and that they participated actively in the process, i.e. they did the homework, even students who normally did not participate in the lesson. It seems, therefore, that the approach through MI constituted a successful path to an individual’s “entry point”.

Another important and unexpected finding: students who showed greater interest in the tasks created within the MI framework seemed to tend towards Intrapersonal and Interpersonal Intelligence. Specifically, they preferred to deal with diaries or to exchange arguments and, in any case, beyond the “paper/pencil” logic of school textbooks, which teachers themselves gradually began to view more critically. These developments pleasantly surprised the teachers. In addition, the questionnaire given to the students after the implementation of the “Toolkit” revealed a small increase in their interest in homework, but mainly a greater belief in cooperation between classmates.

Stepping back, from my experience as an educator, I know that few students like homework. Greek students are burdened with many extracurricular activities and their time is limited. I was encouraged by the results of this modest intervention. At a recent educational conference in Greece, I used some of these assignments to transform some chapters of the school history textbooks into an “MI-friendly” approach. The response of the teachers was touching. Many asked to learn more about the theory and its applications. Additionally, I seek to train as many teachers as I can in MI Theory and the possibilities it offers to get to know their students better.

In this text, I share my own experience and I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Dr. Howard Gardner for his overall interest, support and editing contribution. For the same reasons, I would like to thank his assistant, Shinri Furuzawa. Finally, the contribution and guidance of Dr. Ioannis Fykaris was invaluable.

As a result of this modest intervention, I feel encouraged. The more I examined the students' work, the more I came to believe in them. I realized, therefore, that the MI applications are not a chimera—rather an act of Prometheus, who gave the gift of fire to humans.

Research details:

Title of post-doctoral research: “The Didactic Contribution of Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences to the Structure and Organization of Homework in the Philological Subjects of the Gymnasium” (2024).

Author: Dr. Vasileios Zagkotas, Educational Counselor, Historian, Phd in Educational Sciences, University of Ioannina, Greece.

Supervisor: Dr. Ioannis Fykaris, Associate Professor, Department of Philology, University of Ioannina, Greece.

Are Actors Smart?

Howard Gardner © 2024

You may find that question provocative! If so, please read on.

For decades, I was quite friendly with Carleton Gajdusek. On almost any definition, he was brilliant. In addition to having received the Nobel Prize for Medicine and Physiology in 1976, he spoke numerous languages, was an expert on several cultures in the South Pacific, and was as well-read as any professor in the arts and humanities. In fact, with his approval, I was writing his authorized biography when something happened that caused me to stop…forever.

I’ll get to that definitive disruption near the end of this blog.

Marilyn Monroe

Once, in conversation, Carleton said to me: “Don’t think for a minute that actors are stupid, they are actually very smart. Marilyn Monroe would not have gotten as far as she did, in the way that she did, if she hadn’t been very smart.”

I probably would not have remembered that comment, except that recently I’ve been involved in discussions with psychometricians who have a quite specific definition of what it means to be smart. In a phrase, it means that you do well on an IQ test—or one of its equivalents, like the SAT from the Educational Testing Service. And if you don’t score well, then you can’t be smart, at least according to what psychometricians call “high intelligence.”

As most readers will know, decades ago, I put forth a different view of intelligence—a pluralistic view called “the theory of multiple intelligences.” And once you have embraced that concept, it’s possible to return to my question in a more thoughtful way.

Dr. Thalia Goldstein, PhD

Chatting with my wife Ellen Winner, I was reminded of the quite original research carried out by Dr. Thalia Goldstein, at one time Ellen’s doctoral student. (Thalia is now a professor at George Mason University). For her first empirical study, Thalia conducted substantive interviews with eleven actors who had achieved some success in their profession. As a comparison group, she conducted similar interviews with an equal cohort of eleven well-established lawyers.

Not surprisingly, the lawyers fit the stereotype of intelligence as it is seen and measured by many psychologists. That is, the lawyers presumptively have a high IQ—they would perform well on IQ tests and other academic measures like the SAT or the Bar Exams.

In my terminology, lawyers typically exhibit linguistic and logical-mathematical intelligences. In fact, I sometimes quip that a law professor is the prototype of a high-IQ person, because they are often good with language and can think logically. In contrast, a humanities professor necessarily excels with sensitivity to language; a math professor necessarily is an expert in logical-mathematical thinking—but the respective complementary intelligences are optional, or at least not vital. Indeed, individuals displaying the most extreme examples of linguistic intelligence, or of logical-mathematical intelligence, rarely stand out with respect to the other intelligences.

So, what about actors? According to Thalia Goldstein’s and Ellen Winner’s analysis, what stands out in the case of actors is their personal history. From an early age, future performers observed other people carefully and often sought to imitate them faithfully. These future actors often felt alienated from their family and its surrounds and aspired to lead a different kind of life—often imagining it and trying to enact, readily envisioning alternative (fictional) worlds. Typically, the actors did not like school, where they were expected to follow the norms of the classroom, do the work that was assigned, and not to dream or act out. Put more generally, they sought a different kind of existence and found the stage or the screen a place where—despite typical discouragement from their parents—they could enact different personae, ones unlike their own.

The research confirmed: In all of these respects, the eleven actors differed from the eleven lawyers.

Donning the lens of “MI theory,” what else might one say?

Naturally, if a young person wants eventually to become an actor on the theatrical stage, she or he has to have a good memory for lines—this facility with language is less important in television or movies, where one need not memorize large amounts of text. Still, a person with poor linguistic memory would unlikely be attracted to performance—unless as a mime or as an actor (say, Buster Keaton) at a time when “pictures” were silent. As for logical-mathematical intelligence, that’s fine—but it is an option, rather than a requirement, unless a budding actor should want to be one’s own agent or start one’s own production country or play the stock market successfully.

As for the other intelligences: Depending on what kind of actor a young person aspires to, one would need musical intelligence (to be involved in musicals or the opera), bodily-kinesthetic intelligence with the desired stances, moves, gestures—both of the body as a whole and of particular limbs—and spatial intelligence (if one’s stance vis-à-vis the audience, the other performers, the camera, etc. is critical).

Just as performers need to draw on various intelligences, different performing venues also foreground different configurations of intelligences.

We can look at these configurations in another way: By the age of 10 or 12—and sometimes much earlier—one should be able to predict who is likely to become a performer, and who is likely to become a lawyer. The latter young persons typically like schools, do well in academic matters, and do not have much of a fantasy life—though presumably some of them like to argue!

Getting back to Carleton Gajdusek’s admonition. He would not have been correct if he had claimed that actors need to have the same intellectual profile as lawyers. But if—borrowing the language of multiple intelligences—Carleton had spoken about a combination of linguistic intelligence and personal intelligences, with the option of musical or bodily-kinesthetic or spatial intelligence, he would have been on the mar!

Alas, despite Carleton’s lavish cognitive gifts, he unfortunately behaved abhorrently. He adopted many youngsters—almost all boys—from islands in the South seas and raised them in suburban Virginia. He abused some of them, was arrested and convicted of pedophilia, and after several months in an American jail, spent his last years essentially in exile in Norway.

And of course, Marilyn Monroe came to an equally unhappy fate—at the age of 36, she overdosed on barbiturates.

Whatever form of brilliance you may have, it’s no guarantee that you will lead a long or a happy life. And indeed, the fate of so many television and movie performers—more so women than men, I believe—confirms that depressing ending. Even an abundance of intelligences is no guarantor of a well-lived life—what I would term a “life of good work.”

A more general takeaway

As readers of this blog know, many psychologists and psychometricians believe that the IQ test (with its general factor) can predict success across the vocational landscape (see an example of this I recently blogged about, linked here.) To be sure, no one would readily decline the gifts of linguistic and logical-mathematical intelligences. But to simply conclude that actors are smart, or that actors are dull is simplistic. One needs instead to ask what kind of an actor and what configuration of intellectual strengths.

Reference

Goldstein, T. R., & Winner, E. (2009). Living in alternative and inner worlds: Early signs of acting talent. Creativity Research Journal, 21(1), 117–124. 

Existential intelligence: A Traveler in Outer Space?

By Howard Gardner

A recent op ed in The New York Times (link here) caught my attention. Apparently NASA is looking for astronauts for the next phase of space exploration. According to author, Joseph O. Chapa, the hiring committee is likely to look for scientists and engineers. Given the hiring pattern in the past, this is an understandable predilection—or bias.

Photo by NASA

But Chapa believes that tack is a mistake. Now that our species has figured out how to navigate space, we need the expertise of many other disciplines. As he puts it:

“[We] will require thoughtful inquiry from many disciplines. We will need sociologists and anthropologists to help us imagine new communities; theologians and linguists if we find we are not alone in the universe; political and legal theorists to sort out the governing principles of interstellar life.”

As a one time student of Harvard’s Social Relations department, and as a long time wanderer across the disciplinary landscape, I find this vision appealing. But what really stirred me in Chapa’s essay is his contention that such teams of space explorers could benefit from his own discipline—philosophy.

By his account, some of the greatest philosophical discoveries emerged because the authors had encountered very challenging conditions. Stoics had faced slavery; Thomas Hobbes had been trapped in England’s Civil War (of the 17th century); Hannah Arendt’s insights into totalitarianism came from mortal vulnerabilities in the Nazi era, even as her concept of the “banality of evil” emerged as she covered the trial of Holocaust perpetrator, Adolf Eichman.

In this era of increasingly smart machines, I often ponder which of our multiple intelligences can be easily and adequately replicated by ChatGPT and other large language models. It seems clear to me that the standard academic intelligences: linguistic and logical-mathematical, are well replicated by these instruments—as they were even decades ago. I’d probably add musical intelligence to the list as well.

Other intelligences present a more complex picture. I am not confident, for example, that a computational system can exhibit intrapersonal intelligence; and I don’t think that the bodily-kinesthetic intelligence exhibited by even the best designed robot would have interesting or revealing analogues to human bodily-kinesthestic intelligence.

As I have described it, existential intelligence entails the positing and pondering of the biggest questions—the meaning of life, of death, of love, of hatred, of other facets of the human condition. We look not only to philosophers, but also to poets and painters, to visit and revisit these questions and, as feasible, to put forth tentative answers… about which we can and will reflect, debate, and perhaps replace. 

Until this point in recorded history, our thoughts, reflections, questions, and tentative answers were all based on our imaginations—and if we posited such questions to a large language model, it would no doubt come up with the same kinds of answers as our most imaginative human beings have done.

But once astronauts, as “advance-guard human beings,” actually begin to explore the broader expanse of the universe, I suspect—indeed, I anticipate—that members of our species will pose, ponder, and perhaps provide at least provisional answers to a whole new set of puzzles and quandaries. No doubt LLMs will help in this endeavor, but it will be actually experiencing human beings who will be in the privileged position to visit and revisit what it means truly to exist beyond the surface and the experience of our own planet and our own species.

I ask the sponsors of such voyages—be they governments (like the US or China) or billionaires (like Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk)—to preserve a few places for philosophers and a few niches for existential intellects.

Cover photo by Brian McGowan on Unsplash

The Scaling of MI Theory

BY SHINRI FURUZAWA

When Howard Gardner first published Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences in 1983, he could not have predicted the reach and influence this work would have. MI theory has undoubtedly changed the way many people think of human intelligence; and its impact, particularly on the world of education, has been striking. 

 MI theory is based on evidence in support of the following propositions:

• Individuals can have many kinds of intelligences (one could call these talents, abilities, or skills) which may be useful to society.

• A single measure, such as an IQ test or SAT exam, is inadequate for determining an individual’s capabilities and potential.

The main implications for education:

• Any subject can be approached in many ways to access and take advantage of different intelligences (pluralization).

• Teaching can be tailored to a student’s intelligences (individuation).

The impact MI theory has had is different from other education research endeavors from Harvard Project Zero, the research organization at Harvard Graduate School of Education with which Gardner has been associated for almost 6o years. MI theory was not accompanied by educational frameworks and tools as with most Project Zero endeavors. In addition, there are no “Gardner-approved” tests, textbooks, or curricula based on the theory. The closest Gardner has come to developing such tools was the creation of Project Spectrum materials for children aged 3-7.

One measure of success for education research and practice is how specific ideas and approaches are brought to scale. In the article, The Multiple Meanings of Scale: Implications for Researchers and Practitioners, the authors Morel et al. explore a typology of scale: adoption, replication, adaptation, and reinvention. Through these conceptualizations, I propose to explore the scaling of MI theory. 

Adoption

Multiple Intelligences International School, Quezon City, Philippines

Adoption as a concept of scale defined by Morel et al. is when new ideas that may contradict the consensus opinion result in changing assumptions and practices. Even when adoption is superficial, there may be a “network effect” which can be cumulative and lead to wider spread adoption. 

There are thousands of educational institutions worldwide that have been influenced by MI theory. More impressive, there have also been numerous schools around the world founded on its principles. Prominent among them are the Indianapolis Key Learning Community under Pat Bolanos, and New City School in St Louis, Missouri, under Tom Hoerr. Just a few examples of MI schools outside the US include: Multiple Intelligences International School (Quezon City, Philippines), Golden Bells MI School (Delhi, India), Howard Gardner School (Cesar, Colombia), and Multiple Intelligence School (Fiji).

Policymakers around the world have promoted progressive approaches to education based on MI theory to varying degrees in England, Scotland, China, Korea, and Norway. The book, Multiple Intelligences Around the World, edited by Jie-Qi Chen, Seana Moran, and Howard Gardner includes chapters on how MI ideas have been adopted at schools, communities, and countries across the globe. The book coalesced in 2006 after Branton Shearer organized a symposium on global perspectives on MI with the American Educational Research Association. Several of the participants were asked to write about their experiences for the book.

In recent years, due to the leadership of Professor Rex Li, Hong Kong has become a center for MI educational practice and research. Li has published Research MI Magazine since 2021 and founded the Multiple Intelligences School Network. Li has also organized three International MI Education Forums, most recently in 2023, bringing together MI researchers and practitioners from around the world.

Importance of Context

Why has MI theory been adopted in some countries but not others? Gardner has analyzed the conditions required for adoption in terms of the metaphor of “fertile soil.” In some cases, the soil may be “unfertile”—as, for example when institutions are pursuing goals hostile to progressive education (e.g., focusing only on test scores). In other cases, the soil may be initially “resistant” to MI, but come eventually to absorb the ideas. And sometimes the soil may be fertile with interest in progressive ideas, but the system already in place is perceived to be working well.

The education landscape tends to be most fertile when policymakers are actively seeking new pedagogies. This may be due to reasons such as:

• Recognition that the education system has too narrow a focus e.g. on STEM at the expense of arts and humanities, or that it is not catering to certain students e.g. those who are gifted, or exhibit learning differences.

• Desire for more democratic values as a reaction to a repressive political context e.g. as in Argentina or Romania.

Replication

In terms of replication as a concept of scale, an education innovation is considered to have scaled when it is widespread and implemented faithfully with predicted results.

Frames of Mind in Romanian

Gardner’s words and ideas have certainly been replicated around the world, though whether those ideas have been implemented faithfully with expected results would be impossible to measure. Gardner’s books on MI theory have been translated into multiple languages, including: Arabic, Chinese, Czech, French, German, Georgian, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Slovenian, Spanish, Swedish, and Vietnamese. He has been invited to visit many of these countries and is also in regular contact with educators from across the globe. However, Gardner is not and cannot be responsible for the appropriateness or the success of the implementations.

Books on MI theory and its application by other authors, such as Thomas Armstrong, Tom Hoerr, David Lazear, Mindy Kornhaber, and Linda and Bruce Campbell, have led to what Gardner has lightly dubbed an “MI industry.” There are also many books on MI written in other languages, especially Chinese. Hundreds—perhaps thousands—of doctoral theses and scholarly articles have also been written about MI theory.

Adaptation

Another conceptualization of scale is when an innovation is adapted or modified to meet local needs. As noted, Gardner has never prescribed a curriculum or test. He had no wish to micro-manage; rather he hoped to encourage people to implement MI theory in ways that made sense to them. As he explains,

“There is wisdom in not trying to control what people do with one’s ideas.” 

In the absence of an official MI test, many have developed their own measurement instruments, the best known of which is Branton Shearer’s MIDAS test. Some kind of assessment instrument is often sought by educators and policymakers. Gardner is not opposed to such measurements and often mentions them to educators. He advises the use of triangulation to make use of different sources of data e.g. teacher assessment, self-assessment, and parental input.

More generally, Gardner believes performance measures that involve demonstrating an intelligence (rather than written tests) are the most reliable, e.g. observing how individuals handle conflict to assess interpersonal intelligence, or how they learn routes in a new environment to assess spatial intelligence. Self-assessment by itself is not as reliable; people are not necessarily insightful about themselves and may confuse likes and preferences with their actual strengths.

In the absence of an official MI curriculum, many companies and institutions have developed their own. From a simple internet search, examples include Tutor Time, Positive Action, The Complete Daily Curriculum for Early Childhood, and many others. None are endorsed by Gardner—indeed Gardner never endorses any commercial project as a matter of principle.

Of course, many teachers incorporate the two educational principles of MI theory, individuation and pluralization, into daily practice without use of a particular curriculum. Some examples of the ways in which teachers have used MI theory to meet their student needs can be found here, here, and here. 

Reinvention

Reinvention is a concept of scale which denotes an innovation that transforms into other new ideas or innovation. When it comes to MI theory, perhaps the best example of this is Daniel Goleman’s idea of emotional intelligence. His book, Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, was published in 1995, twelve years after Frames of Mind and is based on some of the same principles and findings as MI theory. A bestseller in multiple countries, Goleman’s book helped popularize the idea that there is more than one intelligence. “Emotional intelligence” can be described loosely as a combination of Gardner’s interpersonal and intrapersonal intelligences with the addition of a value component. Goleman would claim that it’s necessarily good to have emotional intelligence, while Gardner would respond that any intelligence can be used constructively or destructively. Goleman’s later ecological intelligence can be linked to Gardner’s naturalist intelligence. Many people have suggested other intelligences over the years, such as digital intelligence, business intelligence, or humor intelligence. However, Gardner’s intelligences are based on strict criteria for what constitutes an intelligence. As detailed in Frames of Mind, an intelligence must have:

1. identifiable core operation(s);

2. evolutionary history and plausibility;

3. recognizable end-state and distinctive developmental trajectory;

4. existence of savants, prodigies and other individuals distinguished by the presence or absence of specific abilities;

5. potential isolation by brain damage;

6. support from experimental psychological tasks;

7. support from psychometric findings;

8. susceptibility to encoding in a symbol system.

Most suggested new intelligences would not meet these criteria.

Lethal Mutation

One potential issue mentioned by Morel et al. in their conceptualizations of scale is lethal mutation. In this case, an innovation is adopted but misapplied or misunderstood, often in such a way that it runs counter to the ideas behind the initial innovation. As Gardner writes in A Synthesizing Mind,

“Once you launch a meme in the wider world, particularly one that can be easily summarized if not synthesized, you simply cannot control its trajectories.” 

One example of this is dermatoglyphics, the erroneous (indeed ludicrous) idea that an individual’s fingerprints reveal their intelligences. Another example is the education program in Australia that used MI theory to classify ethnic groups according to which intelligences they may or may not have. Gardner appeared on television in Australia to publicly repudiate this idea.

Other misrepresentations of MI theory have recently been described in this blog post by Annie Stachura. Some examples include confusing MI with learning styles, including an intelligence that is not part of Gardner’s theory, thinking that intelligences are linked to stages of development, and thinking that all individuals excel in at least one intelligence.

Conclusion

While scaling can be an indicator of success, it is essential to look beyond expansion metrics. Success in education requires a balance between reaching more learners and ensuring that the quality of educational experiences are maintained or enhanced. In addition to the importance of pluralization and individuation, MI theory acknowledges intelligences that are not conventionally academic, such as interpersonal; this acknowledgement has in turn led to a greater emphasis on developing skills such as collaboration and critical thinking and has provided a strong foundation for inclusive education practices. By recognizing that students have different intelligences, educators are better equipped to support learners with different strengths and weaknesses. This inclusivity helps to ensure that all students have the opportunity to succeed in their own ways and on their own terms. 

The impact of MI theory is so widespread that many people accept its principles without knowing the name Howard Gardner or without having heard of the phrase “multiple intelligences.” And Gardner is happy with that outcome. He once explained the enormous impact of MI theory with typical modesty as, “an idea whose time had come.” 

I would like to thank Howard Gardner, Ellen Winner, and Annie Stachura for their valuable comments and suggestions on an earlier version of this blog post.

References

Chen, J.-Q., Moran, S., & Gardner, H. (2009). Multiple intelligences around the world (1st ed.).

Jossey-Bass.

Gardner, H. (2011). Frames of Mind: The theory of multiple intelligences. Basic Books.

Gardner, H. (2020). A Synthesizing Mind: A memoir from the creator of multiple intelligences

theory. The MIT Press.

Gardner, H., Feldman, D. H., Krechevsky, M., Chen, J.-Q., & Harvard Project Zero. (1998).

 Project Zero Frameworks for Early Childhood Education. Teachers College Press.

Morel, R. P., Coburn, C., Catterson, A. K., & Higgs, J. (2019). The Multiple Meanings of Scale:

Implications for Researchers and Practitioners. Educational Researcher, 48(6), 369–377.

https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X19860531

Banner Photo by Koen Emmers on Unsplash

Multiple Intelligences—A Pre-historical Perspective: Thoughts Inspired by the Writings of David Geary

Howard Gardner © 2024

When I developed the theory of multiple intelligences over forty years ago, I garnered “data” from several disciplines: psychology, neuroscience, genetics, anthropology, and—though it was not emphasized—my own observations and reflections as a presumably educated person in modern society. The assertion that Homo sapiens could be described as a species that has a number of relatively distinct—I dubbed them “semi-autonomous”—capacities caught attention. I would now comment that the theory was accepted too uncritically by many educators, while it was rejected out of hand by too many psychologists (as well as some scholars from neighboring disciplines), who neither bothered to read what I had claimed nor to engage the “data” that I had culled.

The “theory of multiple intelligences” was clearly—if not self-consciously—a work of synthesis. I continue to be fascinated by the human capacity to synthesize large amounts of information and to present the resulting collation or amalgam in a comprehensible format. (See my blog dedicated to the topic).

That said, I did not consider two possibly informative perspectives. On one hand, while I wrote about informal, so-called “bush schools”—prevalent in earlier epochs—I focused primarily on education as it is practiced in modern times. Indeed, most of my successive writings about “MI” have assumed and addressed modern schools located primarily in what’s been termed the “global north.” On the other hand, while certainly aware of biological and cultural evolution, I was writing about human beings in the last few millennia—I did not consider the evolution of Homo sapiens, nor earlier instantiations of the hominin branch.

David Geary

Though familiar with his significant research on the development of mathematical knowledge and skills in young people, I did not know about a notable interest of psychologist David Geary. In a 2005 book of 450 pages, Geary surveyed The Origin of Mind: Evolution of Brain, Cognition, and General Intelligence. And then, in a shorter Cambridge Elements book (2024), Geary probed The Evolved Mind and Modern Education: Status of Evolutionary Educational Psychology.

In no way can I summarize the argument, findings, and claims of these two estimable writings, which are well worth study for those with the time and the interest. Here, I focus on how Geary’s work—and the hundreds of publications on which he draws—has affected my own thinking about “MI theory.”

If one were to have observed our hominin predecessors say, ten thousand years ago, one would presumably have observed manifestations of all of my stipulated intelligences. These hominins spoke and understood (linguistic); they could estimate numbers and exchange quantities (mathematical); they could indicate when an utterance made sense and when it was nonsensical or contradictory—including, presumably, jokes (logical); they could sing, appreciate music, and play on simple instruments (musical); they could walk, run, dance, climb, and play rough-and-tumble games (bodily-kinesthetic); they could distinguish species from one another (naturalist); they could figure out when other hominins liked them, disliked them, were trying to fool or trap them (interpersonal); and, at least to an extent, they knew what had happened to themselves (as opposed to other conspecifics including their own family members, how they felt about such events, and what they aspired to (intrapersonal).

For me, Geary’s work opens up a new vista: What does it take for members of our species to navigate in our modern schools, with their curricula and their mode of operations—a world where one is expected to read, to write, to carry out arithmetical and geometric computation, to sing from a score or produce a simple notation, to identify the logical flaws in an argument, to recognize, name, and classify a wide variety of plants and animals—as well as vehicles and commercial items—to be aware of the wide variety of human temperaments and motivations, deal with individuals who display unexpected combinations of these traits, and finally, to reflect on one’s own aspirations, defenses, gains and losses in the past, and one’s own future life course—especially apart from religious precepts and dictates which might deny one’s own individuality and/or that of other members of our species.

To pose these questions is to lay out an entirely different perspective on multiple intelligences. Instead of being solely synchronic (What do human intelligences look like in a modern schooled world?), we adopt a lens that is diachronic (How did our species evolve from the set of abilities and expectations of the parched regions of Africa, tens of thousands of years ago, to those needed in the two hundred or so countries today, most of them heavily reliant on formal education—at least for the first decade of life—and increasingly, continuing to a later age and to a higher degree?)

A number of possibilities emerge:

l. The human brain-and-body have been largely unchanged. Over time, groups of humans invented more complex operations, and our ancestors were gradually able to master them;

2. The brain-body has evolved, or selected for, certain traits that enabled the invention and implementation of notational systems and scholarly disciplines—and branches unable to handle them (e.g. Neanderthals) disappeared;

Aristotle

3. Certain exceedingly rare individuals (e.g. Aristotle, Newton) with atypical genes, or combinations of genes—and/or with rare talents and combinations of talents—took the lead in inventing notations and disciplines. Once invented, these new symbols—and  systems of symbols—gradually took hold even with less exceptional persons;

Plato

4. More formal ways of transmitting knowledge were created either gradually or by the rare genius (e.g. Confucius, Moses, Plato). These, in turn, led to the creation of institutions where those forms of knowing could be efficiently transmitted, mastered to some extent by most students—and built upon by the most able students.

No doubt, the actual story is far more complex than suggested here, or than can even be imagined. By his impressive syntheses, David Geary has opened up a whole world of study and inquiry which will hopefully lead both to new insights and to more effective and species-appropriate educational systems…ones that we will need as the Anthropocene continues to unfold.

For very helpful comments. I thank David Geary and Ellen Winner.

REFERENCES

Black, A., & Tylianakis, J. M. (2024). Teach Indigenous knowledge alongside science. Science (New York, N.Y.), 383(6683), 592–594. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adi9606

Geary, D. C. (2005). The origin of mind: Evolution of brain, cognition, and general intelligence. American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/10871-000

Geary, D. (2024). The evolved mind and modern education: Status of evolutionary educational psychology. Cambridge University Press.