Intelligence: The Great Debate

by Diana Bohmer

My child gets straight As.

Mine has a knack for solving problems.

Mine does great on projects, but barely passes written tests.

My child got a 1570 on the SAT.

Mine is a nationally ranked swimmer.

What does it mean when a parent says, "My child is gifted," or a teacher says to a parent, "Your child is so intelligent"? Think about it for a minute. If you feel your child is smart, are you thinking of his or her ability to do well on tests? To read and comprehend? Do you think of athletic ability, cooperative skills, or leadership as intelligence?

Intelligence: What is It?

Research has again raised important questions about the nature and the definition of intelligence. While some parents and educators hold up the Stanford-Binet IQ Test as the definitive measure of intelligence, researchers now tend to agree that IQ accounts for about 20 percent of the ingredients for "success" in life. Learning to cooperate, problem solve, persist, and understand oneself and others are all important. These skills are more attuned to the affective, or "feelings" side of the brain, and have not been considered factors of intelligence -- until recently.

The newest view of intelligence, made available to the general public in Daniel Goleman's book Emotional Intelligence, and popularized by making the cover of Time magazine last year, is the theory of EQ, the intelligence of the emotions. Goleman explores the theory that there is intelligence in feelings themselves and that this intelligence can and should be taught.

A Short History Lesson
The history of western civilization has been filled with questions about the location and nature of intelligence. Early Egyptians believed that thought came from the heart, and judgment from the head or kidneys.

Through the centuries, many philosophers and scientists have viewed the intellect as being a single entity that one is born with and that cannot be altered. This is the view that has resulted in the reliance on IQ tests and the coveting of the highest-ranking results.

The other historical tradition is to see the mind as having different parts or functions. Many Greek and Roman philosophers talked about the differences between reason, will, and feeling. From this tradition comes Howard Gardner, one of the best-known "intelligence" researchers. He has a theory of "multiple intelligences" and defines intelligence as "the ability to solve problems, or to create products that are valued within one or more cultural settings." His definition intentionally avoids determining the source of intelligence and any testing instruments to judge it.

Gardner has written about seven intelligences, though he does not believe that the list is necessarily complete. They are:

1. Linguistic
2. Musical
3. Logical-Mathematical
4. Spatial (understanding of spatial relationships)
5. Body/Kinesthetic (athletic/balance abilities)
6. Interpersonal (ability to understand oneself)
7. Intrapersonal (ability to understand others)

Enough Gobbledygook!
What do philosophers and brain researchers have to do with my child's education, you might ask. Everything. Beliefs about intelligence shape the very way that schools and classes are structured. They affect decisions about financing education. They even affect our judgments about individuals and our children's views about themselves. When a child does very well in classes, then gets a low grade on a standardized test, parents and the child often give more weight to the test, concluding that the child "isn't as smart as I thought" or that the teacher "must be inflating the grades." But those who believe there are multiple intelligences would conclude that the child is not strong in the type of intelligence measured by that test (often memory and analytical thinking on standardized tests).

Where belief in a single, measurable intelligence is strong, you will usually find schools use a tracking system (grouping students according to their intellectual abilities). Competition is promoted, as is individual excellence. In communities where IQ is not the highest standard, you are more likely to find groups of mixed abilities and cooperative learning, where children work together and each member's unique strengths contribute to a strong whole. Team work is promoted.

Classroom structure is largely determined by beliefs about intelligence. The quiet classroom with orderly rows appeals more to those whose strengths lie in the logical/analytical intelligences. Classrooms created with the belief that people possess different types of intelligence tend to contain numerous groups and styles of teaching and learning, which may appear quite chaotic to the uninitiated observer.

In a system based on the belief that children think and learn differently, you will also find alternative styles of testing. The multiple choice, true/false, and short answer tests are replaced (or supplemented) with things like portfolios, which show many samples of a student's work in various stages, and "performance assessments,"which give a student or group of students a problem to solve that will require numerous activities -- research, experimentation, trial and error, presentation -- to complete the task.

What's a Parent to Believe?
Dumbing Down Our Kids, by Charles Sykes, claims that ideas like cooperative learning and teachers' concern with the emotional well-being of children is the cause of widespread lower scores on SATs and other standardized tests. But, Gardner points out that "many people with IQs of 160 work for people with IQs of 100, because they lack intrapersonal intelligence. And in the day-to-day world, no intelligence is more important than the interpersonal .... We need to train children in the personal intelligences in school." The Value in All This?

If nothing more, we should consider the unique strengths and abilities of our children. If your son is a straight-C student, perhaps his strengths would shine in a differently structured classroom or when tested in new ways. If your daughter refuses to be involved in team sports, maybe her strengths are in individualized settings. The debate need not end in an "either/or" conclusion. The value is in expanding the possibilities to build our children's strengths and to introduce them to the skills that lead to happy, successful lives. We must go beyond one way of thinking.

More on: Developing Gifts and Talents