Creating Intelligent Schools
Can our schools be named Intelligent Schools? Definitely not, for the reason that our schools have children who are being tagged as idiots, morons and waste. Most of the children are labeled in this fashion by parents and teachers – people who are supposed to facilitate learning in children! So our schools are brimming with idiots, morons and waste and not children. When the traditional definition of intelligence is offered only twenty percent of the children can be named as intelligent children, and the school (or any learning environment) is supposed to be a place of intelligence. That makes it imperative for us to go for a new definition of intelligence. Our schools provide an environment in which our children are asked to perform on certain prescribed formats according to a very rigid set of rules in a suffocating framework. Only twenty percent manages to perform well under the given conditions and we term these children as intelligent and the rest of the children are being labeled as ‘good for nothings’. The peculiarity of the human brain is its diverse faculties. Here we are not providing for these diverse faculties but the focus is on only a very limited set of faculties and we term these faculties alone as intelligence! Intelligence is the power to survive and every human being is blessed with this power and no two human beings use this power in identical fashion. This is specifically why we have no dearth of philosophies, thoughts, ideas and living styles. Humanity has come to embrace all these differences enthusiastically.
When it comes to creating the learning environment are we so sophisticated in our approach? Why our schools does not provide for the diverse abilities of our children? Why can’t we make our learning environment more learner oriented? It has become mandatory that in order to survive every learner has to have some proficiency in language, logical thinking and reasoning abilities. But, should we stress that these are to be learned in only those styles that we design it? Just like we adults talk about choices are we not supposed to offer our children the choice of learning these basic things the way they prefer to learn it? Every learner has her/his fortress of strength and this need to be identified. This is where the theory of multiple intelligences has its applications. Human beings have different sets of intelligences and language abilities and logical thinking is not the only intelligences as far as human beings are concerned. They have the ability to visualize things and identify patterns, they also has the capacity to identify rhythms, sounds and pitches, they can also be very active physically and excel in areas that needs physical coordination, they have the power to identify the changing patterns of nature and be more aware of the peculiarities of nature. They too have the power of interpersonal relations and some are very good at knowing better about the self. Include in this the faculties of language and logical thinking and we get eight different domains of intelligences as far as human beings are concerned. Most of the human beings show a natural tendency to possess three of the eight faculties at a higher level compared to the other five. As providers of learning we need to identify these dominant faculties in each child and this knowledge can be utilized in creating Intelligent Schools.
Once we put such a system in place no children will be termed as idiot, moron or waste as every child is intelligent one way or the other. This creates a positive learning environment as far as the children are concerned. Now the focus shifts from an instructor oriented environment to that of a learner oriented environment. The application of theory of Multiple Intelligence is the tool that can enhance learning in children. The children, once their better developed faculties are identified using scientific techniques are given a positive reinforcement as they are made aware of their own strengths. These acknowledgements of their strengths in turn encourages the children to pursue knowledge acquisition using their own styles and naturally this will motivate the children to have better understanding of themselves and will also help them in planning their future in a meaningful way. Once the tool has been implemented, how to create the ambience to excel in their pursuit of knowledge? This is where the unique human ability comes in to play. The human beings have a specific area in the brain devoted for emotions. Emotions do play a vital role in our survival and hence in our intelligence. Creating an emotionally intelligent school is also mandatory when we think of a learner oriented approach towards education. Emotionally literate teachers and parents can go a long way in creating the ambience for learning. The emotional competency of the teachers, parents and children need to be developed further to take our children to greater heights of learning. Thus Multiple Intelligence is the tool and Emotional Intelligence is the ambience as far as learning environments is concerned.
