Providing Effective Schooling for Students at Risk

Howard Gardner

Howard Gardner, director of Project Zero at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, talks about the theory of multiple intelligences as a framework for thinking about human cognition. Excerpted from the video series Restructuring to Promote Learning in America's Schools, videoconference #4, Multidimensional Assessment: Strategies for the Classroom (North Central Regional Educational Laboratory, 1991).

"So the theory of multiple intelligence not only broadens our notion of being smart, quote, unquote, but it also says even when you have a regular curriculum there are lots of entry points into that curriculum and we shouldn't assume there's only one way to teach geography or geometry or history or math. The theory of multiple intelligence is not like a little bunny that you wind up and you can put it right into a classroom. It's really a framework for thinking about the human cognition. "

This Critical Issue was researched and written by Mary Ann Costello, a free-lance writer, based on an outline and comments submitted by John H. Hollifield, associate director of the Center for Research on the Education of Students Placed At Risk (CRESPAR), and Lynn Stinnette, director of Center for School and Community Development at the North Central Regional Educational Laboratory.

Date posted: 1996