COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA

Copyright Regulations 1969

WARNING

This material has been reproduced and communicated to

you by or on behalf of Deakin University pursuant to
Part V B of the Copyright Act 1968 (the Act).

The material in this communication may be subject to

copyright under the Act. Any further reproduction or
communication of this material by you may be the subject
of copyright protection under the Act.

Do not remove this notice.

Please note
This document has been processed by an optical character recognition program, thus
there is a possibility of transcription errors. Please note that the original scanned
image is also available for download.
Darold E Klindworth

Using multiple intelligences: Collaboratively planning a unit

of work
More and more teachers are exploring issues of teaching and
learning these days. Gardner's Multiple Intelligences (Ml) is one of
the theories commonly referred to.

Multiple intelligences are generally discussed as being seven in number. They are
Rhythmic/Musical, Bodily/ Kinaesthetic, Verbal/Linguistic, Visual/Spatial, Logical/ Mathematical,
Interpersonal, and Intrapersonal. The descriptive characteristics for each of these intelligences
are listed in numerous books. Gardner (1993) has a detailed discussion of his theory. Lazear
(1994) has a very user friendly coverage of MI. George Betts presented in one of his stimulating
sessions at the middle school conference 'Hot Topics' a list of characteristics generated by
primary students he was working with in the USA. Some of these characteristics are found in
Figure 1.

In January of '97 Gardner announced at a conference in Melbourne that he now suggests that
there is another intelligence - called naturalist. This deals with the knowledge of the natural
world. Betts provided some helpful characteristics for this intelligence which are included in
Figure 1.

By allowing students to work across a range of intelligences we increase the opportunities for
learners to work in ways they are comfortable with. It should also reduce boredom and increase
motivation. It has also been suggested that learning should be improved by activating learners
in a range of intelligences rather than in just their preferred ones.

When planning a unit based on MI activities an easy way to collaboratively work out a list of
activities would be to provide large sheets of paper (A3, butchers paper etc), one labelled for
each intelligence. Moving from one sheet to the next, ask participants to contribute as many
ideas as possible. This is a very effective way to generate ideas especially when working with
an entire faculty or if integrating with other faculties. This method is a fairly quick way to produce
a list of activities for any unit of work.

PAGE 25

Figure 2 contains some of the ideas generated at a workshop run at STAVCON '97. The topic
for the activity was ecology.

I am grateful to Toni Noble for the idea she shared at the co- operative learning conference in
1997. I would also like to thank the participants at the workshop at last year's STAVCON.

References
Betts, George, 1997, Creating an Environment for Learning, paper presented to Hot Topics
conference, Moorabbin, Victoria, 16-17 May.
Gardner, Howard 1993, Frames of Mind, Fontana Press, London.

Gardner, Howard, 1997, Multiple Intelligences, paper presented at Using Your Brian
conference, Melbourne, 22-24 January.

Lazear, David, 1994, Seven Ways of Knowing, Hawker Brownlow Education, Highett, Victoria.

Noble, Toni, 1997, Seven ways at once and six levels of thinking in the Co-operative Team,
paper presented at Australasian Association for Co-operative Education, Melbourne, 4-7 July.

Figure 1

TABLE 1

MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES AND SOME OF THEIR CHARACTERISTICS

PAGE 26

Figure 2

TABLE 2 MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCE ACTIVITIES FOR AN ECOLOGY UNIT

TEXTBOX BEGINS

Interpersonal

Group reports on a particular ecosystem - research and report back to the whole class

Jigsaws - 'co-operative learning' eg. Food web in a woodland

Interview situation - role plays involving consumers

Play an animal 'group' (lion pack, monkey troop, etc.)

Play with string to show food web connections

TEXTBOX ENDS
PAGE 27