Comments on: Reframing the Mind

By: T. Taylor

T. Taylor — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 17:21:11 +0000

Who’s Right? Who’s Wrong? The landscape is fill with so such information until it is quite confusing. It would be great to have a person (Organization) who to do the research, and give a definitive answer, about how the brain correlates to teaching and learning. It seems as if everyone trying prove a point and get paid in the process.

This is too important for the future of education.

By: e-reck

e-reck — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 18:20:27 +0000

Everyone that is involved in writing education policy should be aware of this information. It is unfortunate that as a teacher, part of my evaluation is based on my ability to modify my teaching based on different learning modalities or itelligences. It shoud be the content that drives the modality. Thank you for this article!

By: What are people's thoughts on Howard Gardner's Multiple Intelligences Theory? - Quora

Sat, 02 Jul 2011 18:42:11 +0000

[...] both in terms of scientific rigor and in terms of producing measurable differences in learning.http://educationnext.org/reframi…In short, Gardner's theory is not rigorous. It does a poor job of defining what makes something [...]

By: anna

anna — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 17:47:57 +0000

I wish articles like this were discussed more often in education classrooms. I just finished a semester of ‘Teaching Methods’ that involved emphasis on MI – the instructor said, “Do this, because it’s engaging,” except that we never got to find out why it might work, or what kind of data supports MI, if any. THANKS, D. WILLINGHAM! I want to read your book.

By: R. Schultz

R. Schultz — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 15:40:26 +0000

I personally feel that there are many aspects that both, the concepts this article represents, and the writing in itself that should be taken into further consideration. Each point in the mind works as one, as does the environment around these points, and furthermore spread past that. We each seek knowledge on a natural standard as that is currently what is taught, to seek knowledge. If we only seek knowledge in order to further our knowledge, and place a greater span of intelligence on how to seek more knowledge, would we then forever be placed in a struggle for more said knowledge? A long time I have struggled with learning and it was not single factors, nor as were the reasons I lacked certain motivations or the ability to ‘feel’. We are taught in specifics that even the teachers do not comprehend to the fullest extent, and mostly it is a very competitive field of study; knowledge in itself. If you speak in terms that a person may not fully understand, you might feel at a higher level intelligence, or you may not see why that person does not understand. Thus the insult used towards people, when calling them “stupid”. In those cases people would fear of how that effects a person, taking into consideration the behavorial levels of analysis rather than cause and effect in itself. Truthfully, if a person is raised expected to have intelligence, taught that they need to learn to become successful, they may look at others and feel that they should already have that intelligence. So instead of allowing the maturity and growth in the natural brain to form, and entirely developing the human ego, the base stress of emotion at even such a young age can take a very hard toll on a person for the entirety on their life. So if the cognitive science is in terms showing the base levels of analysis, or if teachers feel that repetition, or group structural foundations are effective ways of teaching how to learn and develop specific skills, maybe we should not only take into consideration these possible tools but also the invidual effects they place on specific minds, at say the level of the child.
If Gardner was not entirely accurate with his findings or beliefs, or if Willingham has sought new breakthroughs in child learning, or if someone feels everyone is wrong about what they say, what difference is pointing that out going to make? The best to do is to move on in respects of the other’s belief, as to be honest each point someone has to make is more valuable than no point at all. Use each finding to create the most efficient form of intelligence, taking into consideration of all levels of analysis at the same time; there’s your critical thinking.

So much more than just one point should be implemented into a valid statement, thus creating a higher level of difficulty to communicate those findings or to fully comprehend it one’s self. It was said that people find motivation to learn or research based on a surge of success or pleasure from achieving what was seeked. With that said, would people only be seeking out this feeling rather than respectfully doing their best to make this world a better place? Is it all just then “A Game of Thrones”?How is someone to differentiate successfully between these abstract thoughts and what the reality is behind all of this knowledge that is tossed around like the flavor of the month? With being said that critical thinking is not easy, I find this more of a given rather than the high point of all that needs to be said. I feel after long examining improvements in my own mental health, based on perspectives of those around me and changes in my environment for what is the “normality” of a sixteen years old male, critical thinking is not so very difficult as is to communicating what I wish to explore, or being capable of doing so.

TLDR: Respect, listening, and patience for understanding goes a long way in teaching. No matter who you are, where you are or what you say, if you come in contact with another person you in one way or another to any extent change their life. Every person is different, the mind is deep and complex and all points should be taken into consideration and used in one way or another, no matter the tone or success of which they are presented.
I say this all not as a studied fact nor my only direct opinion, but how I have experienced schooling and the different effects each ‘point’ has placed on me.
And as my not-so-final-thought, maybe Gardner’s ‘g’ theory could be placed in a more abstract thought with it being the general but it holding ‘p’, points; in time, in mind, in self, in environment. Intelligence can be thought of as translated, or taught, or enherited, but it will always be the same concept in each person, judged by another based on biased or taught beliefs, as everything we know is taught to us through history and the specifics of the past believers.
And to prove that very point wrong, I was not taught this format of words I am communicating, I created it using what I have been taught in the past. Thus understanding the process of creation more-so than I did, and this being the first time I have felt accomplished of doing so. I may not be accurate on everything as I do not claim to be, but there is so much to learn and I should not have to feel as though I am wrong for having to, for we all have to learn.

TLDR again: Play well with others.

By: Patrick Smith

Patrick Smith — Sat, 03 Apr 2010 07:48:47 +0000

Professor Willingham, I found your article to be insightful, thoughtful, and well-written. Thanks very much for sharing your thoughts on this topic.

By: Brian Spencer

Brian Spencer — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 22:06:43 +0000

I have been trying to do two things: locate empirical testing done on MI theory, and a reason that it has not been thrown out as a transparent attempt to copy Thurstone’s Primary Abilities Theory (1938).
To date, I have found one empirical study and the results of that study (by Visser,Ashton and Vernon, 2006) echoes the study that caused Thurstone to change his view on HIS theory. Why is MI still being defended, instead of dropped?

By: L. Hack

L. Hack — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 20:10:23 +0000

Have you ever taught in an elementary school? I find your article (as I search for scholarly peer reviewed material for my paper) insulting to educators. Your review of others “100,000 studies” doesn’t make you experienced in the ways children learn in classrooms. Your favor of conventional IQ tests most of which are detested with education practioners with which I work and study is deplorable. At least MI gives educators and parents another tool that is useful. IQ tests created by psychologists are NOT indictative of school success as soon as they are given in pencil and paper format ( now they are a reading/writing test) or as soon as they given 1:1 outside of a classroom because you have taken the child out of the precise setting for which you are trying to predict success. Your insights are not completely objective and your article, unuseable to me as peer reviewed & objective, due to the emtional nature of your writing.

Sad.