Multiple Intelligences

    How do we elicit  a passion for learning in children?  The way we learn, our interests, and the desire for intelligence, inspire us to seek knowledge.   Knowing what a child relates best to and how they learn can give us insight into creating an environment where students want to be involved in the learning process.  This is where Multiple Intelligences come in to play.  Every student is unique and has both strengths and weaknesses.  Our job as teachers is to encourage those strengths and shore up the weaknesses.  Denying an understanding of Multiple Intelligence sets up an environment somewhat like the cartoon below.

The interests and natural abilities of students play a vital role in their understanding of new concepts.  When students believe they are not capable of learning they stop trying. When students know that they are all intelligent in different ways and they have the opportunity to see other avenues of using what they enjoy to strengthen weak areas, it helps them to feel valuable.  Then they are empowered to work toward better understanding.  

   In class this week we looked a Multiple Intelligences.  We discussed how this can apply to the classroom.  We took an inventory of our own intelligences and plotted them on a chart with the rest of the class.  There was a wide variety of strengths and weaknesses. No two people had the same results.  We then created a graph which provided some interesting insight into the relationships between some of the intelligences. All of the intelligences are interconnected.   I discovered that there is a distinct correlation between music and language.  It will be interesting to see what the rest of the class discovered when we return next week.  

Blog Activity for Students

Learning does not take place in a vacuum.   As teachers, we want our students to apply what they have learned in class to real world situations.  This is where I think a blog activity would be useful.  I would have students blog about what they learn outside of the class and how they apply what they learn in class outside of the classroom. 

Examples of assignments:

• Students search for geometric shapes around town and post pictures of their results on the blog.  Their classmates could then try to guess where the picture was taken. 
• Students write of something they learned on a trip. 
• Students write of a talent or activity they have learned outside of class, such as a sport, playing an instrument, or something they have learned in scouting our 4H.

The learning goals for this activity are to get the students to think about learning and to actively discover ways to apply what they are learning in class to real world activities. 

The students’ posts would enable you to judge whether they were able to grasp the object of the lesson.  If they are accurately applying what they have learned in class you will know that they have an understanding of what they are learning and if not you will know where you need to go back and reteach.  

In setting up my blog, I went to the Blogger web site and entered the required information.  I have had prior experience in blogging so this process was very simple.  The difficulty came when adding members from the class.  Trying to find everyone in the class was made easier by having a list of class email addresses.  Then I discovered that I had added members to Google+  and not sent the URL of my blog to others or followed their blogs.  All these problems become a learning curve to discover how to go about using new technology and different ways of doing things.

Welcome to my blog.  I will be exploring ways of using technology in education.  Join me on my adventure!